Senior armed police officer with ‘unblemished’ 20-year profession is sacked after telling feminine colleague her backside was ‘the work of the Gods’

A senior police officer with a 20-year ‘unblemished’ professional record has been sacked for gross misconduct after making ‘degrading’ comments to three female subordinates.

Terry Mayers, 47, was described as ‘an exemplary officer’ with Greater Manchester Police.

The trained firearms officer’s record included being a ‘first responder’ officer at the Manchester Arena terrorist attack in May 2017, when 22 people were murdered at an Ariana Grande concert by suicide bomber Salman Abedi.

But a misconduct panel found the Sergeant targeted three female officers with ‘persistence’ for the ‘sole purpose of establishing an inappropriate sexual relationship and for sexual gratification’.

It added: ‘Police Sergeant Mayers should have recognised that his actions were improper, and could be perceived as an abuse of trust, particularly considering the leadership responsibility that he had.’

The panel heard Mayers first approached one colleague, named only as Officer A, at the end of a night shift in 2022 asking whether her husband would ‘try it on with you’ when she got home.

When she replied ‘no’, he said: ‘well, if it was me, I would slip your knickers to the side’.

Around Christmas that year, Mayers asked her ‘what would it take for me to just hold it?’ He then made a gesture suggesting ‘squeezing’ her bottom, the panel was told.

Then, on a separate occasion and in reference to her bottom, he said he ‘would love to bury my schnoz in there’, it was said.

Terry Mayers, 47,  (pictured) was described as ‘an exemplary officer’ with Greater Manchester Police

Mr Mayers was said to have ‘persistently asked’ to see ‘naughty or revealing’ photos of her on her mobile phone. In her statement, she said he would say ‘show Tel some pictures, go on, be a good egg’.

A second woman, officer B, described Mayers as ‘a bit of a creep’.

The disciplinary panel heard he sent her an Instagram message in August 2022, using ‘an expletive referencing sex’ and said he would ‘drive up’ to be with her.

In a later exchange of messages, Officer B told Mayers she indicated an intention to seek a promotion.

He responded advising her to head to a ‘quiet room on nights, undercrackers to the side’.

Mayers was said to have made ‘repeated comments’ about Officer A’s attractiveness and appearance, referring to her bottom as ‘the work of the Gods’ and ‘fine work’.

The panel heard he also remarked to Office B: ‘I have never seen anyone make a pair of ARV (armed response vehicle) pants (trousers) look like you can’.

In her statement, Officer B added: ‘During a 12 hour tour of duty, he would request to see revealing photos of me on multiple occasions and it would happen every time we were teamed up.

‘I started to feel pressured from him asking me this all the time, but I never did as he asked.’

Officer C said Mayers once told her, while the pair were on patrol: ‘What would you do if I kissed you now?’

All three officers were said to have felt humiliated and degraded.

He admitted making inappropriate comments but denied it amounted to gross misconduct.

However, the panel said it found Mr Mayers’ ‘persistence’ with the officers ‘did constitute sexual harassment as defined under the Equality Act’.

In a ruling, it said: ‘The contact was motivated by a desire to establish improper sexual relationships.

‘This occurred with three separate officers and was not an isolated incident.

‘The language and behaviour of Police Sergeant Mayers, in his position as a sergeant, in a department which was clearly underrepresented by female officers, had a disproportionate effect on women in the unit.

‘The language used in his communications undoubtedly caused distress.

‘The panel concluded that public trust, confidence, and legitimacy has been tainted by the actions of Police Sergeant Mayers, and that such actions damage the standing and reputation of the profession in the round.’

It added: ‘The Panel took the view that the communications were deliberate and targeted steps for the sole purpose of establishing an inappropriate sexual relationship and for sexual gratification.’

Mayers’ former partner, also a serving police officer, said in an account given to the panel that he was a ‘broken man’ and what happened has ‘shattered’ his ‘confidence, his reputation and his career’.

Mayers declined to comment on the decision because he had lodged an appeal.