According to an inquest, Stephen Port’s youngest victim felt that his partner was being ‘pushed out by police’ as they investigated his death.
Ricky Waumsley was speaking at Barking Town Hall on Monday at the inquest into his boyfriend Daniel Whitworth’s death.
He told jurors he felt excluded by investigators and was not allowed to see an apparent suicide note left by Mr Whitworth until the year after he was found dead.
Mr Waumsley said: ‘If it was a straight couple I wouldn’t have been pushed out as much as I was at the time.
“They disqualified me from every way possible. It was due to the fact that we were gay, unmarried couples. I strongly believe in it and stand behind it.
Mr Whitworth’s body was discovered in Barking, east London, on September 20, 2014, after he was given a fatal overdose of the drug GHB by Port.
Stephen Port, a serial killer, planted a false suicide note on the third victim of his crime spree, framing himself for the death due to drugs that occurred to his second victim. An inquest was held.
Ricky Waumsley (pictured) was speaking at Barking Town Hall on Monday at the inquest into his boyfriend Daniel Whitworth’s death
Daniel Whitworth’s (pictured) body was discovered in Barking, east London, on September 20, 2014, after he was given a fatal overdose of the drug GHB by Port
Port was convicted in 2016 of killing fashion student Anthony Walgate (23), Mr Kovari (22) Mr Whitworth (21) and Jack Taylor (25) between June 2014 and September 2015).
The serial killer left a fake suicide note on Mr Whitworth’s body falsely claiming that he had taken his own life after accidentally killing another man, Gabriel Kovari – who was in fact another of Port’s victims.
Mr Waumsley said the police should have verified the handwriting on the note more carefully, rather than just asking the 21-year-old’s grieving parents.
He stated that he felt they had taken the suicide note as it was. I believe they didn’t do any more than that. This is my opinion.
“I felt they could do more. At least they could check the handwriting to make sure it is correct and not ask people in grief or not from that field looking at the handwriting.
In the days after the young chef’s death, the police refused to show Mr Waumsley the suicide note.
He stated that he was angry at his partner for four years, and that he wanted him to tell me what to think.
Mr Waumsley visited Whitworth’s gravesite on September 30, 2014.
Police officers took the parents off to discuss the investigation privately without Mr Waumsley, which he said ‘really p***ed me off and made me feel pushed out by the police’.
It was only in the following year at the first inquest into Mr Whitworth’s death when Mr Waumsley saw the note for the first time, and said it was ‘really impersonal’, did not mention any family members and he could not be sure it was his partner’s handwriting.
Inquest 2015 revealed that neither Whitworth’s bedsheet nor the drug bottle found with him were DNA-tested by officers.
His chest also showed signs of manual handling, but it was not investigated further.
Outside the hearing, Mr Whitworth told officers Paul Slaymaker and Rolf Schamberger ‘You didn’t do your f****** job properly.’
According to Whitworth, he told police that Whitworth never used drugs except for one Amsterdam joint and had not heard of GHB prior to Daniel’s death.
But when Mr Whitworth’s stepmother Amanda had asked the police what the drug was they had told her to ask Mr Waumsley ‘because he should know’.
Port had four victims: Jack Taylor, 25, Daniel Whitworth, 21
Portada also took the lives of Gabriel Kovari (right), and Anthony Walgate (left).
In the days after the young chef’s death, the police refused to show Mr Waumsley the suicide note (pictured)
He will be spending the remainder of his life in prison for killing four men and sexually assaulting many others. The 46-year old began using GHB late 2013.
Jurors were read part of a witness statement he gave to the police watchdog in 2017, then called the Independent Police Complaints Commission, that said: ‘I didn’t understand how they could just brush her question off and say that a typical gay person would know about drugs like that.
“I believe that the police made too much assumption from the content and not only because Daniel is gay.
“I believe they looked at it and took it as is and concluded that job was done.”
Inquests into the men’s deaths are now being heard to determine whether lives could have been saved had police acted differently.