R (O’Connor) v Police Misconduct Panel and the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis [2025] EWCA Civ 27
The absence of sufficient analysis and reasoning by a misconduct panel on the issues of seriousness, culpability and harm raised by the officer’s misconduct was an error of law. As a result, a decision of the panel to impose a final written warning was quashed and remitted to the panel for reconsideration.
R (Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis) v Police Misconduct Panel [2025] EWHC 93 (Admin)
The court held that it was wrong for the panel to allow personal mitigation to justify a lesser sanction and, the panel was wrong to find that the conduct took place at a time when sexism may have gone unchallenged as a mitigating factor.
R (Lino Di Maria) v The Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis and others [2025] EWHC 275 (Admin)
The claimant’s vetting clearance was removed following – amongst others – allegations of unproven sexual misconduct. Because of the claimant not having vetting he was dismissed.
The court held that withdrawal of a police officer’s vetting was not a lawful basis for dismissal.
R (Chief Constable of Cambridgeshire) v Police Misconduct Panel [2024] EWHC 3420 (Admin)
A police misconduct panel’s decision – dismissing three charges of gross misconduct against PC Suckling – was irrational. The panel found that PC Sucking had the relevant forensic evidence training but then failed to make any findings in relation to six matters regarding the application of that training. The court held this amounted to an “unexplained evidential gap or leap of reasoning” and the panel’s decision was quashed.
R (Director General of the IOPC) v Police Misconduct Panel [2024] EWHC 2796 (Admin)
A police misconduct panel failed to give adequate reasons for its decision to impose a two-year warning on a police officer following a misconduct hearing. The court held that this made the sanction decision unlawful but, in this instance, dismissal was not the only rational outcome. As a result, the court declined to substitute its own decision for the panel’s.
R (Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Service) v Police Appeals Tribunal [2024] EWHC 2348 (Admin)
The Police Appeals Tribunal were wrong to determine that a police misconduct panel’s finding of gross misconduct and subsequent dismissal was unreasonable. The court held that, the panel’s findings that the officer had deliberately misled it on important issues was something that could reasonably lead to a finding of gross misconduct.
R (Chief Constable of Thames Valley Police) v Legally Qualified Chair [2024] EWHC 1454 (Admin)
The High Court quashed a police misconduct panel’s decision not to consider disciplinary proceedings against an officer who had failed to correct information in his vetting application. The officer’s failure to disclose amounted to a breach of an ongoing duty to disclose. This was capable of amounting to misconduct.
