Police and helicopter pilots cleared over sex and nudity footage charges
Two police officers and two pilots accused of using a police helicopter to film naked sunbathers and a couple having sex have been cleared of all charges amid emotional scenes.
Pilots Matthew Loosemore, 45, and Malcolm Reeves, 64, and police officers Lee Walls, 47, and Matthew Lucas, 43, appeared to be in tears as they were found not guilty of misconduct in a public office at Sheffield Crown Court.
Pilots Matthew Loosemore & Malcolm Reeves, and officers Lee Walls & Matthew Lucas were cleared of all charges at Sheffield Crown Court pic.twitter.com/oKGbxhm5eE
— Hits Radio News | South Yorkshire (@HitsSYorksNews) August 4, 2017
Their families cried in the public gallery and hugged each other as the jury foreman read out the verdicts following a three-week trial.
The defendants were all in the South Yorkshire Police helicopter at various times between 2007 and 2012 when another officer, Pc Adrian Pogmore, shot the footage as the aircraft flew over the county.
Pogmore, 51, of Guilthwaite Crescent, Whiston, Rotherham, who was the only person in the aircraft when all four of the offending videos were filmed, had admitted four counts of misconduct in a public office.
He will be sentenced on Tuesday.
But the other men told the jury they did not know what Pogmore - described as "a swinging and sex-obsessed air observer" - was doing as he filmed the sequences using the chopper’s high-powered camera.
The jury of six men and six women had been shown footage shot from the aircraft, including an 11-minute sequence clearly featuring a couple having sex on their patio in a range of positions.
At one point in the footage, the naked woman waves at the helicopter.
Pogmore knew the couple through the wife-swapping scene and had even previously had sex with the woman.
The jury was also shown footage shot by Pogmore of a woman sunbathing naked in her large garden with her daughters, who were wearing bikinis. The jury were also played footage of a naked couple on a campsite and another naked couple sunbathing on sun loungers in their garden.
Outside the courtroom, the four men looked relieved as they were embraced by their families.
As Mr Lucas left the courtroom he said "thank you" to the jury.
The court heard Mr Lucas was commended for saving the life of one of the victims of the so-called Edlington incident in 2009.
This was when 10-year-old and 11-year-old brothers attacked two boys, aged nine and 11, in the South Yorkshire village, leaving them for dead.
Captain Reeves and Captain Loosemore both had long military careers before they became police helicopter pilots.
The court heard that Capt Reeves was an RAF flyer and Capt Loosemore flew in the Army.
Capt Loosemore broke down at one point giving evidence in the trial as he explained how he pulled a young boy from a South Yorkshire canal after landing the helicopter, only for him to die later in hospital.
Capt Reeves, of Farfield Avenue, Knaresborough, North Yorkshire, was cleared of two counts of misconduct in a public office.
Mr Walls, of Southlands Way, Aston, Sheffield, was cleared of one count.
Capt Loosemore, of Briar Close, Auckley, Doncaster, was cleared of one count.
Mr Lucas, of Coppice Rise, Chapeltown, Sheffield, was cleared of three counts.
Pogmore, who has already been sacked by South Yorkshire Police, will be sentenced on Tuesday.
In a statement, South Yorkshire Police said: "Notwithstanding today’s verdicts concerning the four defendants who were acquitted, we will now continue with misconduct proceedings internally against the other South Yorkshire Police officers.
"We cannot comment further at this stage, so as not to prejudice any future misconduct hearings."
The couple filmed by the South Yorkshire Police helicopter "putting on a show" as they had sex in their own back garden have now turned their back on the swinging scene, according to statements released by the court.
The married couple, who are not being named for legal reasons, knew PC Adrian Pogmore - the officer who filmed them from around 600ft in the air - through the wife-swapping scene.
In statements released by the court, which were made in 2014, the husband said they first got into the swinging scene ten years before at a club called La Chambre, in Sheffield.
He said they met Adrian Pogmore about 20 years ago when he was a neighbour.
A 5th man, former police officer Adrian Pogmore, had already admitted 4 counts of misconduct in a public office & will be sentenced on Tues pic.twitter.com/wjksEU0F0k
— Hits Radio News | South Yorkshire (@HitsSYorksNews) August 4, 2017
The man said it became clear Pogmore "had similar sexual attraction as we did", although his wife did not.
Turning to the incident on July 28, 2008, the husband said he saw the force helicopter flying close by and he knew his friend’s shift pattern.
The man said: "(The wife) and I started to have sexual intercourse" and he described their antics, which were shown to the jury in graphic detail a number of times during the trial.
He said: "I can confirm that PC Pogmore and no other officer had arranged this event with me and (the wife).
"I didn’t even know at the time that we were being recorded, but we were more than happy to have sexual intercourse with the police helicopter flying over or near to our position at that time.
"This was basically putting on a show for the police helicopter and we had no reservations about doing it in that way because of what we were into, sexually, at that time."
He said: "At the conclusion of what happened, both me and (the wife) got dressed and had a normal evening together."
The man said he "wasn’t bothered" that Pogmore had recorded him without his consent and said the officer told him it "looked good".
Commenting on the footage, he said at one point the filming moves to infra-red.
He said Pogmore told him: "(The wife) must have been enjoying the intercourse as she was going an ’orangy-red’ during the coverage."
The man said he later destroyed a copy of the footage given to him by Pogmore because "we completely left the swinging scene".
In her statement, the woman said the couple would have sex in their garden as frequently as once a week "when the weather allowed" between 2004 and 2009.
She said: "I believe he (Pogmore) would fly over on the chance we would be in the garden having sex."
The woman said the couple decided to change their lifestyle in 2009 and destroyed everything to do with the swinging scene.
She said: "Now that we have moved on with our lives and are no longer involved in the swinging scene, I am extremely embarrassed that this had come to light and been brought to the attention of the police."
