A hero West Midlands Police officer who received a Pride of Britain Award has spoken about the racist abuse he regularly experiences on the beat.

Leon Mittoo described the verbal attacks as “abhorrent” as he called on the courts to impose stiffer sentences on those who racially abuse officers.

His calls have been backed by West Midlands Police Federation, which has also called for a change to procedures around charging offenders to speed up justice for victims.

Leon said: “I get a lot of racist comments. I’m down on police systems as being a repeat victim because it’s happened that often.

“When it happens, it’s hard to stay composed, carry on being professional and carry on my duties.”

Leon said some of the abuse he has received has been from black people or people with a mixed ethnic background.

“I’m mixed race myself and I think some people use racial slurs thinking it’s acceptable because they’re of the same colour, but it’s not,” he said.

“It’s not just me. Every person of colour on the team has been racially abused at some point.

“I’ve had colleagues who are gay and they’ve been verbally abused with homosexual slurs and it’s just not on.

“It’s abhorrent but you can’t let it affect you, because you wouldn’t be effective in your job if you did,” he added.

Leon, who received last year’s Emergency Services Pride of Britain Award with colleague James Willetts after detaining two knife-wielding brothers in West Bromwich, said officers will always look to arrest when someone is being racially abusive.

Picture caption: Leon Mittoo (third from the left) is pictured with Phillip Schofield,
Holly Willoughby, West Midlands Police colleague James Willetts, Holby actress
Adjoa Andoh and actor Adrian Lester receiving his Pride of Britain Award.

And he urged the courts to support the police with stiffer sentences for offenders. 

“We’ll always look to arrest, whereas a few years ago we might not have,” he said. “And then it becomes a separate offence because it’s aggravated by the racial element. 

“I get a lot of support from the Force and the Federation but we need harsher penalties from the courts.

“People need to know that type of behaviour is unacceptable and we won’t stand for it.”

Jase Dooley, deputy chair of West Midlands Police Federation, echoed Leon’s calls for tougher punishments.

And he said the process of putting offenders before the courts also needed to be speeded up.

He said: “Our members are only human and racist abuse can have a huge impact on them. It must never be tolerated.

“Our courts need to pass sentences to show it’s unacceptable for anyone to commit such disgusting offences."

He added: “At the moment, if an offender uses racial abuse, it’s captured on body cam, and it’s admitted in interview, we’ve still got to go to Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) advisers."

“The Federation is working hard to change the current guidance so we don’t have to go to the CPS if the evidence is overwhelming.

“It’s taking six or seven weeks for that information to come back before we charge somebody. It’s delaying justice and, to me, delayed justice is justice denied.

“It causes backlogs in cases where it shouldn’t because the evidence is overwhelming.

“We need to be able to speed it up and give peace of mind and a sense of justice for the victim.”

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