Hampshire detective sent hundreds of football club emails from work account, hearing told

A detective in a ‘toxic’ specialist police unit sent hundreds of emails from his work account to run a youth football team when he should have been working, a disciplinary hearing has been told.
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Six officers from Hampshire police’s Serious Organised Crime Unit (Socu) North (N) office in Basingstoke are accused of breaching professional standards and are facing a three-week tribunal.

The Winchester hearing was told that 23 per cent of emails sent by Det Sgt Gregory Willcox from his work account between October 2017 and April 2018 related to ‘football matters’.

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These emails added up to 360 messages sent in this period.

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He received hundreds of messages in relation to the Stockbridge under-18 football club that he helped run, the hearing was told.

Jason Beer QC, presenting the case against the officers, said in his opening: ‘The schedule of private football-related emails sent by Det Sgt Willcox shows that he was spending a lot of time at work dealing with Stockbridge football club rather than doing his job as a supervisor of Socu N.’

Giving evidence to the hearing, Det Sgt Willcox said: ‘It was a procedure when I first started the youth team, there was a requirement for an email address, as my involvement increased, my emails increased.’

He said that he did not accept that he was spending ‘valuable’ work time organising the football team.

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The hearing has been told that following an anonymous complaint, covert recording devices were placed in the unit’s offices between March 9 and April 2 2018, and some of the officers were recorded using ‘abhorrent’ and offensive language.

Retired Det Insp Tim Ireson, Det Sgt Oliver Lage, Det Sgt Willcox, former PC Craig Bannerman, trainee Det Con Andrew Ferguson and PC James Oldfield are all accused of breaching professional standards.

Mr Ireson and Det Sgt Willcox are accused of failing to fulfil their supervisory roles to stop or report the inappropriate behaviour.

The six officers deny gross misconduct and the hearing continues.

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