WhatsApp and Facebook messages show Gwent police officers openly discussing the sexual harassment of junior female colleagues; racist, homophobic and misogynistic abuse; the leaking of sensitive police material; and corruption.
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In 2018 and 2019 Officer A sent a number of racist images to Jones, mostly about Muslim women. A picture of Grenfell Tower on fire is titled “The Great Muslim Bakeoff”. In May 2019 Officer A sent Jones a racist image about the new royal baby.
In another exchange, on Facebook Messenger, Jones is discussing a possible divorce. Officer A offered him help in carrying out a possible fraud, saying he had done the same in the past for a Gwent police chief.
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In November 2018 at a misconduct hearing female officers gave evidence of domineering, controlling and physically abusive behaviour by Joslyn, then aged 46.
He resigned from the police before the hearing was completed, but the panel determined that he would have been dismissed.
Six months before the hearing, Joslyn had messaged Jones saying he was aware of an internal report that said as many as ten women had made complaints about his behaviour towards them.
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A former partner reported Joslyn to Gwent police in 2012, and he was issued with a harassment warning — but he was allowed to remain a serving officer, even after breaching the order.
Former police officer Sarah was 20 when she got involved in a relationship with Joslyn. The Sunday Times made contact with her via the Centre for Women’s Justice (CWJ), who had represented her when she successfully sued Gwent police.
In one of the most serious domestic incidents, Sarah was having a bath while he cooked dinner. But he became angry saying she allowed the food to go cold. “He was shouting at me,” she said. “He’d been cutting potatoes for dinner and he was still holding the knife. He held me up against the wall and he had the knife at my shoulder.”
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In another case, ex-Gwent officer Rachel, who The Sunday Times contacted with the help of another officer, said that women who spoke out against senior officers were “dismissed to keep them quiet”.
“It left me suicidal,” she said. “I was pretty much bankrupt, I was left homeless and sofa-surfing with my child. I lost my car, I lost everything. It’s like an old school boys’ club. They keep everything in-house. It’s just quite toxic, and it’s a small force, so they manage to hide things really well.”
<snip> [follows reams of domestic abuse behaviour by Jones. Jones committed suicide]
Jones’s family have made arrangements to hand over his phone to Wiltshire Police and have asked them to investigate the messages found between Jones and the serving and retired officers, as well as how the family were treated by Gwent following his death.
<snip> For Sharon and her three daughters, their view of the police has changed for ever. They say the contents of Jones’s phone have made them afraid of the police. Sharon is concerned about the many more women around the UK being abused in a relationship by a police officer. “Where do these women go to be heard?” she asked.
