Her life was ripped apart when she was raped by police officer Stephen Mitchell.
And now Candice Tote has told of her horror at learning details of Sarah Everard's murder at the hands of another serving police officer, who somehow slipped through the net. The mum was one of a number of vulnerable women who was raped and abused by PC Mitchell, who was jailed for life in 2011 but freed seven years later.
Today as she continues to battle the ongoing torment Mitchell left her with, Candice has told ChronicleLive of her devastation of hearing of Sarah's murder by Metropolitan police officer Wayne Couzens. And the 46-year-old has told how she will never be able to trust the police again.
Candice, who has waived her legal right to anonymity, said: "These people are still becoming police officers, it's disgusting, it's just not right. It just shocked me to think there was another one.
"They are the people we are supposed to be able to go to and to trust. This just shows Mitchell wasn't a one off. There are times when you do need help off the police, but I can't trust them. I won't ever trust a police officer again."
Metropolitan Police PC Wayne Couzens was handed a whole life order for the murder of 33-year-old Durham University graduate, Sarah Everard, in London. The Old Bailey heard how Couzens used his position as a police officer to carry out his crime, which outraged the nation and sparked an ongoing debate about women's safety.
The firearms officer used his Met warrant card and handcuffs to falsely arrest Sarah as she walked home from a friend's house in March 2021. Couzens, 48, from Deal in Kent, then drove his victim to a secluded rural area near Dover in Kent, where he parked up and raped her, before strangling Sarah with his police issue belt.
Couzens' actions bear some chilling similarities to Mitchell's attacks on Candice. Glasgow-born Mitchell, who lived in Whitley Bay, was convicted of two counts of rape, three indecent assaults and six cases of misconduct, in 2010. His crimes involved a number of victims.
Newcastle Crown Court heard how Mitchell targeted heroin addicts and shoplifters he met while on the beat in Newcastle city centre, offering to help them in return for sexual favours. He first met troubled Candice, from Walker in Newcastle, when he arrested her for shoplifting while she was homeless, she explained.
The rogue officer then abused the resources available to him as a trusted police officer to terrorise her. Mitchell would use the force computer system to track her whereabouts before turning up at her home and getting her into his marked police car by falsely claiming there was a warrant out for her arrest, she said.
Mitchell would then drive Candice to secluded locations, for example a lorry park on a duel carriageway, where he handcuffed her to the steering wheel and raped her, she said.
"I used to move all over and he used to find out where I was," Candice explained. "He would come and say there was a warrant out for my arrest and there wasn't. I believed him because he was a police officer."
Candice did not report what Mitchell did to her fearing she would not be believed.
"I was so frightened to tell anybody I kept it all to myself," she said. "I just thought who would believe me against a police officer. I thought I was the only one at the time."
But she realised she was not alone in her torment when she was asked to give evidence against Mitchell, who was based at the now closed Pilgrim Street Police Station in Newcastle city centre. At his trial, in 2010, jurors heard how during his five-year reign of terror the cop preyed on women he met on duty and would arrest vulnerable victims on trumped up charges and then release them in return for sexual favours.
Mitchell was convicted of two rapes, three indecent assaults and six cases of misconduct in public office, involving multiple victims. The judge that handed him two life sentences, at Newcastle Crown Court, described him as a “ruthless sexual predator” and warned that he may never be released.
But in 2018 it was revealed that Mitchell had been freed after serving the seven-and-a-half minimum term of his jail sentence. The decision sparked outrage from politicians, victims' campaigners, and even Mitchell's own daughter.
And it sent Candice's life spiralling even further downwards. She says she now lives a virtually reclusive life, unable to trust those who should be there to help and support her.
She has continued to find herself in and out of trouble with police, and says when she has been arrested and handcuffed it brings back terrifying flashbacks of Mitchell's attacks.
"I was a normal person before all this happened," she said. "Now I might as well be the one doing a life sentence. I feel like I'm broken, I'm like a jigsaw.
"If something happens and I get locked up and they want to handcuff us I go mad. I want someone to come with us because I don't trust them. There's no trust there at all."
After Mitchell's conviction the Independent Police Complaints Commission published a report entitled 'the abuse of police powers to perpetrate sexual violence'. The report highlighted failings that in some cases have allowed individuals with a history of inappropriate behaviour to continue targeting vulnerable women and men they meet while on duty.
The IPCC said senior officers must 'root out' those abusing their position. It also highlighted failures to properly vet officers, particularly those in sensitive posts such as child abuse and domestic violence, and lax supervision of officers, especially those who have displayed suspect behaviour in the past.
And the report identified a tendency for police not to believe vulnerable individuals - most of whom are women - when they reported sexual assaults by police officers. And Candice believes Couzens' case shows that lessons have not been learned from Mitchell's crimes.
"How do they slip through the net?" she said. "A lot more needs to be done about it. They need more checks and more monitoring. I can't understand how it's still going on. How many others could there be?"
