A police officer who was sacked for pursuing a sexual relationship with a ‘highly vulnerable’ domestic abuse victim by sending her more than 50 messages has been named after a newspaper won a year-long legal fight to reveal his identity.
Terry Cooke was sacked after an April 2021 misconduct hearing which revealed he had abused his position to pursue relationships with vulnerable women.
He claimed that an anonymity order had been put in place to prevent his name from being revealed.
A legal challenge was launched by the newspaper Basingstoke Gazette to publish his name and Mr Cooke’s solicitors later revealed that there was no anonymity order and referred to the incident as a ‘genuine mistake.’
After a High Court hearing in January, Mr Cooke’s fresh plea for anonymity was rejected and it was ruled that his details could be published as they were in the public interest.
It comes after ten months of legal exchanges and it can now be revealed that Mr Cooke targeted vulnerable women by using information he found at police scenes.
Mr Cooke was also found to have pursued a sexual relationship with a victim of domestic violence and tried to add a second victim on Facebook.
Terry Cooke (centre) was sacked after an April 2021 misconduct hearing which revealed he had abused his position to pursue relationships with vulnerable women. However, the former Hampshire Constabulary officer had said that an anonymity order protected his identity and prevented details about his misconduct from being made public
He had also asked the victim of a car crash on a date and then rang her friend the next day to ask again.
Justice Ellenbogan ruled that Mr Cooke ‘acted improperly’ as he falsely claimed an anonymity order had been put in place to prevent his name being revealed.
She also ordered that Mr Cooke pay the Basingstoke Gazette’s legal costs.
Speaking after the hearing, Simon Westrop, head of legal at Newsquest, said: ‘Police officers should be held to account in their own name when they commit wrongdoing.
‘Statutory regulations require misconduct hearings to be held in public.
‘Any attempt to suppress information about the identity of an officer is an insult to the victims of misconduct.
‘In this case, the Basingstoke Gazette and its publisher Newsquest Media Group could not stand idly by, in spite of the risk and cost attendant on all legal action. It was an important thing to do on behalf of our readers.’
After a High Court hearing, Mr Cooke’s plea for anonymity was rejected and said his details could be published as they were in the public interest. Pictured: Portsmouth Police Station
There were four separate incidents where Mr Cooke was found to have breached the police professional standards of behaviour.
His breaches included deleting messages to cover up the contact, asking the woman out for cocktails and using his work computer system for non-policing purposes.
After the misconduct hearing in April 2021, an investigation into the officer was launched by the Independent Office for Police Conduct.
Mr Cooke had messaged a domestic violence victim on Facebook after responding to her 999 call for help.
She had replied to his message: ‘Naughty, taking my number from police records to get hold of me, I don’t think you’re supposed to do that, laugh out loud.’
Mr Cooke then pursued a sexual relationship with her.
Another woman had called the police as she feared for her safety because her ex-husband had come to her home and began to bang on the door.
Barrister Sarah Gaunt (pictured) ruled that Mr Cooke’s name should be kept secret from the public after his April 2021 misconduct hearing
He had sent her a number of friend requests and a ‘wave’ after searching the woman on Facebook and she did not respond.
The hearing heard that there was a ‘degree of persistence’ in his approaches.
And Mr Cooke said during the hearing that he wished to pursue a relationship with her as he found her ‘attractive.’
The panel noted: ‘The fact is that here again we find the officer abusing confidential information obtained in the course of police work to pursue a personal relationship with a vulnerable victim of domestic abuse.’
A third incident then occurred where the ex-police officer was responding to a car crash and asked one of the victims on a date, telling her to ‘look him up’ on Facebook.
Mr Cooke wrote her Facebook username into his notebook and called her friend the next day to remind her about his invitation for a date.
Defending Mr Cooke, barrister Alexandra Felix had emphasised his ‘long service and the many good things he has done’, which the panel noted.
But they ruled Mr Cooke should be sacked from Hampshire Constabulary without notice as they said his misconduct was so serious.
However, the panel, headed by Barrister Sarah Gaunt, ruled that the officer should remain anonymous to ‘protect their welfare.’
Pictured: Hampshire Police chief constable Olivia Pinkney who is responsible for ensuring that policing services meet the public need
When he was sacked, Mr Cooke and his lawyers threatened the Basingstoke Gazette with legal action as the newspaper sought to report his name.
A legal challenge was launched by the Gazette and its publisher Newsquest against the chair of the police misconduct panel, William Hansen QC.
It came after Mr Cooke’s lawyers, Penningtons Manches Cooper, claimed that the chair placed an anonymity order to block reporting.
After proceedings started, it emerged that no anonymity order had been made.
Jonathan Scherbel-Ball, representing the Gazette, said at the High Court that Mr Cooke’s claims through his solicitors that an anonymity direction had been made led to proceedings being launched on a false basis.
The Gazette and Mr Cooke’s lawyers came head-to-head at the High Court on January 25 and January 28 after a 10-month-long dispute.
Defending Mr Cooke, Darryl Hutcheon claimed that his client’s insistence there was an anonymity order was a ‘genuine mistake.’
But Jonathan Price, defending the misconduct chair, said: ‘Mr Cooke could have been under no misapprehension. Mr Hansen’s covering email clearly summarised the orders which he had made.’
During the High Court proceedings in January, Mr Cooke applied for an anonymity order to prevent the paper from publishing his name. But it was rejected by the Judge Justice Naomi Ellenbogen. Pictured: The Hampshire Constabulary headquarters in Winchester
During the High Court proceedings in January, Mr Cooke applied for an anonymity order to prevent the paper from publishing his name.
But it was rejected by the Judge Justice Naomi Ellenbogen.
She said: ‘Open justice is a fundamental principle of the common law. Its justification is the ‘value of public scrutiny as the guarantor of the quality of justice’ and ‘its significance has, if anything, increased in an age which attached growing importance to the public accountability of public officers and institutions and to the availability of information about the performance of their functions.’
A spokesperson for Penningtons Manches Cooper said: ‘We recognise and support the important role that the press plays as the public’s watchdog for matters such as police misconduct proceedings, and the public interest in the responsible reporting of the same.
‘However, it is not an unfettered right and there are sometimes compelling individual factors which mean that right should be restricted.’
Mr Cooke had worked for Hampshire Constabulary for 20 years and was commended in 2017 by chief constable Olivia Pinkney for his deployment helping the British Virgin Islands after Hurricane Irma.
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