Meet local police officer and former soldier forced to hide sexuality

In the year 2025, a person's sexuality does not come into the equation when considering which career to pursue. But as recently as the 1990s, less than 30 years ago, you could not join the army in the UK if you were openly gay. It took a ruling European Court of Human Rights to see the ban lifted as it was deemed to be a violation of human rights.

That didn't happen until 2000 - this century. But not only was it against military law to be gay up until this point, the army actively had military police raiding soldier's dorms in search of 'homosexual material'. If discovered, offending soldiers could be discharged or possibly even face criminal charges under military law.



READ MORE: Girl left in serious condition after incident at 'Rec' in Nuneaton One of the military police officers who carried out searches for 'homosexual material' was Wayne Corbishley-Forbes - a current serving member of Warwickshire Police. Wayne recently revealed he always made sure he didn't find offending material. That's because Wayne himself is gay.

Wayne has shared tales of his time in both the army and the police force as part of Behind the Badge. The campaign sees service police personnel tell their stories and how they feel about their jobs with the aim of helping the public understand more about the people who work in policing in Warwickshire. "When I was 18 I'd applied to become a PC in Yorkshire and they said, 'we could offer you a position, but go away and get some life experience first," Wayne shared.

"I joined the army – the Royal Military Police (RMP) to be precise - in 1997 when I was 20. My claim to fame is that I had to lie about my sexuality to get in. "I was in Edinburgh for my final interview, sat in front of an officer in all his finery and then came the question: 'Do you have any homosexual tendencies?' "I did what generations of LGBT+ soldiers had been forced to do up until the year 2000 and said, 'no'.

During my first posting in Germany I'd sometimes be asked to search soldier's rooms for 'homosexual material'. I always made sure I didn't find any." Despite being forced to hide his true identity, Wayne thrived in the army, and though stints in the Middle East had a profound impact on him, these harrowing experiences also set him in good stead for his future career.

"I did 11 years in military police in total. I ended up in the special investigation branch - sort of like the army's CID. I remember a few really bad incidents while deployed to Afghanistan where it was just body after body.

My colleague and I totted up that it was in the hundreds over the years. "We looked at each other and said, 'when did this become normal?' I had my own battle with PTSD and I saw a lot of people in the army struggling to cope. "Because of that, I'm determined to help to provide support to others and I'm now a mental health first aider and a peer supporter alongside my current role as a PC.

"I joined Warwickshire Police as staff in 2009 - I was a scenes of crime officer and then I worked with the coroner's office. I was able to use skills I'd learnt in the RMP and build on them. I was once able to gather a piece of evidence the judge called the 'golden link' that secured the conviction.

It was a partial footprint and it saw a dangerous sex offender jailed. "A few years on and I saw the force was recruiting PCs. I thought back to when I was 18 and I had a last flair of ambition.

I started out on the patrol team responding to 999 calls. A good thing from my time in the military is that I've been left pretty un-shockable. "I'm now a tactical trainer - I teach officers how to conduct public order operations, to use a taser - and protocols around CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear) incidents.

It's a huge sense of pride when I see the difference between officers coming in on day one versus when they complete the courses. "I still go and police football matches and protests myself - I think it helps the officers I'm training when they see me out doing it too." Asked about how being open about his sexuality in his current role compares to having to hide his true identity back at the start of his career, Wayne added: “It couldn’t be more different in Warwickshire Police .

LGBT+ colleagues are accepted and supported.".