Linda Williams, a Metropolitan Police detective raped by David Carrick in 2004, has called for Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley to resign after settling her civil case against the force. She said the way Scotland Yard handled her complaint felt "like being raped all over again" and said she would not report a rape to the Met today.
Williams waived her legal right to anonymity to speak to the. She said she has post-traumatic stress disorder because of the attack, that the lengthy civil case left her feeling suicidal, and that she settled after seeking damages from the Met for failing to protect her from Carrick.
Linda Williams and the Met
The Met has now paid Williams compensation without accepting liability. In its response, the force said it "tried to reduce further distress and re-traumatisation to DC Williams' welfare and has aimed to deal with her claims as quickly and compassionately as possible," and said it recognised the unique impact on her because her exposure to Carrick came through her work as a Met officer.
Williams rejected that account. She said the process felt brutal enough that she would not go to the Met today if she were raped again, because she does not trust the police and does not think they deal with it correctly.
David Carrick in 2023
Carrick was jailed for life in 2023 for sexual offences against Williams and 11 other women. After he was sentenced in January 2023, Rowley praised the victims and said: "We have failed and I'm sorry. He should not have been a police officer."
Two months later, an official report by Baroness Casey described the Met as a "boys' club" that was institutionally misogynistic and had failed women. Williams said she contacted the after Panorama's report last year into a hidden culture of misogyny and racism inside the Met.
Sir Mark Rowley and the Met
Rowley became commissioner in 2022 and pledged to change the Met. Williams said that pledge has not changed her view of how her case was handled, and she has now made her call for him to resign public.
Her account also raises a narrower practical question for other victims inside the force: whether a serving Met officer can trust her own employer to handle a rape report fairly. Williams says she cannot, and her case ends there for now, with compensation paid and no acceptance of liability.
