Police response criticised at Sam Kerr trial in London

The jury in the trial of Australian soccer star Sam Kerr has been told the police response was "completely unacceptable" on the night she called a policeman "stupid and white".

The defence made its closing argument on day six of the trial, which is examining Kerr's words to London policeman Constable Stephen Lovell during a drunken dispute about a taxi ride in January, 2023.

She pleaded not guilty to one charge of racially aggravated harassment.

In her final address to the jury, defence lawyer Grace Forbes also said there was not enough evidence of Lovell experiencing "harassment, alarm or distress" for the jury to convict Kerr.

The jury retired to consider its verdict about mid afternoon on Monday in London.

The 31-year-old, who is captain of the Australian women's team the Matildas, also plays for Chelsea Football Club in the UK's Women's Super League.

She is Australia's all-time leading goal-scorer.

Metropolitan Police criticised

Forbes told the jury that police failed to properly investigate claims by Kerr and Kristie Mewis that they had been held "hostage" by the taxi driver.

"The reality is that the police took no meaningful steps to investigate on the night, nor in the two years since," Forbes told the jury.

In the police body-cam vision, Kerr asked officers more than 20 times to "listen to the recording" of what happened in the taxi.

The court was told that no officer ever physically swept the car for a camera, instead relying on the word of the driver, who said he did not have one.

The driver was never formally interviewed by police and has not given evidence in the trial.

Kerr last week told the court she felt the officers were treating her differently because of the colour of her skin and were choosing to believe the driver over them.

Kerr told the court that after she was sick, the driver locked them in the cab and drove erratically for 15-20 minutes.

The driver told police that the pair declined to pay for the taxi fare and cleaning fee.

The driver drove them to Twickenham police station, at the direction of police, who he had called after becoming concerned about their behaviour.

In the police video, Mewis admitted to kicking out the back window of the taxi because she was scared and wanted to escape. Both said they had no idea they were being driven to a police station.

On the night, police eventually arrested Kerr for calling Lovell "stupid and white" and for criminal damage to the taxi, despite the fact Mewis admitted to kicking it through.

"It is very odd that police arrested Sam Kerr for criminal damage, when Kristie Mewis had told them time and time again that she had broken the window," Forbes said.

She said Kerr wasn't intending to harm the officer with her words, but was instead trying to express, "however poorly", her view on "power" and "privilege" in that moment "and how that might colour perception".

The criminal charge was dropped after the pair eventually paid the driver for the damaged window, taxi fare and a clean-up fee to cover the cost of Kerr being sick in the car.

Lovell told the court last week that he first saw Kerr that night climbing out of the broken window of a taxi, but didn't turn his body-cam on until nearly an hour later.

Grace Forbes said it wasn't for the jury to decide exactly what happened in the cab that night, or make a decision about the actions of the police, but argued it did inform Kerr's state of mind when she called Lovell "stupid and white".

Both women told the court they were in fear for their lives in the car.

"You might think the fears they felt, genuinely held, whether well founded or not, were highly relevant to what happened that night," she said.

The prosecution repeatedly referenced moments from the body-cam vision that showed Kerr threatening to call lawyers as examples of her having power and privilege in the situation.

The prosecution also argued that another clip, showing her gesturing with her phone toward PC Lovell, was her showing off her bank account.

She said it was her showing him her call to emergency services.

Forbes rejected the suggestion Kerr had power in the police station, arguing officers were the ones with the ability to control the situation that night.

"Like a puffer fish blowing itself up to seem bigger when it's under threat, that posturing might be a clue as to how scared she was really feeling," she told the court.

"If she had lawyers, she would have called them in that pitiful hour in Twickenham police station.

"Look past the puff and the truth is tragic… a woman sat there feeling desperately scared on the inside… fronting it up on the outside".

The prosecution has argued that the pair were drunk and "kicking off" in the cab and that Kerr's words were against the law because they were made in reference to race.

Forbes said "undoubtedly, Kerr did not cover herself in glory in the way she expressed herself that night", but her client didn't mean to cause Lovell harassment, alarm or distress.

Credibility questioned

Forbes told the jury that the fact the prosecution had to ask Lovell five times in court to describe how the words "stupid and white" made him feel was telling.

He initially told the court he was "upset" by them, before referring to his second witness statement, in which he said he felt "humiliated", "shocked" and "belittled" by them, adding that they "went too far and I took great offence to them.

"The elbow grease that had to go in to extracting those words from PC Lovell, you may think, casts serious doubt on the credibility of the sentiment expressed," Forbes told the jury.

"How can you be asked to be sure of impact if PC Lovell has not been?"

The prosecution last week said Lovell didn't "over-egg" his statements, adding that his feeling were "totally reasonable".

Forbes was critical of the timeline leading up to that second statement, saying it "utterly undermines" its contents.

Lovell didn't address how the words "stupid and white" made him feel in his first statement after the incident, something Forbes described as a "hugely significant" omission.

"Had he felt the impact he now asserts, he would have said so in that statement on the night," she said.

He made official mention of it in a second statement, submitted nearly 11 months after the incident took place.

That came after the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) initially declined to lay charges against Kerr, saying that the criminal threshold hadn't been met.

After officers lodged a request to review the decision not to prosecute Kerr, the CPS requested further evidence of harassment, alarm or distress from the police.

"This is a police officer who, as he told you, has written hundreds of witness statements.

"He knows exactly what the elements of the charge are.

"PC Lovell knew exactly what the obstacle was. The Public Order Act is his bread and butter."

He admitted in court last week that he was determined to pursue Kerr and the charge through the criminal courts but denied making something up to get the charge over the line.

The 2023 Women's World Cup was also on at the time Lovell was considering an appeal against the decision not to charge Kerr, but he denied in court that she was "on his radar".

- ABC News