Female police officer speaks out on sexual harassment in the police force

TAUNTED, sexually harassed, and driven to mental breakdown. A former police officer tells what it’s really like for women in the force.

WHEN Kirsty joined the police force in 1998, she thought she was prepared to be a female cop.

She knew she’d often be the only woman on her team and she could handle it — she was ‘one of the boys’.

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It wasn’t until she left the force in 2010 — hyperventilating and in tears after a shocking incident that brought back the years of harassment, physical assault and threats she’d endured from male colleagues — she realised gender discrimination and sexual harassment was the one part of being a female cop she wasn’t prepared for, and it was unavoidable.

As Victoria Police Commissioner Ken Lay today announced a review into sexual harassment and predatory behaviour in the police force — a landmark review that’s expected to have a national impact — this former police officer has opened up on what it’s really for women in the force.

It really started in 2006, when Kirsty was in her 20s serving as an officer in New South Wales.

She was excited to join the team and ignored warnings from female colleagues that a senior officer would target her.

“I was an operations officer, but I was pushed into a desk job that I wasn’t trained for. They didn’t want me on the beat because I was a girl,” she tells news.com.au.

“Then when I did get to go out, the officers would belittle me, not only in front of colleagues but in front of known offenders.

“It shouldn’t matter what they think but it got to the point that these people wouldn’t take me seriously as a police officer, so not only was it cruel, it stopped me from effectively doing my job.”

Kirsty’s toilet breaks would routinely be announced over the PA system. Unwanted gropes, catcalls and other gender based taunts were thrown her way daily.

This continued when her complaints led her to be transferred to another command, and then another.

“It was, and still is, a cultural issue — everywhere was the same,” she says.

But she still hadn’t seen the worst of it.

Trying to escape the “toxic police culture” that was “one hundred per cent against women”, Kirsty transferred once again to train with the Australian Federal Police after taking up a gig at Sydney Airport.

Turning up to the training group in Canberra, Kirsty wasn’t surprised to see only one other woman in her group.

Even after all the harassment she had endured she was prepared to brush aside some of the taunts that would inevitably come from the “boys club”.

“There was one guy there who just wouldn’t let up,” she says.

“I was singled out in the beginning because I was shy, I just wanted to get on with the course, but that wasn’t good enough for this guy, he said I thought I was better than everyone else.

“He told me I was hard up and needed a good f*** to loosen me up and he could help me with that.”

Over the eight week course Kirsty tried to ignore the officer, but the comments continued.

“He would stir me up, making inappropriate comments and was crude giving graphic detail of what he could do to me,” she says.

During the fourth week the officer was going on about how he wanted to f*** Kirsty “this way and that way” and soon after that it got physical.

“I said I wasn’t interested and told him to go away. He pressed himself and his groin up against my left thigh and started rubbing himself against me by rocking back and forth slightly,” she says.

“It happened in the kitchenette with other officers around. I looked up and the other female course member was there … she just stood and watched.”

It wasn’t the first time Kirsty had been physically harassed and she wasn’t sure it would be the last but she wanted to get on with her job.

“I was confused as to what to do as the police culture doesn’t make it easy for those who make complaints,” she said.

“I had already copped it for that before, I didn’t want to be labelled a complainer.”

Kirsty sucked it up and completed the course, eager to start her new job in Sydney, far away from the officer who had harassed her who was posted in North Queensland.

Her stint at Sydney Airport was not unlike others, seeing her marginalised as the only woman on an eight person team and “made a joke of until I felt physically ill”, but she got through eight months of it.

One day, when a woman who had come back on an international flight had complained of being indecently assaulted on a flight, Kirsty was taken off the task she was working on to “deal with it”.

“It wasn’t my job, but my colleagues, even though I was of a higher ranking, decided I would take the complaint because as a woman I was the one who should deal with ‘the warm and fuzzies’ — they didn’t take it seriously at all,” she says.

“When I was talking to that woman, the touching, the assault that she was talking about, brought it all back, all the harassment and abuse that I had experienced while I was just trying to do my job — and put up with it.”

It was the straw that broke the camel’s back for Kirsty, who had always wanted to be a good cop and tried to ignore the issues faced by women in the police force. It led to a mental breakdown and she left the force for good.

Even though she knew she wasn’t any of her attackers’ first targets, it wasn’t until Kirsty sought help and counselling and support for her trauma that she realised there were countless other women who had endured the same thing during their time in the force.

“It happens everywhere and it’s swept under the carpet,” she says.

The issue of sexual harassment and predatory behaviour in the police force has been brought into the spotlight today with Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Ken Lay acknowledging cases like Kirsty’s and announcing a review of such behaviour within Victoria Police.

Mr Lay today revealed there had been 20 reports of inappropriate behaviour made within the organisation since 2011, and acknowledged many cases go unreported.

“There are men in this organisation whose behaviour towards women is reprehensible,” he said, announcing the review today.

Mr Lay acknowledged cases involving inappropriate text messages, filming in change rooms, making suggested comments and unwanted touching and groping, and said historically, Victoria Police hadn’t been good at dealing with them.

“As an organisation I don’t think we’ve been good at calling that behaviour out.”

The review, inspired by a similar review into the Australian Defence Force commissioned last year, is expected to be a landmark for Australian police services.

Originally published as Female police officer speaks out on sexual harassment in the police force