Cheshire Police employee who tipped off criminal friend is jailed

Natalie Mottram told a criminal friend about covert police surveillance

A police employee who tipped off a criminal friend about a covert investigation has been jailed.

"Corrupt" Natalie Mottram admitted misconduct in public office, perverting the course of justice and unauthorised access to computer material.

The 25-year-old was caught when the National Crime Agency (NCA) suspected she was responsible for a leak and put her under surveillance.

Mottram was jailed for three years and nine months at Liverpool Crown Court.

The court heard she was employed by Cheshire Police but was on secondment and working as an intelligence analyst at the North West Regional Organised Crime Unit when she was arrested on 12 June 2020.

She was held as part of Operation Venetic, a nationwide investigation tackling communication devices used by criminals.

Mottram, of Vermont Close, Great Sankey, Warrington, told Jonathan Kay, 38, about a covert investigation and that officers had intelligence on him.

On 24 April 2020, a friend of Kay's messaged another user to say he had learned that day about law enforcement infiltrating the EncroChat messaging platform.

And he messaged a second contact: "I no [sic] a lady who works for the police. This is not hearsay. Direct to me. They can access Encro software. And are using to intercept forearms [sic] only at the moment. There [sic] software runs 48 hours behind real time. So have ur burns one day max. And try to avoid giving postcodes over it."

"Burns" refers to the delete-time on messages.

He added: "Her words was are you on Encro, I said no why, I only sell a bit of bud. She said cool just giving you a heads up. Because NCA now have access. But she wouldn't lie."

By 12 June 2020, NCA investigators suspected Mottram was responsible for the leak.

Mottram alerted a criminal friend about a police EncroChat operation

On that day, her bosses asked her to analyse an intelligence log referring to Kay, who was the partner of Mottram's close friend, Leah Bennett, 38.

But the log was bogus and Mottram was under surveillance.

Mottram left work that afternoon and drove to Kay and Bennett's house on Newark Drive in Great Sankey.

At 17:15, Kay - who has convictions for driving offences and being drunk and disorderly - arrived home in his car with Bennett arriving seven minutes later in hers.

The prosecution say this is when Mottram corruptly informed Kay and Bennett about the intelligence log concerning him.

Mottram, Kay, Bennett and another man were all arrested later that day and £200,000 in cash was recovered from Kay and Bennett's house.

'Betrayed her job'

Kay, who admitted perverting the course of justice at an earlier hearing, was sentenced to two years and six months in jail.

A charge of perverting the course of justice against Bennett was dropped by prosecutors.

John McKeon, head of the NCA's anti-corruption unit, said: "Natalie Mottram betrayed her job, her colleagues and the public she was paid to protect.

"Her corrupt actions had the potential to hugely damage the overarching investigation by alerting offenders of the need to abandon EncroChat and cover their tracks.

"Her actions were disgraceful. The evidence against her was overwhelming.

"She was left with no option but to finally plead guilty."