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WRITTEN QUESTION TO THE MINISTER FOR HOME AFFAIRS BY DEPUTY M.R. HIGGINS OF ST. HELIER
ANSWER TO BE TABLED ON TUESDAY 19th FEBRUARY 2013
Question
Following the unauthorised publication of the judgement of the disciplinary hearing against 3 police officers will the Minister -
- explain why the signed statements of the three police officers who faced a disciplinary hearing over the bugging of the hire car of one of the defendants in the Curtis Warr en case were not made available at the disciplinary hearing which resulted in unsigned statements transposed onto Hampshire Police paper being introduced instead;
- state whether or not the evidence in the unsigned statements was disputed by any of parties to the hearing and, if so, the nature of the disputed evidence?
Answer
I strongly deplore the decision of the disciplinary tribunal being used in this way. Not only was the hearing by law held in private, but also, the presiding Chief Officer expressly stated in his verbal decision that he did not expect to see his comments in the media and that he did not authorise the use of his comments other than for this hearing; and, in his written decision that he did not authorise the publication of his written judgment other than for the purposes of this hearing.
Although I was initially minded to continue to decline to answer questions on the written decision, the outrageous nature of some of the questions posed to me which imply serious misconduct on the part of senior police officers has forced me into clarifying the position by answering a number of procedural questions.
- The Hampshire Police loaded the relevant statements into the HOLMES computer system as part of the investigation. Unfortunately, it was the printout of the statements which were presented as part of the agreed and disclosed bundles to the presiding Chief Officer and not the original statements. I am informed that the original signed statements were available at the hearing but the presiding Chief Officer did not refer to them.
- It would appear that one officer raised a question as to whether the HOLMES version of his statement was accurate.