Two Metropolitan Police officers who strip-searched a 15-year-old black schoolgirl while she was on her period have been sacked for gross misconduct.
The girl, known as Child Q, was searched at a school in Hackney, east London on December 3, 2020, by officers after she was wrongly suspected of carrying cannabis.
The 'traumatic' police search involved the removal of Child Q's clothing, including her underwear, her bending over and having to expose intimate parts of her body, the police disciplinary panel heard
Authorisation was not sought for the intimate search, which left the teenager feeling 'demeaned' and 'physically violated', while no appropriate adult was present. Child Q's mother was also not informed of the situation.
The misconduct panel concluded that the strip search was 'disproportionate, inappropriate and unnecessary', while also adding the incident had caused 'enormous harm' to the child as well as 'significant harm to the community in trusting the police'.
