a serving metropolitan police officer
has been arrested on suspicion of murder
following the disappearance of a woman
in south london a week ago
sarah everard who was 33 was making her
way home from a friend's house
the metropolitan police commissioner
dame cressida dick revealed tonight that
what appear to be human remains
have been found near ashford in kent but
those remains
have not yet been identified dame
cressida said that the news that the man
arrested was one of her officers
had sent shock waves and anger
throughout the force
let's have this report from our special
correspondent lucy manning
sarah everett described by her family
as amazing lovely fantastic
for a week they clung on to hope she
would be
found alive off this beaten track
surrounded by woodland police searched
all day
as one of their own colleagues sat in
police custody
on suspicion of her murder and kidnap
this evening detectives
and search teams investigating sarah's
disappearance
have found very sadly
what appears to be human
remains the discovery was made
in an area of woodland in ashford
in kent the news today that it was a
metropolitan police officer
who was arrested on suspicion of
sarah's murder has sent shock
waves and anger
through the public and through the met
sarah everard was last seen a week ago
walking from a friend's house in south
london
to her house as many women do on many
nights out
walking alone she didn't make it home
the police officer under arrest is in
his 40s
his house in deal in kent was also
searched
police removing a car he was a
diplomatic protection officer
but instead of protecting embassies he's
facing questions about a possible murder
a woman was also arrested on suspicion
of assisting an offender
about four o'clock in the morning i
heard car doors banging because
i just assumed it was like um night
workers
they you know people going to bed go to
work
and then i just saw some activity with
police down there
sarah a marketing executive had been at
her friend's house on leithwaite road
close to clapham common in south london
she left there at around
nine in the evening to return to her
home in brixton
an hour's walk away police believe she
made her way across clapham common
this footage from a doorbell camera
showed sarah on poinders road
at around 9 30. it's the last time
she was seen her family still want
people to come forward
to help the police with anything they
saw that night
the policeman arrested was scotland yard
said off-duty at the time of her
disappearance
and it's not known if he was or wasn't
connected in any way to sarah
she was just 33 years old
just enjoying london life then walking
home
how could that end here where the
week-long agony of her family
is only intensified
when a woman disappears after walking
home alone
so many people women especially hold
their breaths hoping
that that person will be found it seems
tonight
after the searches in these isolated
dark
fields that everything sarah's family
willed for
their hope that she would be found it
seems that that
has not been possible it was an
ashen-faced commissioner of the
metropolitan police
now leading a murder inquiry where the
main suspect
is one of her own officers lucy many
thanks again for the latest there in ked
lucy manning our special correspondent
just to recap in her statement this
evening the metropolitan
police commissioner dame krastadic said
that londoners
should know it was incredibly rare in
her words for a woman to be
abducted from the capital streets and
she said her thoughts very much were
with sarah everard's family
let's go to scotland yard and our home
affairs correspondent daniel sanford
daniel
what's the latest that you have for us
there
well first of all i think there is an
urgent sense here of a need to reassure
the people of london
that it is extremely rare for people to
be abducted by
strangers rare is still for there to be
an abduction that turns into a possible
murder
and of course if a police officer is
involved that would essentially be
unique the other word that's being used
around here this evening as well as
reassurance and shock is betrayal
because although this investigation
could
take another path after all nobody has
yet been charged
if it does turn out that a police
officer has been involved then there
will be a very strong sense of betrayal
from the very top of this organization
down to the rank and file a sense that
they will have been portrayed
and that the people of london above all
would have been portrayed because they
feel a
deep sense of pride that their job is to
protect the people of london
and now here's one of their own officers
suspected of doing the exact opposite
in the worst possible way daniel many
thanks daniel sanford home affairs
correspondent there at
scotland yard