- READ MORE: Police trainee banned for passing secrets to drug dealer boyfriend
Police chiefs have been urged to overhaul vetting of new recruits after scandals involving female officers having affairs with criminals including gangland drug lords.
Campaigners told the Daily Mail that not enough was being done to prevent ‘susceptible’ young officers signing up only to then end up in disgrace.
The calls come as a trainee police officer was this week banned for life for passing information to her drug dealer boyfriend.
Ex-West Yorkshire Police officer Maryam Ilyas, 20, accessed the force’s computers to find confidential data and inform her criminal boyfriend about an operation into him.
It was found that Ms Ilyas had used police computer systems to search for details about the man on three occasions between March and May 2025.
Ms Ilyas resigned ahead of her disciplinary hearing on Wednesday, but the panel ruled that she would have otherwise been fired.
Her links to the man were identified when he was arrested in June, with officers finding messages between the pair, including pictures of money and chats about drugs.
The hearing was told that Ms Ilyas failed to notify the force of her relationship with the man when she was recruited in June 2024, and in January, she told investigators she was ‘unaware of his criminal history’.
Catherine Hankinson, the force’s former deputy chief constable, ruled that messages indicated an ‘existing relationship’ up to July 2025.
She said the officer’s conduct had been ‘repeated’, ‘sustained’ and ‘intentional’.
The case is one of several involving police officers entering into relationships with criminals – while prison warders have also been punished for affairs with inmates.
Former police officer Norman Brennan, founder of the Victims Of Crime Trust charity, expressed his dismay at the recent revelations – and also suggested Ms Ilyas should have faced a criminal investigation as well as the disciplinary probe.
He told the Daily Mail: ‘This is unacceptable and it seems like it’s happening more and more these days, in both the police and the prison services.
‘Such behaviour undermines the whole criminal justice system and also erodes public trust.
‘Young people are being recruited but the vetting is letting people through that should never be in the police, especially when there are links to the criminal underworld.
‘In this latest case, she wasn’t arrested or charged – but there are cases that do warrant arrest and imprisonment.
‘The whole criminal justice system is in a mess and it’s going to get a lot worse.’
West Yorkshire Police said: ‘Criminal proceedings were carefully considered. However, after a full review, the circumstances did not meet the evidential threshold required for a referral to the CPS.’
Other cases include that of a corrupt female police officer filmed passionately kissing her inmate lover in a prison waiting room while still in her uniform as they carried out a secret fling in plain sight.
Choni Kenny was spotted on CCTV having an illicit affair with drug dealer Josh Whelan, to whom she passed information and provided 20 mobile phones so he could still run his criminal enterprise behind bars.
When the relationship broke down after his release, the 27-year-old started a relationship with former schoolmate Rahim Mottley, who was under investigation by Greater Manchester Police and had moved to Spain.
She told him about planned firearms raid and promised to find out who the ‘local grasses’ were, after searching police systems for information when he was arrested.
But her crimes were exposed when her fateful kiss with Whelan at Forest Bank Prison was spotted on CCTV by GMP anti-corruption investigators as they probed her movements, phone and computer use.
She was also seen with Whelan in her BMW and went to a Nando’s restaurant with him, before going to work where she searched for details of prisoners released that week.
The Greater Manchester Police officer was jailed in April at Manchester Crown Court for three years and nine months after she was convicted of passing information to both men.
‘Committed criminal’ Whelan, was reimprisoned for two years after admitting to possessing a phone in prison, possession of a bladed article, racially aggravated assault, threatening behaviour and a bail offence.
Mottley, 28, was sentenced to two years and four months after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit misconduct in a public office.
Another ban was handed out to a corrupt police officer who was ‘infatuated’ with her secret criminal boyfriend and raided police systems to pass intelligence to him.
Former PC Lorna Pennycook accessed West Midlands Police systems 200 times so she could supply information to ‘professional’ crook Anthony Kennedy.
She ‘researched’ confidential details about investigations and shared them with her lorry jacker partner before attempting to cover her tracks by telling him to delete their messages.
Pennycook even convinced Kennedy not to end their affair after he realised she was a police officer.
At an accelerated misconduct hearing in July, Pennycook was found to have breached standards of professional behaviour.
A panel ruled that her actions amounted to gross misconduct and she would have been dismissed had she still been working for the force.
Her actions were ‘calculated, deliberate, in no sense coerced’, a report from the hearing read.
Pennycook joined the force in January 2009, spending the majority of her career on the Birmingham East Neighbourhood Policing Unit where she became acting sergeant in August 2020.
In March 2021, she was posted to the organised crime and gangs team as a constable.
She started a relationship with Kennedy in 2016, finding out he was ‘involved in criminality’ the following year.
The report from Chief Constable Craig Guildford read: ‘[Kennedy] wanted to end the relationship upon discovering your profession; you clearly did not want to end the relationship despite learning that he was a criminal.
‘You remained in a relationship with him. You did not disclose this relationship to your supervisor.’
Pennycook ‘used numerous police systems to access sensitive policing information and intelligence’ which was not relevant to her duties between August 2017 and February 2021.
This was ‘deliberate conduct’ to get hold of information which would have been useful to Kennedy and his criminal associates, the report read.
Pennycook told Kennedy – who was known to be part of an organised criminal group – to delete her messages and ‘requested a burner phone’ so messages were not linked to her.
She was arrested in April 2021 and resigned three months later.
The panel heard how she was charged with misconduct in a public office and admitted the charge – but with an ‘untruthful basis of plea’.
But her basis of plea was later abandoned and she was jailed for four years last December.
Pennycook, formerly of Walsall, penned a letter to a case worker within the force’s professional standards department in March 2025.
She ‘fully acknowledged’ her wrongdoing and said she expected to be dismissed.
Pennycook was found to have breached the standards of professional behaviour relating to confidentiality, discreditable conduct and honesty and integrity.
She now features on the College of Policing’s barred list.
Kennedy, then 43 and of Tipton in the West Midlands, admitted assisting in the commission of misconduct in a public office and was jailed for four years last year.
Birmingham Crown Court previously heard how he had a criminal record boasting 18 convictions for 41 offences.
This included a gang lorry jacking in Oldbury which led to him being locked up for eight years in 2012.
Kennedy threatened to end his relationship with Pennycook over concerns it would have been damaging to his reputation with his criminal friends.
But Pennycook warned she would not leave him alone and said it would be ‘advantageous’ for him if they stayed together.
The former officer called Kennedy significantly more times than he contacted her during the four-year period, the court heard.
Pennycook had access to force computer systems which held information on crime reports, logs, custody records, alleged crimes, telephone numbers, vehicle registrations, wanted suspects, warrants to be executed and the management of prisoners.
She also ‘attempted to shift the blame’ upon Kennedy before she was sentenced, claiming she had acted under pressure.
Meanwhile, a budding young police officer was caught assisting her drug dealer boyfriend in selling cocaine and ecstasy at a major music festival – but avoided jail after revealing she was pregnant with his child.
Carly Fay, 25, acted as a ‘conduit’ for Dylan Neilson and a customer after he smuggled a haul of drugs into Creamfields in Daresbury, Cheshire.
Fay, who aspired to join the Metropolitan Police, exchanged messages with a woman named Emily about the prices for cocaine.
Fay and Neilson travelled 230 miles to the festival from their homes in Glasgow and were detained after security staff spotted him acting suspiciously.
Neilson, 29, from the Coatbridge area, was rugby tackled to the floor and found to have 15 bags of cocaine, 324 ecstasy tablets, and 4.23g of broken ecstasy tablets – while £13,000 in cash was recovered.
He was found with 15 bags of cocaine, 324 ecstasy tablets, 4.23 grams of broken ecstasy tablets and cash totaling £13,000 – and additional drugs were discovered in their tent.
Fay denied supplying drugs but incriminating messages were found on her phone.
At Chester Crown Court last year, Fay pleaded guilty to being concerned in the supply of cocaine and MDMA.
She faced two years in jail but was sentenced to 18 months suspended for two years.
Defence counsel Kate Morley said: ‘The relationship between them is now over.
‘Miss Fay gives a description of the toxic relationship and how she felt in the relationship.
‘She considered that the balance of power was heavily in favour of Mr Neilson.
‘Whilst she does not say that Mr Neilsen forced her or threatened her to assist in the supply of drugs, such was the nature of the relationship there was a subtle pressure to assist him.’
Neilson, who has previous drug offences, was jailed for 30 months after he pleaded guilty to possession with intent to supply cocaine and MDMA and to possession of criminal property.
In another case, a rookie police officer embarked on an affair with her married boss before going on a date with a drugs kingpin – but avoided a misconduct hearing.
Caitlin Howarth, 25, was just weeks into her career with West Yorkshire Police when she struck up an illicit romance with Chief Superintendent Daniel Greenwood – a father of two 17 years her senior.
Mr Greenwood, then the £93,000-a-year Covid enforcement chief for Bradford, lost his job after admitting gross misconduct over the ‘obviously wrong’ affair last year.
Ms Howarth, who boasts more than 11,500 Instagram followers and regularly shares revealing selfies, was due to face a similar police disciplinary hearing.
But the Daily Mail revealed how those proceedings were quietly shelved – and after a criminal case alleging Ms Howarth committed misconduct in public office was also dropped last year.
A West Yorkshire Police spokesman said in September: ‘A review of the misconduct matters took place following Ms Howarth’s acquittal. This established there was no case to answer.’
Mr Greenwood, once tipped as a future assistant chief at West Yorkshire Police, flouted lockdown rules to sneak off for trysts with Ms Howarth, despite being responsible for enforcing stay-at-home rules.
The pair swapped raunchy pictures and even had sex while he was out jogging, with the affair causing ‘tittle-tattle’ and ‘gossip in the ranks’.
Ms Howarth had sex with Mr Greenwood, 42, after he helped her secure a job in the force in 2019.
After meeting in person in March 2020, the pair swapped flirty messages and sexually explicit pictures over the summer.
The pair had sex during the January 2021 Covid lockdown, shortly after her 21st birthday and when she had been a probationer PC for just seven weeks, and again in July 2021.
The relationship was eventually exposed in November 2021 when Ms Howarth was investigated by anti-corruption officers over meet-ups with Joseph Shaw, a drug dealer later jailed over a £1.5million heroin racket.
A disciplinary panel found Greenwood abused his position of trust and responsibility. He quit just two days before he could be formally sacked, later reinventing himself as a cheesemaker.
When quizzed over the illicit liaisons, Mr Greenwood told investigators that the fling was ‘habitually initiated’ by Ms Howarth who ‘found older men…more attractive’.
She, in turn, said she did not have sex with Mr Greenwood because of his rank but ‘because I was going through a rough time with my boyfriend’.
Howarth, from Bingley in West Yorkshire, told investigators: ‘I ended up getting feelings and then that’s how it happened.
She added: ‘He always asked me to delete the messages. I think he deleted them so that his wife didn’t see but he used to say ‘make sure you delete the pictures or delete the messages’.
‘Towards the end I didn’t [because] I didn’t think. I didn’t know why I needed to. I think he deleted them from my iCloud at his request.’
During Mr Greenwood’s misconduct hearing, it emerged Ms Howarth had been on a Tinder date with drug dealer Shaw, whose brother Daniel was in prison at the time.
Shaw, 31, was jailed for six and a half years in January 2023 after admitting a drugs supply plot with his brother Daniel, 27, and has since been released.
Alsi put behind bars, in November 2023, was corrupt police worker Natalie Mottram, after she illegally accessed sensitive information to tip off a criminal friend about a secret international investigation into serious crime.
Mottram, then 25, from Warrington, was sentenced to three years and nine months after betraying her police bosses – only to be caught in an undercover sting operation set up to trap whoever was leaking secrets to criminals.
She had been working as an intelligence analyst at the ROCU when she was arrested by National Crime Agency (NCA) officers on June 12, 2020.
Mottram was held as part of Operation Venetic – the NCA-led UK response to the takedown of the encrypted communications platform EncroChat, used by gangsters and serious criminals across Europe to avoid detection.
Mottram, whose job involved making threat assessments of organised crime gangs, told Jonathan Kay, 39, about the covert EncroChat operation, and that officers had intelligence on him.
She admitted misconduct in public office, perverting the course of justice and unauthorised access to computer material, at an earlier court hearing.
Kay admitted perverting the course of justice at an earlier hearing and was sentenced to two years and six months in jail.
John McKeon, head of the NCA’s anti-corruption unit, said: ‘Operation Venetic is a once-in-a-generation investigation which has made a huge contribution to public protection.
‘More than 1,240 offenders have been convicted, more than 173 firearms recovered and more than nine tonnes of heroin and cocaine seized. More than 200 threats to life were averted. But Mottram’s actions had the potential to derail all that.’
Assistant Chief Constable Jo Edwards, head of the North West ROCU, said: ‘The overwhelming majority of people who work in policing do so to protect the public from harm, and they devote years of service to that end.
‘Sadly, the actions of Natalie Mottram undermine the good work that is being done daily by her colleagues here at the North West Regional Organised Crime Unit.’
Superintendent Simon Parsonage, head of professional standards at Cheshire Constabulary, said: ‘As this case demonstrates, nobody is above the law and I want to reassure the public that we are committed to doing all we can to root out any officers or staff who fail to meet the high standards that the people of Cheshire expect and deserve.’
The NCA inquiry was part of an Independent Office for Police Conduct-directed investigation.
Rosemary Ainslie, head of the Crown Prosecution Service Special Crime Division, added: ‘Mottram’s corrupt actions were a gross breach of trust and had the potential to be hugely damaging to a very important and large-scale investigation into EncroChat and organised crime.
