When police are contacted three times about a man exposing himself in public, you would expect them to investigate. And when his vehicle registration and credit card number are provided, you would expect them to act swiftly. The failures of the Met and Kent police to investigate these reports of Wayne Couzens served to strengthen his “dangerous belief in his invincibility”, Mrs Justice May said on Monday, when she handed Couzens a 19-month sentence for indecent exposure, on top of the life sentence he is serving for the rape and murder of Sarah Everard.
The attitude of the police to sexual offences is under close and growing scrutiny. But officers are not alone in treating “flashing” as a crime deserving less attention. Despite carrying a maximum two-year sentence, indecent exposure is still too easily brushed off as an unpleasant but ultimately inconsequential act. The stereotypical image of a man in a mac, and even the language of “flashing”, diminish the seriousness of this crime and make it easy to trivialise. Couzens’s offences are further proof that such crimes can be precursors to more dangerous behaviour.
