Ex-police officer not giving rape trial evidence

Ex-Met Police officer David Carrick denies several counts of sexual assault, rape and coercive and controlling behaviour

Former Metropolitan Police officer David Carrick has declined to give evidence in his trial charged with sexually abusing a 12-year-old girl and former partner.

The 50-year-old is accused of molesting the girl in the late 1980s and raping the woman during the course of a toxic relationship more than 20 years later.

Jurors have heard the allegations were made after Mr Carrick pleaded guilty in 2022 and 2023 to 71 instances of sexual violence against 12 different women over a 17-year period.

Mr Carrick, from Stevenage, has denied the fresh allegations against him, saying that sex with the woman was consensual and he claimed the child accuser had lied.

On Monday, his barrister Rebecca Wade KC told jurors that Mr Carrick would not be giving evidence in his defence and she would not be calling any other evidence on his behalf.

Trial judge Mrs Justice McGowan said the jury would begin deliberations on Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday.

The judge told jurors that evidence of Mr Carrick's previous convictions were relevant to their considerations, but said: "It does not make your decision for you.

"The fact he has done it before does not prove he is guilty of these offences."

Mr Carrick is being tried at the Old Bailey, also known as the Central Criminal Court, in London

In his closing speech, prosecutor Tom Little KC said Mr Carrick's silence was "deafening".

He told jurors: "The cold reality of this case is the man in the dock, a Met police officer for decades, started his abuse when he was a teenager.

"When he was a serving officer, he was a serial rapist, a serial sex offender, and a coercer and controller of women he was in a relationship with."

The prosecutor told jurors not to lose sight of what Mr Carrick did for a living, saying it must have made him feel "invincible".

He said the "real David Carrick was then unmasked" in 2022 and said his "Mr nice guy" image did not stand up to the "grim reality" that he would commit criminal offences "at will".

Mr Carrick has pleaded not guilty to two charges of rape, one of sexual assault and coercive and controlling behaviour towards the woman between 2014 and 2019.

The defendant has denied five counts of sexual assault relating to the girl in the later 1980s.

The Old Bailey trial continues.