Metropolitan Police officer jailed for child sex abuse offences

Detective Constable Chris Maitland was found guilty of sexual offences including sexually touching a 13-year-old girl

Scotland Yard said the 40-year-old man has been taken into custody and subsequently bailed pending further inquiries (Getty)

A Metropolitan Police officer from a sex abuse unit has been jailed for more than five years for child sexual abuse offences.

Detective Constable Chris Maitland, 40, was based on the Sexual Offences, Exploitation and Child Abuse Command when he was arrested in November last year.

At Southwark Crown Court on Friday he received a total sentence of five years and four months.

Maitland was found guilty on two counts of sexually touching a girl under 13, seven counts of making an indecent image of a child and five counts of taking an indecent image of a child.

The office was originally arrested in 2015 on suspicion of possession and distribution of indecent images of children.

He was taken into custody and subsequently bailed pending further inquiries.

On 15 March he was arrested on suspicion of sexually touching a child, and later charged.

The unit Maitland worked for, also known as Sapphire, investigates rapes and serious sexual violence and has a child abuse investigation team tasked with safeguarding children.

The Metropolitan Police Service said Maitland was off duty at the time of the offences and is currently suspended from duty.