Believe Me

ITVX

If you thought that misogyny in the UK police force was a thing of the past, this sobering drama will change your mind. Most of us are aware of sexism in various UK police forces over the past 50 years, from the repeated referral to the Yorkshire Ripper’s victims as ‘prostitutes’ rather than ‘women’ through to the astonishing warning signs that Sarah Everard’s rapist and murderer, Wayne Couzens, was a danger to women.

Other examples include the police officers taking selfies of themselves next to the murdered bodies of Bibaa Henry and Nicole Smallman, and distributing them with chirpy comments referring to the victims as ‘dead birds’ - this after the police initially refused to search for the missing sisters, leading to the family having to carry out their own search and coming across the horrific murder scene themselves.

But even though I was familiar with the crimes of black cab driver John Worboys, before seeing this powerful drama, I had no idea of the scale of his offending - nor the dismissive way his victims were treated by the Metropolitan Police.