Met Police pay over £400,000 to mother of undercover policeman's child

The Metropolitan Police is to pay more than £400,000 in compensation to a woman who had a child with a man who she did not know was an undercover officer.

Former Special Branch detective Bob Lambert began a relationship with the woman, known as Jacqui, while she was a political activist in the 1980s.

Lambert, who Jacqui knew as "Bob Robinson", was a member of the now-defunct Special Demonstration Squad (SDS) which placed officers in deep-cover roles between 1968 and 2008.

He was also married with two children.

Lambert vanished when their child was two, leaving Jacqui to bring him up.

She discovered his true identity after reading a newspaper report in 2012.

The Met initially refused to confirm whether Lambert was an undercover officer, but a High Court ruling forced Scotland Yard to disclose his identity.

She will now receive £425,000 in damages.

Jacqui is one of several women taking action against the force over the conduct of undercover officers.

She said she felt "violated" and had since received psychiatric care after the revelation.

"The legal case is finished but there is no closure for me," she said in an interview with the BBC and the Guardian newspaper.

"There is the money, but there is no admission by the police that what they did was wrong, there is no meaningful apology and most importantly there are no answers.

"I don't know why I was singled out by the police to be duped into an intimate sexual relationship with Bob Lambert.

"I don't know if he was paid overtime to be with me during the 14 hours of labour I went through giving birth to our son. I feel violated."

She revealed that Lambert and his son had since developed a close relationship.

Scotland Yard said it unreservedly apologised for "any pain and suffering that the relationship" had caused.

But the force said it had "never had a policy that officers can use sexual relations for the purposes of policing".

"We recognise the impact that the revelation that he was an undercover police officer must have had both on her and her son," a spokesperson said.

"From the outset we have dealt with this lengthy case with professionalism and sensitivity, completely understanding the gravity of the circumstances. We regret if this necessarily complex process has added to her distress.

"We want to be, and have tried hard to be, as open as we possibly can.

"Arguing the need to maintain the policy of neither confirm nor deny in relation to undercover operations has never been a refusal to accept wrongdoing, but has been done solely to protect a vital policing tactic."