Wiltshire Police offender manager jailed after cheating on partner with convicted rapist

Rachel Beale was meant to be managing sex offender Marc Few, when she started the illicit relationship and abused her position to benefit her lover.

She invited Few to her house to smoke cannabis and drink alcohol with her then-partner Jason Elliot, who on one occasion caught her cuddling Few in the bed of their guest room.

She also booked hotel rooms, including in Swindon’s Holiday Inn, during lockdown. During that time, only police staff with a law enforcement purpose were able to do that.

The court heard that during her time in Wiltshire Police’s Management of Sexual or Violent Offender (MOSOVO) Unit, Beale had been placed in “a position of trust” with an “enormous amount of responsibility”.

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“Those who abuse that trust and responsibility must understand that it is inevitable a custodial sentence is the consequence if they act in the way you did,” Judge Peter Blair QC said in sentencing at Bristol Crown Court on Wednesday afternoon.

“It’s an important matter of public deterrence for sentences to clearly flag the behaviour of the sort you fell into will be punished and will be punished severely.”

He jailed Beale, now 53, for six months, reduced from nine months for her early guilty plea.

But there was drama after Few, watching his partner’s case from the public gallery, marched to the dock after Beale was jailed.

Marc Few, a convicted rapist who Rachel Beale was meant to be managing when he started an illicit relationship with him.

Few, earlier reprimanded by Judge Blair for interrupting his sentencing remarks, stuck his middle finger up at the judge, and ignored a security guard who asked him to move away from his partner.

“Don’t touch me,” he told the guard, before he hugged a teary Beale and stormed out of court.

The court had earlier heard how Beale, of Kencot, Oxfordshire, previously pleaded guilty to misconduct in a public office relating to a seven-month period between February and September 2020.

Prosecutor James Haskell had said that Few, initially jailed for rape in November 2003, was released in February 2020 with various licence conditions, and Beale was named his offender manager.

He was living at a hotel for offenders in May of that year when the relationship came to the police’s attention. Another resident Anthony Mead, had been reporting a separate incident when he asked the call handler what he should do if “an offender manager had been having sex with a bloke under her care”.

Other residents and staff also became suspicious. One, who worked for Wiltshire Council, asked Beale why Few had been staying away from the hotel.

“The defendant replied that him staying away was connected to his drug rehabilitation, which was not true,” Mr Haskell said.

Rachel Beale hid from the cameras at Bristol Magistrates' Court earlier this year. Photo: Andrew Lloyd.

He went onto say that Beale misused the police database several times to search for the names of the fellow residents of the hotel – including whilst on sick leave and annual leave. She claimed that was to stay on top of who they were, but no record was found of her doing the same searches of other offenders she was managing.

The Independent Office for Police Conduct later took over the investigation, and found over 500 messages between Few and Beale on her personal phone, some of which “were clearly sexual in nature”.

One of the messages including Beale telling Few “good news he’s off out on the bike”, and then to “get over here” with suggestive emojis.

In interview, she passed this off as “banter”, admitting a relationship with the sex offender but denying it was sexual.

In mitigation, Martha Smith-Higgins told the court that “credit for plea is the greatest mitigation”.

She added: “She accepts and has always accepted that she did enter into an intimate relationship with a person she should not have been with at that time.

“She left an abusive relationship in May 2020. It was from that point that the relationship with Mr Few developed.

“As a result of that decision, she has lost everything. She remains in a relationship with Mr Few but accepts looking back she should have handled it differently.”

Ms Smith-Higgins added that Beale has since resigned, and was fully prepared to go straight to prison on Wednesday afternoon.

But, she highlighted that the defendant is a carer for her elderly mother who has cancer, adding: “I ask your Lordship to consider the suspension of her sentence. For the reasons I have outlined already, but in addition we are dealing with a woman now aged 53, who up until now has been a lady of clean character.

“In my submission this is a case where there is significant personal mitigation and a realistic prospect of rehabilitation. Miss Beale has been assessed as posing a low risk of reoffending, is of low risk of serious harm, and a positive recommendation that she is suitable to work with the probation service.”

In sentencing, Judge Blair highlighted some of the effects of the case on the defendant: “You’re now 53 years of age and you’re someone of good previous character, have had a long employment history.

“This offending has led to your fall from grace, you resigned from your employment with Wiltshire Police, felt the need to move out of the area due to the adverse publicity you suffered, and have not been able to get employment because of this hanging over your head.”

He said that “appropriate punishment can only be properly achieved by an immediate custodial sentence”, to which the defendant started to cry.

Beale is likely to serve half of her six-month sentence.