An award-winning police officer told of her fury after a force spent 10 months investigating her for calling a transgender activist ‘Fred’ instead of ‘Freda’ on social media.
Cathy Larkman, who served with South Wales Police for more than three decades, was shocked when former colleagues turned up at her home near Port Talbot on Sept 4.
The retired superintendent, who won awards during her career as a firearms commander and she founded the South Wales Female Police Association, was horrified to discover that police had spent 10 months assessing whether shortening the name of a transgender activist was a hate crime.
In social media posts dating back to September last year, Ms Larkman referred to activist Freda Wallace as ‘Fred’, using the ‘dead’ male name of the now transgender woman.
Ms Larkman believes a complaint was made by disgraced transgender police officer Lynsay Watson, who has a history of urging the authorities to pursue criminal investigations of people who are critical of gender ideology.
Police later decided that the ‘threshold for a crime had not been met’ and the investigation was closed, but privately the officers involved expressed concern that they had to waste 10 months on it.
The investigation came just days after Graham Linehan, the Father Ted writer and an outspoken critic of transgender ideology, was arrested by armed officers at Heathrow Airport.
Yesterday Ms Larkman said the investigation was ‘completely mad’, telling the Mail: ‘All I did was shorten a person’s name. It’s like someone calling me Cath.
Cathy Larkman, who served for three decades at South Wales Police, says a force spent 10 months investigating her for calling a transgender activist ‘Fred’ instead of ‘Freda’
Ms Larkman believes a complaint was made by disgraced transgender police officer Lynsay Watson (pictured), who has a history of urging the authorities to pursue criminal investigations of people who are critical of gender ideology
‘The whole thing is completely mad. This is not what police are there for. They are not there to police unfashionable thoughts or hurty words.
‘I know frontline officers hate having to deal with this nonsense.
‘The first thing they said to me is they didn’t think it was a crime either.
‘No one had bothered to even look at who it was who was reporting this.
‘They take ‘crimes’ purely on the word of the person reporting.’
Ms Larkman said activists were trying to ‘weaponise police’ to ‘pursue private grievances’.
She added: ‘The police service keeps demonstrating that it is ideologically captured from the top down. It is failing the public.
‘It is also failing the brave officers who sign up, intending to serve that public – not to police their thoughts and words. They deserve a leadership that gives them the confidence and support to say a firm no to these extremists, not to capitulate to them.
‘This should concern us all. Public trust and confidence in our police service is not only being eroded, it is being destroyed. That is unacceptable.’
Ms Larkman was not home when police visited her home and left their details with her daughter.
Superintendent Cathy Larkman, pictured in 2019, was shocked when former colleagues turned up at her home near Port Talbot on Sept 4
Officers later informed her that the complaint related to three social media posts in relation to an ongoing debate about the police’s strip-searching policy.
Ms Larkman has argued that transgender women should not be allowed to strip-search women.
The messages complained about included ‘Fred blocked me’ and ‘Fred, put that drink down’.
A social media account called SEEN Police Official Open Public Network responded by saying a complaint had been made to South Wales Police about ‘a malicious activist’.
It is believed that this account is run by Ms Watson, a transgender former PC who was sacked by Leicestershire Police for gross misconduct in 2023, after sending more than 1,000 messages to another retired officer, Harry Miller.
Darren Millar, the leader of the Welsh Conservatives, said this weekend: ‘The majority of people in this country have so-called ‘gender critical’ views. Anyone should be free to air their views on trans issues.
‘Providing they are not encouraging violence this should never be a matter for the police.’
A spokesman for South Wales Police said: ‘Officers received a report of an alleged hate crime/malicious communications incident on Nov 26, 2024.
‘As part of their investigation into the report, officers visited an address in Margam, Neath Port Talbot on Thursday, Sept 4. The threshold for a crime has not been met, and the investigation has been closed with no suspect or subject identified.’
