A victim of serial rapist policeman David Carrick has told Sky News how he used his job as a firearms officer to gain her trust before subjecting her to months of physical and mental abuse, telling her: “The safest place you can be is with me.”
This article contains details of abuse that some people may find distressing.
Speaking exclusively to Sky News, the woman said Carrick boasted about his job in the Metropolitan Police, but later went on to repeatedly rape and assault her over the course of their relationship.
The former firearms officer also shot the victim’s young daughter with a BB gun, causing injuries “because he said she was being naughty”, the woman said.
She said Carrick’s controlling behaviour included him starving her and her daughter and placing several surveillance cameras around his home to track their movements while he was at work.
“He would only allow me to have two protein bars a day because he wanted me to be weak and he would watch us on the cameras while he was at work. His eyes were always on us,” she said.
“Once I started eating a pack of blueberries, but he called me and went mad screaming ‘What do you think you are doing?!’
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“He said he could see me on the cameras eating something I shouldn’t be.”
The victim said Carrick used to boast about protecting the Queen at Windsor Castle and Barack Obama when he was US president on state visits and how he regularly used to protect prime ministers.
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Image: The woman eventually escaped from Carrick while he was at a wedding
Carrick met the victim on a dating app and immediately said he was a police officer to gain her trust.
“At first, he was the dream man. He was so charming. But over time that changed. His eyes changed. He was evil.
“I have no idea how someone so f***** up can be a police officer, never mind give him a gun. If he shot anyone I wouldn’t be surprised.”
The victim said she was introduced to his Met colleagues at a pub in London for off-duty drinks but was not allowed to talk.
“When I started to speak to his friends he would stop me,” she said.
“He didn’t want me talking to anyone. A couple of his colleagues reached out to me after that. A couple have been in touch since his arrest as well.”
Repeated rapes over months
The woman was one of many victims who lived with Carrick at his home during their relationship.
Shortly after moving in, Carrick bought permanent window shutters so no one would see in or out.
The victim told Sky News: “In the morning I wanted to get up and start working but he wouldn’t let me. He closed the shutters and said I had to rest because of what he would do to me later. He said he wanted me to have energy.
“He was so manipulating – he knew what he was doing.”
Carrick repeatedly raped her over the course of several months, causing injuries, and urinated over her.
“After he raped me, he would say: ‘Don’t pretend you didn’t want it as much as me.’
“He was such a horrible person. He used to drink wine bottles at a time, saying work was stressing him. He said he hated foreigners.
“One time I wanted to see my friend dying in hospital of cancer and he just told me to let him die.”
Women’s refuge refused to help
The victim said she reached out to a local women’s refuge but that it refused to help after hearing Carrick was a police officer.
She eventually ran away from the house when Carrick was at a wedding because it would be unlikely he would be monitoring the surveillance cameras.
Carrick tried to track her down after she escaped, but she managed to avoid him.
The woman came forward to police when she saw a news report that Carrick had been arrested for rape. “I just burst out crying,” she said.
Carrick pleaded guilty to 49 offences including rape, false imprisonment and possession of a weapon.
The victim’s daughter said: “I know this sounds weird, but I was angry when he pleaded guilty. I wanted to have the chance to tell my story.”
The pair are receiving trauma therapy but say they want to move on with their lives after Carrick is sentenced in early February.
“He doesn’t deserve to ever get out of prison,” the victim said.
Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has said it will “pause” shipments to the US as the British car firm works to “address the new trading terms” of Donald Trump’s tariffs.
The US president has introduced a 25% levy on all foreign cars imported into the country, which came into force on Thursday.
JLR, one of the country’s biggest carmakers, exported about 38,000 cars to the US in the third quarter of 2024 – almost equal to the amount sold to the UK and the EU combined.
In a statement on Saturday, a spokesperson for the company behind the Jaguar, Land Rover and Range Rover brands said: “The USA is an important market for JLR’s luxury brands.
“As we work to address the new trading terms with our business partners, we are taking some short-term actions including a shipment pause in April, as we develop our mid- to longer-term plans.”
The company released a statement last week before Mr Trump announced a “baseline” 10% tariff on goods from around the world, which kicked in on Saturday morning, on what he called “liberation day”.
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JLR reassured customers its business was “resilient” and “accustomed to changing market conditions”.
“Our priorities now are delivering for our clients around the world and addressing these new US trading terms,” the firm said.
Trading across the world has been hit by Mr Trump’s tariff announcement at the White House on Wednesday.
All but one stock on the FTSE 100 fell on Friday – with Rolls-Royce, banks and miners among those to suffer the sharpest losses.
Cars are the top product exported from the UK to the US, with exports worth £8.3bn in the year to the end of September 2024, according to data from the Office for National Statistics.
For UK carmakers, the US is the second largest export market behind the European Union.
Industry groups have previously warned the tariffs will force firms to rethink where they trade, while a report by thinktank the Institute for Public Policy Research said more than 25,000 car manufacturing jobs in the UK could be at risk.
Two people have died following a fire at a caravan site near Skegness, Lincolnshire Police have said.
In a statement, officers said they were called at 3.53am on Saturday to a report of a blaze at Golden Beach Holiday Park in the village of Ingoldmells.
Fire and rescue crews attended the scene, and two people were found to have died.
They were reported to be a 10-year-old girl and a 48-year-old man.
The force said the victims’ next of kin have been informed and will be supported by specially trained officers.
Officers are trying to establish the exact cause of the blaze.
“We are at the very early stages of our investigation and as such we are keeping an open mind,” the force said.
A 15-year-old boy has died after “getting into difficulty” in a lake in southeast London, police say.
Officers and paramedics were called shortly after 3pm on Friday to Beckenham Place Park in Lewisham.
The Metropolitan Police said a boy “was recovered from the lake” at around 10.42pm the same day.
“He was taken to hospital where he was sadly pronounced dead. His death is being treated as unexpected but not believed to be suspicious,” according to the force.
The boy’s family has been told and are being supported by specialist officers.
The force originally said the child was 16 years old, but has since confirmed his age as 15.
In the earlier statement, officers said emergency services carried out a search and the park was evacuated.
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Image: Emergency teams were called to Beckenham Place Park on Friday afternoon
Beckenham Place Park, which borders the London borough of Bromley, covers around 240 acres, according to the park’s website.
The lake is described as 285 metres long, reaching depths of up to 3.5 metres.
It is designed as a swimming lake for open-water swimming and paddle boarding.
A London Ambulance Service spokesperson said on Friday: “We were called at 3.02pm this afternoon to reports of a person in the water.
“We sent resources to the scene, including an ambulance crew, an incident response officer and members of our hazardous area response team.”
Emergency teams have not explained how the boy entered the water, or whether he was accompanied by others.