13 September 2024 , 19:09
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A former Metropolitan Police officer has been jailed for 16 months after he admitted stealing money from a man who died after collapsing.
Craig Carter stole £115 from Italian director Claudio Gaetani after he collapsed and died on the street in Hackney after suffering a fatal heart attack in September 2022.
The filmmaker had been in London to attend a theatre festival, having arrived from Italy the evening prior to his death.
Two officers watched over his body until an undertaker came, while his corpse was in full view of ‘children’.
Italian filmmaker Claudio Gaetani died after collapsing in the middle of the street in Hackney (Picture: Facebook)
Carter was serving as a constable at the time of the offence, and later pleaded guilty to taking money from Mr Gaetani after it was found to be missing from his wallet after family got his belongings back.
One of his friends has since said body worn footage showed an officer counting the money at the scene.
Scotland Yard received a complaint about the incident in October 2022 from a friend of Mr Gaetani, which it referred to the Independent Office for Police Conduct the same month.
The friend previously said: ‘The money is not the issue. Claudio comes from quite a wealthy family.
‘I’m still doing this complaint, not because of the money, but because people who are in uniform they should have a kind of trust. I think it is really disrespectful. I was really, really upset.’
Handing him his sentence, Judge Kalyani Kaul KC described Carter’s career and noted that he has raised two daughters, and has a ‘strong’ marriage with his wife who he cares for.
She then told him: ‘On the 7th of September, two years ago, you threw all of that away – you let down your force, you let down your community’.
He admitted misconduct in public office on July 26 this year and the charge stated that ‘while acting as a public officer namely as a police constable” he “took for his own use money from a wallet received by him in evidence in relation to a sudden death’.
Carter was dismissed from the force without notice in August after serving for 23 years.