Policewoman sues Scotland Yard after being sacked for ‘stealing a handbag’

A policewoman is suing Scotland Yard for sacking her over an alleged handbag theft – claiming she was suffering post-traumatic stress disorder at the time.

The officer, known only as P, said she had needed antidepressants and counselling after surviving an attempted so-called honour killing following her escape from an arranged marriage.

She was dismissed in 2012 after she allegedly stole a woman’s bag and emptied the contents in a bin.

No criminal charges were brought, but a police misconduct panel sacked the woman – who was 29 at the time – for damaging the force’s reputation.

Years earlier, P had been taken to Pakistan and forced into marriage. She was held against her will for a year and claims to have suffered physical and mental abuse.

P eventually escaped and returned to Britain in 2003, before joining the police. Her marriage was declared void in a landmark ruling at the High Court when her estranged husband tried to enter the UK as her spouse.

But months after the ruling, two Pakistani men attacked her at home, beating her and throwing her down the stairs, leaving her with a badly-damaged spine. Following the attack she was diagnosed with PTSD.

A policewoman is suing Scotland Yard for sacking her over an alleged handbag theft – claiming she was suffering post-traumatic stress disorder at the time. The headquarters of New Scotland Yard is pictured above

In 2011, during a drunken night out in Wimbledon, south-west London, she began acting ‘bizarrely’, emptying two handbags into bins, before behaving rudely towards bar staff.

No complaints were made – but P was later arrested and eventually sacked for gross misconduct.

The Supreme Court ruled in 2017 she could appeal against the decision, and the case has since returned to the Central London Employment Tribunal, where P is claiming disability discrimination and unfair dismissal.

P said that though she went to live with her parents in the UK after fleeing the forced marriage, it was clear she had ‘brought shame on her family’ and she became an outcast.

That and the legal challenge to her marriage brought further ‘shame’.

P added: ‘In their view, how could a Pakistani female have the audacity to stand up to this?’

She said the attack at her home was an attempted honour killing and that afterwards ‘my life became a living nightmare and the only place I felt safe was at work, surrounded by other police officers’.

She admitted misconduct over the bags incident and blames the stress she was under for her behaviour.

‘To this day, I have no memory of taking the handbag or behaving in this way,’ she added.

But former colleagues told the hearing she had been suspected of stealing before and had been accused of bizarre behaviour in the past.

Jesse Crozier, counsel for the Met, accused P of tailoring the facts to suit her case and said her conduct had been inappropriate enough to warrant her sacking.

No date has been set for the tribunal’s decision.

The Supreme Court ruled in 2017 she could appeal against the decision, and the case has since returned to the Central London Employment Tribunal, where P is claiming disability discrimination and unfair dismissal. The Supreme Court is pictured above