We’re campaigners for women’s rights fundraising for our friend Rachel Fletcher, who’s been scapegoated for standing up for women’s rights in police forces and during detention. Rachel is a single mother with two young children who has been subjected to a grave injustice and now needs help to support herself and her family until she finds new work.

Rachel served 17 years as a police officer, and until very recently she was a Detective Constable with Northumbria police. For the final six years of her police career she worked as a family liaison officer within child protection. This demanding and vital role involves directly supporting victims of horrific crimes and traumatic situations, including child abuse, sudden infant death and child suicides.

Rachel was the lead officer in this harrowing case of a predatory paedophile, which resulted in a successful prosecution and a long prison sentence.

'Predatory' paedophile jailed for 23 years

On 31st July 2026 Rachel was dismissed following a long drawn-out investigation for “gross misconduct” on the basis of allegations she has consistently denied.

Rachel’s real offence was to stand up for vulnerable women and girls by speaking out against unlawful guidance put forward by her force’s Chief Constable and adopted nationwide. This outrageous policy permitted male officers to strip-search female detainees, in defiance of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, which mandates that such searches must be carried out by an officer of the same sex.

The guidance added insult to injury by saying that if a female detainee objected to this cruel and humiliating treatment, she should be recorded as having committed a hate crime.

Rachel thought this was unlawful and an abuse of police powers. She was right. After a public outcry and questions asked in Parliament, the guidance was abandoned.

The Chief Constable who introduced this unlawful guidance has faced no career consequences, or been disciplined. But Rachel was made a scapegoat.

Her force started an investigation into her views, which resulted in years-old alleged comments about male violence being dredged up. After a gruelling two years of investigation, on 31st July a panel chaired by a member of her Chief Constable’s team found her guilty of all the allegations, refused to consider less severe sanctions such as a final written warning and dismissed her from her job.

Rachel will be exploring the possibility of appealing. But right now she is in serious financial difficulty, with no means to support herself and her two children. The sheer injustice and unrelenting pressure of the investigation have taken their toll, and it will take time for her to recover and to find new work.

Rachel has been punished for her courage and principles, and for standing up for what is right. When she comes through this crisis, she is sure to continue to be a powerful voice for women and girls, and integrity and fairness in policing and public life, whatever she chooses to do.

In the meantime, can you help her get back on her feet? Any amount, no matter how small, will help. If you aren’t in a position to donate, you can still help by sharing.

Here’s Rachel outside the Royal Courts of Justice with other women’s rights campaigners at a recent legal hearing about police searching policies. The fight continues.