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Teenage girl stripped naked and left in police cell after threatening self-harm

Police officers at Skegness Police Station removed the teenager's clothing, forcing her to wait for ten minutes for an 'anti-rip suit'

Saturday 20 February 2016 12:07 GMT
The court heard that Peter Morgan worried Georgina Symonds would leave him and bugged her phone
The court heard that Peter Morgan worried Georgina Symonds would leave him and bugged her phone (Getty Images)

A 16-year-old girl was allegedly stripped of her clothes and left naked in a jail cell after she threatened to harm herself, a police inspection report has revealed.

Police officers at Skegness Police Station removed the teenager's clothing, forcing her to wait for ten minutes before giving her an “anti-rip suit” and allegedly pushing her twice.

Officers have allegedly refused to follow up the girl’s complaints about being “violated”, according to the Daily Mail.

The incident was noted in Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary’s report on its inspection of police custody and after inspecting CCTV, the report concluded “not enough was done to maintain her dignity.”

The report states: "Staff appeared to spend some time negotiating with the girl before she was restrained; staff then left the cell, inexplicably, taking the anti-rip suit with them, leaving the girl naked in her cell for a period of around 10 minutes.

"At this point, the top half of the anti-rip suit was posted through the cell hatch, followed by the lower half about 10 minutes later. Her behaviour was challenging and resulted in a male officer pushing her twice while she was naked.

"The vulnerability of this girl in police custody was compounded by her being left naked in a cell. Not enough was done to maintain her dignity."

Lincolnshire police have been contacted but were unavailable to comment.

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