Credit: Elainea Emmott
News
The Justice For Zayna campaign is calling for an end to misogyny and racism in policing
2 years ago
5 min read
Zayna Iman claims she was drugged and sexually assaulted while in Greater Manchester police custody. Now, the #JusticeForZayna campaign is calling for the release of missing CCTV footage and for an overhaul of police culture.
Content note: this article contains references to sexual assault and sexual violence that readers might find upsetting.
In February 2021, Zayna Iman found herself in Greater Manchester police (GMP) custody, where she was held for 40 hours. She was initially detained by police because a friend had called them following concerns for her welfare after she’d taken cocaine earlier in the evening. However, CCTV footage of Iman’s time in custody reportedly shows her being forcibly stripped by officers and left topless in a cell. The 38-year-old also alleges she was drugged and raped while in police custody and has waived her right to anonymity in order to share her experience publicly.
Now, a campaign – #JusticeForZayna – is calling on GMP to release withheld CCTV footage from Iman’s time in custody, and challenging misogyny and racism in policing as a whole.
GMP has provided Iman with the CCTV footage of her time in custody, except for the three hours when the alleged sexual assault occurred. The CCTV feed cuts out in several places including at 9.49am on 5 February 2021, returning again at 11am. This is the period when Iman claims she was drugged and raped.
Later in the day, the CCTV footage shows Iman looking up at the camera and pointing at dark stains on the white bench and on her legs. “I remember swiping my hand between my legs – from back to front – and it was covered in blood,” she told The Independent. Iman’s medical report, which was seen by the paper, states that she reported “bleeding from places she shouldn’t be bleeding” and claimed she had been raped.
Iman has been regularly submitting subject access requests to the police over the last two years but has only received bits and pieces about her case. The missing footage that she still hasn’t received is the “final piece of the puzzle”, she says.
The #JusticeForZayna campaign has been backed by the Women’s Equality Party (WEP), who joined Iman and others in Manchester on 1 August to raise awareness of her case. On 3 August, the WEP and campaign group Catcalls of London came together to protest again in London outside the Home Office. Joined by Iman, protesters wore white and joined hands in silence for 40 minutes to represent the 40 hours that she was held in police custody.
Credit: Elainea Emmott
Mandu Reid, leader of the Women’s Equality Party, said that Iman’s alleged experience was “not an isolated incident. Other women from across the UK have come forward to share their allegations that the police stripped them unnecessarily – sometimes leaving them naked in cells for hours – to punish and degrade them.
“The institutional misogyny which is baked into our police forces is plain to see. We see it in the way Zayna was treated. We see it in the conviction of police officer Stephen Hardy, who was found guilty of grooming and repeatedly raping a child, using his status as a police officer to protect himself. We see it every time there is another story about police officers freely using sexist, racist, homophobic or ableist language in their WhatsApp groups.”
Only a complete overhaul of policing will suffice
Mandu Reid
The Casey report, published in March, found that the Metropolitan police is “institutionally racist, misogynistic and homophobic”. The WEP is now calling on the Home Office to overhaul policing so that institutional misogyny and racism are completely rooted out of police forces in the UK.
Reid noted that police were initially responding to a welfare callout when Iman was arrested. However, she said that officers’ “total lack of concern for [Iman’s] welfare is crystal clear” from the CCTV footage so far released by GMP.
“How can women be expected to trust the police when we are given so many reasons to fear what will happen to us when we come into contact with them?” she said. “How many more examples of police misconduct and violence will it take for the home secretary to take meaningful action? The police claim to protect and serve but they can’t do that if we can’t trust them. We’re at the point now where only a complete overhaul of policing will suffice.”
In a statement released by GMP on 26 July, Deputy Chief Constable Terry Woods said the force “[understands] and [shares] the concerns of the public regarding allegations against Greater Manchester police”.
He continued: “Miss Iman’s allegations regarding her treatment in custody, in February 2021, are subject to an ongoing investigation. The force made a referral to the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) which instructed a GMP-led investigation.” Woods added that he had “taken the decision to make another referral to the IOPC in order to assure Miss Iman and the public that all of her allegations will be rigorously and independently reviewed.”
Woods also issued an update on 2 August, saying GMP is “obviously aware of and [understands] the concerns regarding the allegations that the force is withholding footage”. He said that GMP had “been unable to recover two one-hour segments of the CCTV footage from the custody cell”, but was not “withholding this deliberately”.
He continued: “The footage was burnt onto four discs in hour-long segments. One disc corrupted, but files were recovered by the Digital Investigation Unit. Upon review, it was identified that two hours (from 10:00 to 10:59 hours on 05/02/21, and from 13:00 to 13:59 hours on 06/02/21) were missing but, by that date, the parent footage on the servers had been overwritten (due to the standard retention time having passed).”
Woods said that GMP has now recovered and secured the servers and has “an active line of enquiry – being if the outstanding hours can be recovered by digital forensics professionals”.
GMP said that the IOPC is continuing to assess the second referral made by the force in relation to Iman’s complaint, and that the force will “positively engage” with an independent review by former victims commissioner Dame Vera Baird.
An IOPC spokesperson said: “We received a complaint referral in May 2022 from Zayna Iman in relation to allegations about her treatment in police custody at Pendleton police station. Following careful consideration of the available information, we directed the force to carry out a local investigation in July 2022.
“In light of the new information and concerns raised in media reports we have been in further discussions with Greater Manchester police and agreed with them that they should submit a new referral so we can assess new information. We will be reviewing existing and additional information before determining if any further action is required from us.”
This story was originally published on 3 August 2023 and has been updated.
Images: Elainea Emmott
Sign up for the latest news and must-read features from Stylist, so you don’t miss out on the conversation.
By signing up you agree to occasionally receive offers and promotions from Stylist. Newsletters may contain online ads and content funded by carefully selected partners. Don’t worry, we’ll never share or sell your data. You can opt-out at any time. For more information read Stylist’s Privacy Policy
Thank you!
You’re now subscribed to all our newsletters. You can manage your subscriptions at any time from an email or from a MyStylist account.