Former police watchdog chief sexually abused girls at Yorkshire leisure centre – trial

The former head of the police oversight authority is alleged to have raped a 14-year-old girl while meeting another victim, a court heard.

65-year-old Michael Lockwood faces 17 charges – three rapes and 14 sexual assaults against two 14-year-old girls between 1979 and 1986.

He was in his mid-20s at the time and worked part-time as a lifeguard at a leisure centre near Hull in East Yorkshire, where he allegedly met and sexually abused the girls.

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Lockwood had a “distinguished” career in local government before becoming director general of the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC), the watchdog for complaints about police in England and Wales.

One of the alleged victims, now in her 50s, said she was repeatedly raped in a pantry and sexually abused in Lockwood’s Ford Capri.

A second woman was tracked down by police after reading about the initial allegations against Lockwood in the Hull Daily Mail.

She met him in the late 1970s and stayed with him even after her 16th birthday because she believed they were in a “real relationship,” the court heard.

In a video of a police interview played in court, she said she found Lockwood “wonderful” and “loved” him.

Now she felt she had been “groomed”. She said he knew her age because he had helped her with maths before she sat her GCSEs while he was studying at Hull University.

She added: “I did not lie about my age.” During her testimony in court, the woman read a list of Lockwood’s “likes” and “dislikes” that she had written in her fourth-grade exercise book.

The list of likes included his “personality,” “butt,” and “hairy chest,” and the dislikes included “never goes anywhere,” “the way he treats me,” and “he lies.”

Under cross-examination, Sarah Elliott KC asked how the woman felt when she first learned that Lockwood had been charged with offences against another girl in the 1980s.

Ms Elliott said: ‘One of the things that must have been going through your mind was whether there was some sort of overlap between the allegations and your relationship with him?

“The thought that there might be someone else must have troubled you at the time when you thought you were in a committed relationship with him?”

The woman, whose identity cannot be disclosed for legal reasons, replied: “I was worried.”

She further said that she learned that Lockwood was engaged to someone after she started dating him.

Ms Elliott claimed: ‘I submit that your relationship with him did not develop into a relationship as a couple until after your 16th birthday.

“In fact, it took some time before you and he had actual sexual intercourse after that friendship developed into a relationship.”

The witness said: “No, that is not right.”

Prosecutor Sarah Przybylska asked the witness if Lockwood had ever told her he was engaged to someone else.

The woman said this was not the case and she only learned about it from someone else after the two began a romantic relationship.

It is alleged that Lockwood dragged her into a men’s restroom at the leisure center, where he kissed and sexually touched her.

The jury heard that it was common knowledge among fellow lifeguards that they sang about being “locked in the toilet together”.

It is also alleged that Lockwood sexually abused the girl in the back seat of his mother’s car after her 15th birthday.

The court heard that their relationship ended when Lockwood moved to Epsom in Surrey.

In a police interview last year, Lockwood said he was “shocked and angered” by the woman’s allegations.

He admitted that the two had had a sexual relationship, but stressed that at the time he assumed she was over 16.

He pleaded not guilty to eight counts of indecent assault against the witness between August 1979 and August 1981.

Lockwood, of Epsom, Surrey, also denies three counts of rape and six counts of sexual assault in relation to the other complainant between October 1985 and March 1986.

The trial continues at the Old Bailey before Judge Bennathan.

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