This story contains detailed descriptions of offensive sexual acts.
It started with a phone call.
Late at night in October 2022, my mobile lit up with a withheld number.
There was a man at the other end of the call, a voice – and then he started making noises.
Without a doubt, this stranger was masturbating down the phone.
The noises got louder and louder. My heart raced, struggling to believe what I’d just heard. I hung up. But the phone rang again and again.
At this point, I switched into journalist mode.
I knew this man needed to be reported and I was sure the police could trace the call – but they’d need evidence.
So I ran upstairs and grabbed my work phone. On his third or fourth attempt to call back I picked up the call and put it on speakerphone, and recorded him.
For five minutes I listened and recorded as he masturbated, calling out my first name, using vulgar language to say “suck my [penis]” and making other obscene and lewd comments about my genitalia. I wondered when he would have had enough and when I would have enough evidence.
I was concerned about my personal safety: if this man knew my first name and number, did he know me? Had I met him? Was it someone I’d interviewed? Did he know where I lived?
He had an accent I didn’t recognise, maybe Midlands. I assumed it was in some way connected to the fact I was an on-air journalist but I wasn’t sure. I dialled 999 to report the crime.
The following day I went to my local police station to give a statement and was asked to upload the taped recording onto the Metropolitan Police’s system.
I was naively hopeful they could use it to quickly trace the caller and arrest the man.
I’ve worked on too many stories of violence against women – including the disappearance and subsequent rape and murder of Sarah Everard.
Police had failed to investigate Wayne Couzens for at least three indecent exposure offences before he murdered Sarah Everard. Experts say those offences may have been a “red flag” that someone could go onto more serious offending.
So I had two concerns: my own safety and making sure this man couldn’t go on to commit more serious sexual offences.
The whole ordeal would turn out to be an eye-opening experience into why so many sexual offences go unreported or unpunished, how slow the police and justice system move and how despite the warm words, women are still being failed, due to police incompetence.
Police actually dropped my case and only reopened after a Victims’ Right to Review was carried out.
He was eventually charged – but he wouldn’t have been if I hadn’t taken control of it.
To make matters worse, three days ago I found out he’d actually been convicted in 2015 for making 15,000 calls to random numbers – raising even more questions about why it took so long to get him charged now.
The Met Police admitted their handling of the case “clearly fell short”.
Lancashire Police said their initial handling “did not meet the standard expected”.
Here’s how it unfolded.
