JOHN SMYTH’s abuse was properly referred to the police by the Church of England in 2013, retired senior law enforcement officials have told the Church Times. Their comments challenge the Makin review’s conclusion in regards to the responses of the diocese of Ely, and of Lambeth Palace, in that yr.
In a “summary of failures”, the Makin report says: “There was never a proper referral to Cambridgeshire Police.” But three retired detectives with extensive safeguarding experience have told the Church Times that, on the evidence presented within the report, a referral had properly been made by church authorities in 2013.
Analysing the steps taken by the Bishop of Ely’s safeguarding adviser, Yvonne Quirk, in 2013 after learning of the abuse, one retired police detective, who has worked in safeguarding for greater than 20 years, told the Church Times: “I don’t know the way rather more of a referral you may get.”
None of the three former officers were willing to place their name to their concerns, owing to their holding independent safeguarding positions, and shall be known as former officers A, B, and C.
In his report, released on 7 November, the independent reviewer Keith Makin wrote: “John Smyth could and will have been formally reported to the police within the UK and to authorities in South Africa . . . by Church officers, including a diocesan Bishop and Justin Welby in 2013.”
Former officer B told the Church Times: “Nobody can say this isn’t a hideous, horrific case, but to say that, in 2013, nobody did anything, and that it wasn’t a police referral, resulting in where we at the moment are with the Archbishop resigning, it’s just unsuitable.”
The Makin report records that the police detective who received information from Ms Quirk understood the conversation to be about giving advice. The report says that the police officer, Lisa Pearson, “didn’t consider this to be a proper referral to the Police”.
But this, the previous detectives claim, is contradicted by the undeniable fact that there followed a gathering between Ms Quirk and two of Ms Pearson’s senior colleagues.
An in-person meeting with senior officers to debate the case was not an off-the-cuff process, former officer C said: “That’s reporting to police.” Officer C said that it was unclear to them what Mr Makin meant by a “formal referral”.
When this was put to Mr Makin, his spokesperson said: “Any detail on police involvement beyond what’s contained within the report is an issue for the police.”
Former officer A also said that the production of an “intelligence report” by Cambridgeshire Police, to be sent to Hampshire Police, about Smyth’s actions was further evidence that Ms Quirk was justified in considering that the disclosures had been treated seriously by police.
Officer A emphasised that this was not a criticism of Ms Pearson, who, they said, had acted accurately by bringing in senior colleagues.
The Makin report says that “no other record” of the intelligence report had been found, and a spokesperson for Hampshire Constabulary told the Church Times: “No intelligence report was received by us from the force mentioned throughout the report.”
Ms Pearson, who’s now assistant diocesan safeguarding adviser in Ely, declined to comment. The Church Times was unable to contact Ms Quirk.
The Makin report says that Archbishop Welby was “ill-advised in regards to the actions taken within the Ely diocese”, where Smyth’s abuse was first reported to a church safeguarding adviser. “He was told that a referral had been made to the police. This was not correct.”
All three of the retired detectives who spoke to the Church Times suggested that, on the idea of the data presented within the report, Archbishop Welby was justified in considering in 2013 that proper processes had been followed.
The Church, officer B said, had “trusted the skilled judgement of the police, and discharged its obligation when it comes to referral”.
In the statement announcing his decision to resign, Archbishop Welby said: “When I used to be informed in 2013 and told that police had been notified, I believed wrongly that an appropriate resolution would follow” (News, 12 November).
In an announcement on the identical day as Archbishop Welby announced his resignation, the Bishop of Lincoln, the Rt Revd Stephen Conway, who was Bishop of Ely in 2013, said: “It was my understanding that this matter was reported to the Police in Cambridgeshire and duly passed on to the Police in Hampshire where the abuse had occurred.”
Ms Quirk, officer B said, was “absolutely right” to think that she had made a referral, and due to this fact Bishop Conway and Archbishop Welby were justified of their confidence that a referral had been made: “Because the adviser said: ‘I’ve made a referral and I’ve had a gathering with them, but they don’t feel there is usually a prosecution.’”
On the interactions between Ms Quirk and the police, the Makin report says: “The crucial issue here is that these two interactions with Police were later assumed, by more senior Church leaders, to be a ‘report back to police’, although no crime record or crime reference number was made.”
But the previous detectives who spoke to the Church Times dismissed the apparent conflation of against the law report with against the law reference number. “Whether it’s given against the law number or not, it doesn’t mean it wasn’t a referral,” officer A said.
Instead, officer A said that this indicated that the police, having considered the evidence, had decided not to research it as against the law — a conclusion that echoes Ms Quirk’s account of the meeting within the Makin report: that the case “had been given proper consideration but there was no possibility of a criminal investigation. That is why there was no crime number.”
In 2014, an inspection of Cambridgeshire Police concluded that the recording of crimes referred to the force by third parties, including “other public sector organisations”, required urgent attention.
“We found little evidence of supervision of those systems and we found that there isn’t any cross-referencing to the crime-recording system,” the inspection report said.
Crime Recording Rules from the Home Office say: “A belief by the victim, or person reasonably assumed to be acting on behalf of the victim, that against the law has occurred is generally sufficient to justify its recording.”
A spokesperson for Cambridgeshire Constabulary said last week: “Concerns regarding the conduct of a person within the Eighties were discussed at a safeguarding meeting in October 2013. Limited information was spoken about in relation to 2 victims of physical abuse who had approached representatives from the diocese of Ely, but didn’t want to be identified or make a proper criticism to the police.
“Both victims were adults on the time of the alleged incidents and not one of the incidents were believed to have taken place in Cambridgeshire. With the limited information available on the time, and the victims’ not wishing to make a criticism, it was impossible for us to pursue an investigation.”
The Makin report says that, “had the known and full description of the abuse been shared” in 2013, it “would have indicated the seriousness of the abuse and potential level of risk posed by John Smyth. In turn, this will have led to further Police led investigation at this point.”
The Makin report records that Ms Quirk said that she refuted the claim that she didn’t share fully the knowledge that she had in regards to the abuse in her interactions with the police.
“REALLY, what more could the Church have done?” said former officer A, in relation to making sure that the police were investigating John Smyth in 2013.
Asked whether a bishop or archbishop asking the police to research further would have been prone to have an effect, the previous officers said that they’d have been given the identical rationale for not pursuing the case that Ms Quirk was given.
“They couldn’t coerce the police into taking motion,” former officer C said, though suggested that, with more resources, church authorities could have further investigated Smyth and presented more evidence to police.
Officer C warned, nonetheless, of the danger of judging actions in 2013 with the good thing about hindsight.
In response to a request by the Church Times, Mr Makin agreed to reply written questions via a public relations adviser.
Asked to comment on the suggestion that knowledge of Smyth’s abuse had been properly referred, Mr Makin’s spokesperson said: “Any detail on police involvement beyond what’s contained within the report is an issue for the police.”
Asked what specific motion Bishop Conway and Archbishop Welby could have taken with regard to making sure police pursued the case, Mr Makin’s spokesperson said: “The point made by the report is that each of the bishops you’ve named knew in regards to the abuse that had taken place and mistakenly thought the matter was being pursued by the police and more must have, and will have, been done to make sure appropriate motion was being taken.”
Asked whether he thought that the actions of the police ought to be reviewed, Mr Makin’s spokesperson told the Church Times: “That wouldn’t be a choice for Keith to make, it’s beyond the remit of the review.”
In an announcement, Mr Makin said: “The focus of the report is the experiences of the victims and these should remain central to any discussion in regards to the events which have taken place, the processes that ought to or could have taken place, and what changes are yet to return to safeguard people in the long run. We must not ever forget why this review was launched in the primary place.”
Lambeth Palace declined to comment.
In addition to the previous officers, the Church Times also spoke with several current church safeguarding professionals, who, due to their jobs, didn’t wish to be identified. One said that asking questions on Mr Makin’s conclusions was “not an anti-survivor narrative, on any level”, and emphasised that proper scrutiny of all of the institutions referred to within the Makin report was necessary for securing improvements in safeguarding.
Asked to comment on the expectations put upon safeguarding personnel within the Church of England, a spokesperson for the National Safeguarding Team said: “Our Responding guidance could be very clear — that full and detailed reporting and referrals must happen, with all concerns and allegations logged in writing.
“Any contacts and/or meetings with statutory agencies including police ought to be recorded in writing and a duplicate kept securely within the respondent case file. This record should include the date the referral was sent, which agency it was referred to, by whom and any decision made in relation to the priority or allegation.”
Guidance on practice from the College of Policing says that “passing information between agencies is a referral if someone believes a baby could also be suffering or is vulnerable to suffering significant harm.
“The police may turn out to be aware of kid abuse cases through contact by a representative from one other agency (for instance, children’s social care, education or health sector, or the [NSPCC]. This information could also be received as a documented or verbal referral.”
