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02
Oct
North Yorkshire Police officer who failed to disclose crash dismissed
A North Yorkshire Police officer has been dismissed after failing to disclose that he had been involved in a crash while on duty.
Nicholas Ham, who was a traffic constable, appeared before a misconduct hearing at the force’s Alverton Court headquarters in Northallerton on Monday, September 8.
In a notice published ahead of the hearing, the force alleged that TC Ham breached its professional standards of honesty and integrity, and discreditable conduct.
TC Ham faced three separate allegations over a road traffic collision on December 31, 2022, in which he collided with a central reservation on Huntington Road in York.
The notice said:
1. On 31 December, 2022, following a road traffic collision in which you were the driver and responsible, you knew or ought to have known that your vehicle had, or might have, sustained damage. Following the collision, the vehicle displayed a warning light alerting you to damage and/or low tyre pressure. You knew, or ought to have known, that the vehicle was, or might have been, in a dangerous condition. Notwithstanding that, you:
2. Continued to drive the vehicle on an emergency blue light response, in poor road conditions, despite the possible consequences for you and others due to the extent of the damage being unknown;
3. Failed to report the damage as a collision or disclose to the control room that you had collided with the central reservation; instead seeking to report a standard puncture and arrange a call out repair. In doing so, you were not being open and honest.
Following the hearing, which was chaired by Assistant Chief Officer Sarah Jackson, the force dismissed TC Ham without notice after finding that his behaviour amounted to gross misconduct.
In a decision notice, ACO Jackson said:
TC Ham's deliberate failure to fully and honesty report the full circumstances of the collision would have been dishonest by the standards of ordinary people.
The panel found that his omission of reporting critical information was in the furtherance of preserving his position. In failing to fully report the circumstances of the incident, TC Ham would have been more likely to protect the privileges afforded to him in the specialist role he held.
Therefore, it follows that his dishonesty has been driven by self-interest, which exemplifies a compromise of integrity.
His actions could have also endangered other road users, ergo, there was a potential for considerable impact on public confidence in policing.
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