A former Met police officer who lied that she had been sexually assaulted during a fake traffic stop because she was late for work has been ordered back to prison.
Lauren Evans, 35, claimed she was pulled over and subjected to an intimate body search while driving on the A20 in southeast London in March 2023.
During the subsequent investigation, another serving Met officer identified as having been on the same dual carriageway was arrested in front of his wife and children.
He spent a night in the cells and was suspended from duty before further examination of CCTV and number plate recognition footage proved no stop had ever taken place.
Evans, from Maidstone in Kent, was jailed for a year on March 2 having been found guilty of perverting the course of justice at Southwark Crown Court.
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But the Court of Appeal has now increased her sentence to two years after the case was referred under the Unduly Lenient Sentence scheme.
As she’s already been released from prison, she’s now been ordered to go back.
Evans, who was based at Bromley Police Station, sent messages to senior officers saying ‘I’ve just been pulled over!!’ while she was running late for her shift.
But in reality, no stop had taken place and the lie had ‘snowballed out of control’, the court heard, after she arrived on time but appeared flustered and repeated the account to colleagues.
Judge Martin Griffith said during Evans’ sentencing her crime was ‘all through a simple lie told in circumstances which must have had something to do with being late’.
Evans went on to give a detailed and emotional statement where she said she’d been stopped by a man in an unmarked car who said he was a Kent Police officer, claiming he’d carried out an intimate search of her body.
An investigation involving more than 30 detectives and over 1,500 hours of work identified a serving Met officer as a potential suspect, as he had been on the A20.
He was arrested at his home in front of his wife and two young children.
He was held in custody overnight, interviewed, suspended from duty and later cleared when data showed his vehicle never left the motorway.
Further CCTV and ANPR analysis proved no stop had occurred.
Evans was arrested and later convicted of perverting the course of justice.
In January this year, a misconduct hearing found that she should be dismissed from the force without notice.