A top police officer has said her team is doing “everything possible” to bring those responsible for an alleged racially-motivated rape of a Sikh woman in the West Midlands to justice.
Speaking at the scene of the attack, which happened on September 9 in the Tame Road area of Oldbury, West Midlands, on Thursday, Chief Superintendent Kim Madill, police commander at Sandwell, urged anyone with information, doorbell or dashcam footage to come forward.
The victim, reported to be a British-born Sikh aged in her 20s, told West Midlands Police officers a racist remark was made to her during the sexual assault.
The perpetrators allegedly told the woman “you don’t belong in this country, get out” as they sexually assaulted her, between 8am and 8.30am, the Sikh Federation (UK) said.
A man in his 30s, who was arrested on Sunday on suspicion of rape, has been released on bail pending further inquiries, West Midlands Police said on Wednesday.
Ms Madill told the media the investigation is continuing “at pace” and said officers have been trawling hundreds of hours of CCTV.
She said: “Our forensic specialists are also carrying out extensive enquiries. These will continue to be part of the investigation.
“We are working closely with key partners and keeping them as updated as we can.
“While this is being treated as an isolated incident at this time, I understand the fear and concern this has caused our communities.
“Violence against women and girls is a key priority for me and my teams in Sandwell.
“Today, I would like to take this opportunity to ask for the public’s help to bring us the information about who has carried out this horrendous attack.
“If you have any dashcam or doorbell footage that you think would help the investigation, please submit this.
“Finally, I would like to reassure you we are doing everything possible to bring those responsible to justice on behalf of this young woman and our investigation will not stop until the individuals responsible for this awful attack are put before the courts.”
The police chief reappealed for anyone who saw two white men in the area of the attack at the time.
The first man is reported to have had a shaved head, a heavy build and was wearing gloves and a dark coloured sweatshirt, while the second was wearing a grey top with a silver zip.
Ms Madill said it is her team’s “absolute priority” to apprehend the suspects.
She said: “We need to bring them to justice, we need to stop them if they were ever considering doing something like this again. It is the most important thing and our absolute priority.
“We need the public’s help with that. It happened at around 8.30am but those offenders may have been around before that.
“If you have got dashcam footage in the hour or hour-and-a-half before the incident or just after, please just have a little look and send it to us – we will judge whether it is important to the inquiry.”
Asked by the media how the victim was doing since the attack, the officer said: “She is doing as you would imagine – this is a horrific, traumatic incident, it will take her her whole life to get over it, but we have got specialist support to her and we are helping her work through her feelings and the challenges she will experience over the next weeks and months.”
The attack happened against a backdrop of anti-immigration protests, rising tensions around the use of the hotels for asylum seekers and an increase in English and British flags being put up in public.
Preet Kaur Gill, the MP for Birmingham Edgbaston, was also at the scene on Thursday morning and said the majority of those who want to celebrate being English “don’t want to divide and create hate”.
She said: “I think there is a minority who will abuse the flag and will use it for means to create division and hate.
“But I do think the division and hate element, separating it from the flag, has meant that people feel more emboldened to be racially and verbally abusive, but to carry out an attack like this? Nobody would have ever expected it to have got to this extent.
“There has got to be an important national conversation that the flags have started about what it means to be British.
“I do worry about the rhetoric and the shifting narrative and change that we are starting to see about the kind of people we do and don’t want to see here.
“This is not the Britain I know. I would never have expected Britain to have ended up in this position in 2025.
“It isn’t about the flag, those that are committing crimes like this don’t have the British values I recognise.”
Anyone with useful information about what happened should contact the force via 101, quoting log 798 of September 9, or on the online portal at: mipp.police.uk/operation/20HQ25C17-PO1.
