Victim’s family accuse Avon and Somerset police of bullying and attempting to cover up deception

An undercover police officer used his fake identity to deceive a woman into a 19-year relationship in which they became partners and had a child together, the Guardian can reveal.

The officer concealed his real identity from the woman for the duration of that period, never telling her his real occupation, and using his fictitious identity on the birth certificate of their son.

In 2020, after the couple were engaged to be married, the woman discovered that her fiance, whom she believed to be a businessman, was in fact a police officer who had subjected her to a sophisticated deception lasting almost two decades.

  • AbouBenAdhem@lemmy.worldEnglish
    48·
    1 year ago

    IMO, the sketchiest part is that the department knew about the relationship, let him continue using the fake identity for years after leaving the force, and pressured the family to keep quiet after learning the truth.

    • FlowVoid@midwest.socialEnglish
      184·
      1 year ago

      I’m not sure it was a bit.

      He wasn’t investigating her. If you are an undercover agent and meet someone new - off duty and unrelated to work - are you allowed to tell them your real name?

      If not, if a single person is forced to choose between no intimate relationships and relationships only under a pseudonym, then the latter is the predictable choice.

      • fred-kowalski@artemis.camp
        101·
        1 year ago

        I think the ethical choices are not what you laid out. In this case choose between relationship and job. People do it all the time.

        • FlowVoid@midwest.socialEnglish
          54·
          1 year ago

          Or choose both. You may consider that unethical, but that doesn’t mean it was insincere. People do unethical things all the time with sincere motivations.

            • FlowVoid@midwest.socialEnglish
              32·
              1 year ago

              I’m not necessarily defending it, I’m pointing out that his commitment to her was quite possibly sincere and not a “bit”.

              • girlfreddy@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
                21·
                1 year ago

                Lying and manipulation are not evidence of commitment to anyone but but his own selfish desires.

                To argue the opposite is ingenuine at best.

                • FlowVoid@midwest.socialEnglish
                  32·
                  1 year ago

                  Being in a relationship with someone for 10+ years and raising a child with that person is strong evidence of commitment. Lying about one’s birth name is not enough to prove otherwise.

  • laylawashere44@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    20·
    1 year ago

    This isnt even the first time this has happened in the UK. A group of officers held fake relationships with a climate protester group too.

      • Astroturfed@lemmy.world
        15·
        1 year ago

        After you read this, I guarantee you will feel sorry for me. Imagine this. You are attracted to women, like you are now (emotionally and sexually), but they do not exist. They existed a long time ago, and no one knows what they looked like (They have a pretty good idea from the fossils, however), but they do not exist anymore. That means, not only do you know there will never be any possibility of you having sex with one, but there’s not even a possibility of you ever seeing one in real life. Everyone else, however, except for a very few, are not attracted to women, they are attracted to something else entirely. So in other words, you will never find any porn anywhere on the internet, only non-sexual pictures of women. Everyone you have told about your attraction to women think it’s disgusting. To relieve yourself, you get off on the non-sexual pictures of women, knowing it will never get any better. That’s what life is like to me. I am a degree 6 Zoosexual, sexually and emotionally attracted to Tyrannosaurs and nothing else. Women don’t even do it for me. I am cursed to live my life in the misery that my most powerful emotional fantasies will never be even close to coming true. Life is like hell to me. I will never know true love.

    • Eheran@lemmy.world
      916·
      1 year ago

      What red flags?

      You are free to point them out to me, I did not read about any. That would be far more effective than downvoting me.