Top cop whose team failed to flag Southport killer bungled probe into notorious paedo

Counter-terrorism chief's rap over teen abuse case

- SASKIA ROWLANDS

A POLICE chief whose team failed to escalate concerns about the Southport killer had previously bungled a probe into a notorious paedophile.

Dominic Scally headed up counter-terrorism policing for the North West and was responsible for officers who decided Axel Rudakubana's behaviour did not warrant further intervention.

He was handed the role, which oversees anti-terror programme Prevent in the region, despite mishandling an investigation into sex offender Domenyk Lattlay-Fottfoy, previously known as Dominic Noonan.

A review found officers did not take Rudakubana's obsession with massacre and extreme violence into account before he murdered Bebe King, six, Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven, and Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine, in Merseyside on July 29 last year. Charlotte Littlewood, a counter extremism consultant, said yesterday. "Questions to the local Prevent team, social services and police need to be answered."