Police watchdog investigators who are alleged to have described an inquiry into the 2023 Nottingham stabbings as politically motivated are “disrespectful and inhumane”, the mother of one victim has said.
Emma Webber said new allegations about staff at the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) had left families asking whom they could trust.
The IOPC is examining the response of police involved in the case of Valdo Calocane, who killed three people. Its investigators are reported to have told Leicestershire police officers who failed to arrest Calocane a month before the stabbings that their disciplinary case was politically motivated and was “being driven by the families of the victims”.
The officers, who did not arrest Calocane for assault even though he was wanted on a warrant for not attending a court hearing relating to previous violence, claim they were told they would get off with “words of advice or reflective practice”.
The IOPC said it was treating the allegations against its staff “extremely seriously” and had commissioned an external investigation.
Webber, the mother of Barnaby Webber, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “This bombshell that the officers themselves have now made a formal complaint with regards to their investigation and interviews in the investigation itself, it’s just mind-blowing.
“It’s indicative of the whole sorry, terrible, tragic mess and the car crash of our institutions. How disrespectful and inhumane is that, you know? To think that it is politically driven. We just want the truth and people that just didn’t do their jobs properly or failed or were neglectful, they must be held to account.”
Speaking on behalf of all the families, she said the development called into question the “legitimacy, honesty and integrity” of the IOPC investigation. “If we cannot trust them to hold the police force to account, then who can we trust?”
A IOPC spokesperson said: “We are aware of allegations made about IOPC staff by Leicestershire police officers who are subjects of an IOPC investigation. The allegations involved comments alleged to have been made about that investigation.
“We are treating this matter extremely seriously and have commissioned an external party to investigate them alongside other complaints about the investigation made by the families of the victims. We will continue to provide the families with regular updates as these matters progress.”
Calocane fatally stabbed Barnaby Webber and Grace O’Malley-Kumar, both 19, as they walked home from a night out in Nottingham in the early hours of 13 June 2023. He then went on to kill caretaker Ian Coates, 65, and attempted to kill three others
Calocane admitted three counts of manslaughter by reason of diminished responsibility and three counts of attempted murder and was sentenced to an indefinite hospital order.
