The cop WhatsApp groups shaming Britain's police forces: Ex-detectives call for crackdown on officer work chats after sharing of racist, sexist and grossly offensive messages in string of high-profile cases

Former detectives have called on police WhatsApp groups where 'messages beyond the pale' are allowed to be written in plain sight, to be monitored and pleading with officers to be particularly careful about what they say on social media.

It comes after the grieving mother of Nottingham stab victim Barnaby Webber made a heartfelt plea this week urging officers to show more compassion after her son's body was described as being 'properly butchered' in an appalling WhatsApp chat.

Emma Webber was left feeling 'physically sick' when she was told of the horrific group messages describing the tragic scene where her teenager, along with fellow student Grace O'Malley-Kumar, also 19, had died.

Officers had sent texts with shocking language describing the victims' 'innards out and everything', which has reportedly seen some members of the force being sacked on the low-down.

However it is not the first time that bereaved families - who have lost loved ones in the worst circumstances imaginable - have been subjected to 'more trauma' at the hands of officers working on the cases. 

Sisters Bibaa Henry and Nicole Smallman, who were stabbed to death by 19-year-old devil worshipper Danyal Hussein, were labelled 'dead birds' by two officers who shared six photos of their harmed bodies.

And Sarah Everard's rapist and killer Wayne Couzens had made jokes about rape two years before he murdered her, while his colleagues also laughed about sexually assaulting domestic abuse victims. 

Anti-crime campaigner Norman Brennan, who worked as a London police officer for 31-years, told MailOnline, said while he does not believe the group chats should be banned outright, better care is needed to protect families. 

'It is is a difficult one really. When you are dealing with suicides, murders and other fatalities, sometimes officers will privately say things that they call black humour but to the victim's family it is completely beyond comprehension,' he said.

'Police officers often have to pass on the most dreadful of news and in the minutes when they are dealing with it, sometimes they discuss among themselves using black humour. That is how police has always been.

'But if anything like this ever gets back to the families ears it would be exceptionally upsetting. 

'I've met the most homicide families than anyone else in Britain and I know anything said in the moments where police exchange black humour would be very upsetting.'

Mr Brennan said his main concern lies with who leaked the messages initially rather than asking those responsible to remove the texts to avoid any 'insensitive words' getting back to victim's loved ones.  

'I see both sides and my only overview is that in this day and age - and era of social media -police need to be exceptionally careful,' he added. 

'It is clear they need to be careful with what they post on social media because it can often be released to those it was never intended to be released to.'

Another retired Met Police officer, who also served in the force for three decades, agreed that while the group chats should not be banned something needs to be done to crackdown on the 'appalling' behaviour sometimes seen.

Speaking with regards to the messages about the Nottingham stab victims, the former officer, who asked not to be named, said: I can only say say that such behaviour is appalling.  

'Those in the police can become desensitised by the volume of trauma they witness and it can even affect their mental health but there is no excuse for this or some of the other examples we've seen. 

'There have also been issues with a lowering of recruiting procedure standards due to cuts and Covid. 

'Whilst this behaviour is beyond the pale, the public can be reassured by the hundreds of acts of bravery, kindness and compassion which occur in policing over each and every 24 hours. Most never make the headlines.' 

While both former police officers with decades of experienced called out the appalling nature of such WhatsApp groups, they have stopped short of saying they should be banned altogether. 

Officers said the group chats offer a support network to help cops cope with the 'volume of trauma they witness' and can help ease the burden of witnessing horrific cases that could in turn impact their own mental wellbeing.

The unnamed retired officer said that while he believes WhatsApp groups 'can be useful for officers under stress' the 'College of Policing and each force should lay down strict guidelines for their use and as a strange positive miss-use can also identify officers and staff who we don't want'. 

Mr Brennan added: 'I was a police officer for 31 years, dealing with death, whether it was murder or suicide. It really affects everyone involved including the police officers who are often there to help pick up that devastation.

'And sometimes they are dealing with such travesty they may share black humour which to anyone outside policing, certainly the families, would not be acceptable.

'It has got to the stage now when officers have to realise that whatever you post, if a family member saw it and would find it upsetting or distressing, perhaps to not post it.'  

Nottingham University students Barnaby and Grace were killed alongside local school caretaker Ian Coates, 65, by paranoid schizophrenic Valdo Calocane on June 13 last year.

He admitted manslaughter and was given a hospital order.  

It later emerged that officers working on the horrific tragedy had shared graphic injury details on WhatsApp.  

Grace's father, Dr Sanjoy Kumar, wrote to Nottinghamshire Chief Constable Kate Meynall to express his 'disgust' at the conduct of her officers, while Barnaby's mother Mrs Webber wrote an open letter to the force this week. 

'When you say a couple of students had been 'properly butchered' did you stop to think about the absolute terror they felt in that moment?',' she said on GMB.

'From my perspective it was something that I could not let lie, I had to address it and I wanted the officers concerned, as I put in the letter, to take a moment to pause and think. And I hope it might educate them in the future.

'I wasn't asking for any further misconduct or disciplinary against them. That's been denied the opportunity to do it privately.

'But I do think it is strange how things work out because publicly it's a wider story now and it's at risk of endemic in this country that, particularly the police and our emergency service responders, it's not gallows humour. They are desensitized and disrespectful.'

Begging officers to have more compassion, Ms Webber said: 'Every day I walk past my beautiful boy's bedroom and I see his draws and his wardrobe full of clothes, his shoes where he last left them and countless photos and also the calendar on his wall that will never go beyond June 2023.'

Tragically the messages from the officers who handled the Nottingham case echo other murders and stabbings that have taken place over the years.  

In December 2021, two former Metropolitan Police PCs were put behind bars after they took pictures of murdered sisters Bibaa Henry and Nicole Smallman after they were found dead in the bushes of Fryent Country Park in Wembley, north London. 

The officers took six photographs of the women's bodies after they were stabbed to death in June 2020 by 19-year-old devil worshipper, Danyal Hussein.

Pc Jamie Lewis and Pc Jamie Lewis had been told to guard the scene over night after Ms Henry, 46, and Ms Smallman, 27, were discovered but spent their time sharing the gruesome pictures.

One was a 'selfie-style' image which included Lewis's face superimposed on it. The officers also described the victims as 'dead birds' in WhatsApp groups.

Lewis wrote: 'Unfortunately I'm sat next to two dead birds full of stab wounds.'

Jaffer posted on another WhatsApp group: 'I have pictures of the two dead victims. Let me know who doesn't want to see.'

Both were jailed for two years and nine months with the judge telling the officers they had disregarded the victims' privacy for 'a cheap thrill' or 'some form of bragging right' that led to trust in the police being undermined. 

The officers, however, were released automatically after serving half of their sentence. 

The women's mother Mina Smallman said at the time that the officers' actions were 'a betrayal of catastrophic proportions' and a 'sacrilegious act'.

'Those police officers felt so safe, so untouchable, they felt they would take photos of our murdered daughters. Those officers dehumanised our children,' she said. 

'One of them said they had deleted the picture and they hadn't. The IOPC (Independent Office for Police Conduct) got in touch with us because one of them had been heard offering to show the image,' she said later following their release.

'He could have sent it to anybody. He was called in and made to delete it again. Will one day those pictures suddenly appear?

'That's my biggest worry. That's the one thing Chris [her husband] and I could not do. We couldn't see the bodies. I want to remember the girls as they were, not get images of them after. That's a cause of great concern and anxiety.'

Similarly, depraved rapist and murdered Wayne Couzens joked about rape two years before he murdered Sarah Everard in March 2020. 

Couzens was in a WhatsApp group chat with police officers including PC Jonathon Cobban and PC Joel Borders, who were jailed for three months for the messages in November 2022. 

Four other officers, PC Gary Bailey, PC Matthew Forster, William Neville and PC Daniel Comfort lost their jobs over the incident, after being in the group chats called 'Bottles & Stoppers' and 'Atkin's puppets'.

They contained offensive messages about race, women, rape, violence, sexual orientation, gender reassignment and disability. 

Also in 2022, Charing Cross Police Station was investigated after details emerged off racist WhatsApp messages being exchanged. In February that year the IOPC found officers joked about rape, killing black children and beating their wives.

An investigation found evidence of 'toxic masculinity, misogyny and harassment' within the force with ''banter' used to excuse oppressive and offensive behaviours', and 'bullying and aggressive behaviour'.

One officer was known on WhatsApp as 'mcrapey raperson' was asked to explain the name and said it referred to his reputation for 'harassing them [women], getting on them, do you know what I mean being like, just a d***' 

Other officers used WhatsApp groups to send messages about 'raping' each other, and homophobic comments like 'f*****g gay' and 'F*** you bender' while others mocked the Black Lives Matter movement, ethnic minorities and disabled people.

More recently in December 2023 eight elite Met police officers were spared jail despite sharing racist jokes about Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, Prince William and Kate, the Princess of Wales.

As well as targeting the royals, they mocked-up a street sign called 'Browning Street' alongside a photo of Rishi Sunak, Priti Patel and Sajid Javid.  

Another message featured a racially offensive photo of Prince William and Kate Middleton greeting young black children through a wire fence.

Offensive messages about Romanians, Chinese and other nationalities were also shared in the private group. Remarks were also made about the floods in Pakistan, which killed more than a thousand people.

Michael Chadwell, 62, Peter Booth, 66, Anthony Elsom, 67, Trevor Lewton, 65, Alan Hall, 65, and Robert Lewis, 62, were all sentenced to between six and 14 weeks' imprisonment - suspended for 12 months at Westminster Magistrates Court. 

A spokesman for the College of Policing said: 'The College of Policing recently introduced a refreshed Code of Ethics for officers and staff setting out clearly the behaviour the public has a right to expect from the police service at all times.

'The College of Policing's Code of Ethics sets out that all officers and staff will act with courage, respect, empathy and public service. It guides how officers should behave both on and off duty, and this includes the use of social media.

'The posting of discriminatory, abusive, oppressive, harassing, bullying, victimising or offensive material is incompatible with these ethical policing principles and totally unacceptable.'

Nottinghamshire Police force previously said 'it would be inappropriate to comment further due to the ongoing independent investigation by the IOPC, and the review by the College of Policing.'

The force took immediate action after its Professional Standards Directorate (PSD) found one message posted on a Whatsapp group where words were deemed crude and distasteful. 

The officer faced a gross misconduct trial in January 2024 and was given a final written warning.