Woman raped by father wins payout as police finally admit mistakes in four-decade battle for justice

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A woman who was raped by her father has hit out at a catalogue of misogynistic police failings during her four-decade-long fight for justice.

Carol Higgins, from West Yorkshire, was repeatedly raped and abused by Elliot Appleyard as a teenager – with her now 77-year-old father convicted of five counts of rape and 10 counts of indecent assault back in 2019.

West Yorkshire Police has now done a major U-turn and finally apologised to Ms Higgins for the long wait for her father’s conviction.

Speaking to The Independent in an exclusive interview, Ms Higgins said when she first reported her father to the police for raping her in 1984 an officer told her if the case went to court, “you will be made out to be the biggest liar and slag going”.

The 54-year-old said: “Their failure to investigate meant that I was forced to continually fight to ensure that a rapist face criminal justice.”

Ms Higgins said the police apology constitutes the first time in 39 years West Yorkshire Police has admitted her father’s offences were not handled “effectively and quickly”.

The mother of two has been in a four-year civil court battle with the police, accusing them of infringing her human rights – with this culminating in the police apologising and a compensation payment of £15,000.

Ms Higgins said it took the police over 30 years to take her claims seriously as she reported her father’s abuse on five separate occasions stretching from 1984 to 2015.

She said: “The constant battling and pushing has taken an additional toll on my mental and physical health.”

John Robins, chief constable of West Yorkshire Police, apologised in a letter, seen by The Independent, for the long wait for her father’s conviction, as well as admitting the investigating officer who oversaw the case in 2015 hadn’t finished his training.

“Communication should have been more frequent and clearer,” his letter says. “It is acknowledged that this failure exacerbated your suffering and distress and accepted that you tried to raise this, but it was not accommodated. It is accepted that derogatory language was used about you during the investigation and that comments were made by officers that should never have been made.”

A spokesperson for the force told The Independent: “The chief constable has apologised directly to the complainant on behalf of West Yorkshire Police and given his personal reassurance that the force has learned from the mistakes made in her case.”

Ms Higgins added: “This retraumatised me and exacerbated my suffering, caused me significant additional distress and unnecessarily delayed my recovery.”

It comes after West Yorkshire Police and the Independent Office for Police Conduct said nothing had to be learnt or improved in the aftermath of her case.

Her father was sentenced to 20 years in prison for sexual offences perpetrated when Ms Higgins was aged between 14 and 15.

Ms Higgins, who has written two books about her experiences, explained how she is “petrified” about her father’s release from prison in a few years’ time due to him previously making threats to kill her.

“I’ve seen him holding guns to my mum saying he is going to kill her and slit her with machetes from her vagina to her neck,” she said. “He perpetrated domestic abuse against her.”

Her father normalised his sexual abuse of her by claiming that all fathers “break their daughters in” and telling her some of his friends lived as husband and wife with their daughters, she added. Ms Higgins said she was made to wear her father’s wife’s engagement ring.

Ms Higgins recalled: “I first reported my dad to the police for raping me in 1984, when I was 15. I had to make a 17-page statement and endure internal forensic tests. They had me jumping up and down on blotting paper and I was internally bleeding.

“Whilst still in the police station an officer said to me that ‘if this goes to court your name will be blackened and dragged through the mud and you will be made out to be the biggest liar and slag going. Can you handle this?’”

The abuse meant she lost her father, her childhood, her “innocence and sense of self-worth”, she said, explaining how she was forced into living alone at the age of just 16 “in a cold, rented house feeling frightened with no one to turn to”.

Ms Higgins, who says she lost count of the number of times the police accused her of lying, has been diagnosed with complex post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and has had years of therapy, she added.

“I have nightmares,” she said. “If I see someone on the street who resembles him, I panic and sweat.”

Ms Higgins said she is eager to raise awareness of paternal rape as it remains “taboo” and an “ugly or sensitive subject which people do not want to think about or accept happens”.

“If you can’t trust your mum and dad to love and protect you, then who else will?” she said.

Rape Crisis offers support for those affected by rape and sexual abuse. You can call them on 0808 802 9999 in England and Wales, 0808 801 0302 in Scotland, and 0800 0246 991 in Northern Ireland, or visit their website at www.rapecrisis.org.uk. If you are in the US, you can call Rainn on 800-656-HOPE (4673)