Wayne Couzens has been sentenced for committing indecent exposure days before he murdered Sarah Everard

This article contains references to abduction, rape, and murder.

It’s been two years since 33-year-old Sarah Everard disappeared. It was later determined that Wayne Couzens, a 48-year-old serving police officer, had kidnapped and murdered her while she was walking home.

Today (6th March 2023), Couzens has been sentenced to 19 months in prison for exposing himself on three occasions, including just days before he abducted Everard. 

He is already serving a whole life sentence for the murder of Everard, so the sentencing doesn’t affect the amount of time he will serve in prison – he will never be released. However, the sentencing has highlighted serious police failures that could have prevented Couzens from leveraging his power as a serving police officer to abduct, rape, and murder Everard. 

Couzens admitted exposing himself on three occasions in Kent, “twice at a fast-food restaurant in February 2021 and another in woodland in 2020” (via BBC News). In the incident that took place three days before Couzens abducted Everard, his car’s registration plate and credit card details were reported to the police. 

One of the hospitality workers Couzens exposed himself to described the anguish this caused to the court, saying in her victim statement,  “I had no one contact me or ask for a statement. It was only after Sarah’s murder that I became involved. If he had been held accountable when we had reported the crime, we could have saved Sarah.”

Mrs Justice May further highlighted concerns over the police failures as she handed down her sentence, saying:

“The fact that no police came to find him or his black car, to question him about these incidents, can only have served to confirm and strengthen, in the defendant’s mind, a dangerous belief in his invincibility; in his power to sexually dominate and abuse women without being stopped.”

The Met’s Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stuart Cundy told BBC News there were missed opportunities to stop Wayne Couzens.

“It’s fair to say we could have done more and we will do more.

“I am sorry for the Sarah Everard family. I can’t imagine what must be going through their minds today and my thoughts are with them and all those Wayne Couzens targeted.”

On 30th September 2021, Couzens was sentenced at the Old Bailey, after pleading guilty to kidnap, rape, and murder. He received a whole life order – the first ever police officer to receive the sentence – meaning he will never be eligible for parole and will never be released. 

In the initial sentencing, Judge Lord Justice Fulford said that Everard was a “wholly blameless victim of a grotesquely executed” crime and that “she was simply walking home”. 

Everard’s family read out statements about how the murder has affected them. Her mother, Susan, described her heartbreak at losing her youngest child: “Sarah died in horrendous circumstances. I am tormented at the thought of what she endured… 

“I would give anything to hold her once more; I hope I dream that dream again.”