Government rape tsar quits over failures to hold alleged attacker to account for breaching bail conditions

‘My life as I knew it ended that night. In all of my interactions with the criminal justice system, I’ve been worn away over and over and over again,’ Emily Hunt says

Ms Hunt called for the prosecution of rape cases to be a ‘priority’ as she warned evidence shows rapists are often repeat offenders and the majority of uncaught rapists go on to rape again (PA) (PA Archive)

A government rape adviser says she quit her job over the criminal justice system’s failures to hold her alleged attacker to account for repeatedly breaching his bail conditions.

Emily Hunt told The Independent her decision to step down from her role was also prompted by feeling like there was a lack of “will” and “drive” to improve justice for rape survivors.

The 44-year-old, who alleges she was raped in May 2015, woke up without any clothes in a hotel bed in London next to a man she says she had never seen before.

Ms Hunt, who says her last memory was of having lunch with a family member in a local restaurant five hours earlier, felt as if she had been drugged and also suspected she had been raped. She described how her alleged attacker took a video lasting over one minute of her naked and unconscious on the hotel bed for the purpose of “masturbating to it later”.

Christopher Killick was arrested on suspicion of rape in 2015 but denied the allegations and was not charged because of a lack of evidence.

Half a decade on, Killick pleaded guilty to voyeurism and was handed a 30-month community order and told to never get in touch with Ms Hunt.

He was arrested after repeatedly infringing the restraining order by posting messages on Twitter. Killick spent three months on remand before being given a suspended 14-month jail sentence.

Ms Hunt, an independent adviser to the Ministry of Justice’s Rape Review for the last two years, told The Independent it was this “egregious” sentence that marked “the point for me where I gave up”.

She added: “He gets to go on and live his life as he likes. Whereas I am sentenced to continuing to have to be afraid of him and to have my friends and family police his social media to make sure that he’s not breaching the restraining order, because the police or the probation service never kept track of this.

“This was me and my friends having to see him write horrible things about me. He was tweeting about me – saying my full name.”

Ms Hunt, who is originally from New York, said she was going back to the US due to feeling at risk in the UK.

Ms Hunt said: “I’d hung in there hoping I’d see a shift but fundamentally I don’t feel like there is a drive to keep pushing forward.

“For me, I can’t keep giving that small bit of my soul that I give in each conversation talking about what happened to me. Talking about being failed by the criminal justice system is hard.”

Discussing her decision to step down, she said she could not be “a rubber stamp” as she noted her own case “highlighted that things weren’t changing the way they needed to – and weren’t going to.”

Ms Hunt, who had served as the Ministry of Justice’s independent adviser to its rape review since 2021, said: “Fundamentally, my life as I knew it ended that night.

“In all of my interactions with the criminal justice system, I’ve been worn away over and over and over again. I’ve been failed so many times. It’s impossible to keep track of. And I have gotten to a point where why would I report something to the police to go through that again?

“And if the outcome is only something that isn’t a real sentence, how can I imagine that I’m okay here? What if he turns up on my doorstep? What is going to happen then?”

The Metropolitan Police were called immediately after Ms Hunt suspected she had been raped – with the suspect admitting sex had taken place but claiming it had been with her consent.

Ms Hunt said the prosecution of rape cases must be a “priority” and warned that evidence shows rapists are often repeat offenders and the majority of uncaught rapists go on to perpetrate rape again.

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Justice said: “The role of independent advisor has been integral to the successful implementation of the Rape Review. We thank Emily Hunt for her valuable contributions over the last two years, supporting the government in exceeding all three ambitions ahead of schedule.”