The worst thing a parent could go through had already happened to Christine Durand. Her son Steven was missing, and she didn’t know if he was alive.
But what the now 70-year-old mother didn’t know was that things would only get worse in the coming months and years.
“I feel like they didn’t care, like I was left on the shelf,” she said independent. “I had to go to the police station every day about my son, crying. They let me down many times.”
Steven, 31, was walking from his sister’s flat to her home in Preston on 19 October 2018, the day he disappeared. He lost his phone, so all he had was his bus fare.
After Ms Durand reported Steven missing, Lancashire Constabulary launched a public appeal for the 31-year-old, who Ms Durand said was known to officers as he suffered from mental health problems. But they misidentified him twice by describing him as white when he was mixed race.
Steven Durand disappeared at the age of 31. Police misidentified her race twice, describing her as white when she was mixed race (Christine Durand).
Christine Durand believes her son could have been found if the police had handled his case better (Christine Durand)
“Everything I asked the police to do, they did the opposite,” Ms Durand said, citing moments such as when police broke down the door to Steven’s flat when she told them she had a spare key.
“I think the police are racist – I think they didn’t care about my son because he was mixed race.”
The Leyland retiree believes her son, “the kindest person you could ever meet,” could have been found if police had handled the investigation better.
Research by the charity Missing People shows that black (31 per cent) and Asian (35 per cent) people have a lower proportion of missing people reported by the police than white (39 per cent) people.
The report also found that black and Asian children are more likely to be long-term missing than white children. One in five missing cases involving black children occurred for longer than 48 hours, compared with 14 percent for Asians and 13 percent for whites.
Missing People has now launched its new SafeCall service, a national lifeline designed to help the 72,000 children who go missing in the UK each year. independent Last month it reached its £165,000 fundraising target, enabling the creation of a free, confidential, round-the-clock service.
Ms Durand says the police have ‘let me down on many occasions’ (Christine Durand)
Evidence Joel’s experience is similar to Ms. Durand’s.
Ms Joel’s son Richard Okoroge, aged 19, went missing from Ladbroke Grove, London on 22 March 2021. Ms Joel, 43, said she reported Richard, who has sickle cell syndrome, missing to police the next day, saying he was away from home without medication.
But the 43-year-old claimed her concerns weren’t dealt with immediately by authorities and described the investigation as a “disaster,” adding, “Don’t worry, he’ll come home,” and also, “If you can’t find your son, how do you expect us?”
Richard was found dead on 5 April 2021 in Epping Forest, London.
Richard Okoroghe, aged 19, went missing from Lundbroke Grove, London on 22nd March 2021 (Proof Joel)
Ms Joel believes her son might have been found alive if the investigation had been handled properly. “I felt everything was ruled by discrimination and racism,” the nurse said. “Every day I go through this pain in my heart knowing that something could have been done, but nothing was done. I remember sleepless nights, walking barefoot from my house to Ladbroke Grove police station, crying, begging to find my child.”
The Metropolitan Police apologized to Ms Joel for providing a “level of service that the public would not expect from us”, but did not admit any discriminatory behaviour. An Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) investigation identified a number of failings by the police and described the level of service Ms Joel received as “unacceptable”, but found that “the evidence does not indicate that any delay in upgrading Richard’s risk level was due to his or Ms Joel’s race”.
In Ms Durand’s case, she made a complaint and an internal investigation by Lancashire Constabulary found “insufficient evidence” that Steven had been discriminated against on the basis of his race or mental health. The force declined to comment on the matter.
Ball also disputed her claim about the door being broken, but the IOPC upheld Ms Durand’s allegations after reviewing her complaint. It added that the constabulary has apologized for its ethnic identity.
Evidence Joel believes that his son might have been found alive if the Force had acted properly (Evidence Joel)
Although Ms Joel told Ball that Richard, who has sickle cell syndrome, was unsafe and away from home without his medication, she accused the authorities of not immediately treating her concerns (Evidence Joel).
Josie Allan, head of policy and partnerships at Missing People, said the charity had heard from many families who felt they had been discriminated against because of their race.
Explaining why research can come to competing conclusions, she said that “underlying systemic bias” will affect police responses, but its “insidious” nature makes it difficult to identify.
“There are inherent issues in being able to identify discrimination in the complaints process,” she said. “We know that the data shows that there are disparities for black missing persons, so there is a gap between the evidence about the disparities and their acceptance… The statistics and the sheer volume of families raising concerns should raise very serious concerns within the police that there is a pattern.”
She noted that the IOPC had recently revised its guidance in an attempt to improve its “problematic” handling of discrimination complaints.
In 2021, the Home Affairs Select Committee’s ‘McPherson: 20 Years on Inquiry’ suggested that police services had failed to overcome issues and perceptions of institutional racism following the initial inquiry into Stephen Lawrence’s murder, which found consistent evidence of “over-policing” and “under-protection” of black communities.
Speaking about Steven’s case, a spokesman for Lancashire Constabulary said: “We carried out extensive inquiries in relation to CCTV, telephony, open land and waterway searches, accomplices, witnesses, health agencies and financial checks and a number of media appeals, before deciding to record the investigation.”
The force said that “difficult” decisions such as filing a case must be taken occasionally, but that “any new information will be fully investigated”.
A Met Police spokesman said: “When Richard went missing in 2021, hundreds of officers worked tirelessly for more than 15 days as part of an extensive search, including specialist search teams, dogs and horses and colleagues from Essex Police, before his body was found.
They said the force accepted all recommendations from the IOPC’s 2022 inquiry, and had “made significant changes to the way we respond from the moment a person is reported missing”.
“This includes putting more emphasis on engaging with people who report someone missing, so we can better understand the risks they face,” they added.
please Donate now In the Independent and Missing People’s Safecall campaign, which raised £165,000 to create a free, nationwide service to help vulnerable children find safety and support.
Reach out for advice, support and options if you or a child you love has gone missing safecall.org.uk
