Officer says murder photos kept 'for teaching'

A Metropolitan Police detective who kept photos of the murder scene of a teenage girl claimed he retained them as "a once in a lifetime opportunity" to teach crime scene investigators.

Sally Anne Bowman, 18, had been raped multiple times and her body was found near a skip in Croydon in the early hours of 25 September 2005.

A tribunal previously heard Jason Grafham - an exhibits officer dealing with physical evidence in the investigation - kept the "extremely graphic" images for the reasons of "entertainment and bragging".

But on Wednesday, Grafham's representative said he had retained the photos for policing purposes and that he was proud of his work on the case.

Mark Scrutton, a member of the Police Federation speaking on behalf of Grafham, challenged the claim that the former officer had shown the pictures to numerous colleagues.

Grafham was not present at the hearing. He retired on Friday 10 July, is no longer in the force and not obliged to attend.

Scrutton told the tribunal that Grafham was "incredibly proud" of his role in the case convicting Mark Dixie, who was jailed for life in 2008 with a minimum term of 34 years for the rape and murder.

Scrutton said the purpose "was to keep the photographs because it was a once in a lifetime opportunity to pass on the information that those photographs held for crime scene investigators.

"Despite the horrific images in those photographs, they held an enormous amount of information.

"One officer has seen these pictures and didn't see it was an unusual thing for them to be shown.

He didn't ask to be shown the pictures, and at that point didn't think there was training or teaching going on, but didn't see it as a problem in his position as an advanced exhibit officer."

On Tuesday, a witness named only as Miss C told the first day of the tribunal that Grafham had frequently referred to his work on the Sally Anne Bowman case, which became a "running joke" in the office.

Another witness, Miss B, said she found it "highly inappropriate" and "disturbing" when she saw him show photographs of the crime scene to a colleague.

In a closing statement outlining the allegations against Grafham, counsel Louise McCullough said:

"It is my submission that he showed more than one colleague, and we say that this was not for an educational, not a proper policing purpose," she added.

"We already know the photos were utterly horrific, extremely graphic. It would appear they were not being used for training purposes."

She said Bowman "had been deprived of her dignity in death, and the officer's conduct has perpetuated this".

McCullough said the photos were "readily accessible" to the officers who found them in Grafham's desk.

Grafham is also facing five allegations of sexually inappropriate remarks to colleagues – three of which he has admitted – and three allegations of derogatory and/or discriminatory remarks which he denied.

The result of the hearing is expected on Friday morning.

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