UPDATE: Channel 4 has made more specific allegations that appear to have been the trigger or Hayman’s resignation.
Andy Hayman was already under pressure over his expenses claims and criticism of his conduct after the killing in Stockwell of Jean Charles de Menezes. But he made the decision to step down when confronted by suggestions that he had improper contacts with an employee at the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC).
Channel 4 News reported that Mr Hayman rang or texted the woman 400 times in two months while the IPCC was compiling a report on the death of Mr de Menezes. In a breach of guidelines for senior police officers, these contacts were not disclosed.
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Metropolitan police anti-terror chief Andy Hayman has resigned, following serious allegations about excessive expenses charged to his police credit card for drinking with fellow senior officers at posh hotels and restaurants (to the extent of fifteen thousand pounds) and about expensive trips abroad taken with a female sergeant colleague:
Hayman is being investigated after an audit of Metropolitan police credit cards found he had spent about £15,000 – considerably more than other senior officers.
How much? Hardly a monument to probity is it? It’s not just the expense:
He has been asked to explain at least £15,000 expenses that included claims for “inordinate amounts” of drinking with colleagues. “Apart from the money, what happens if they are all out drinking when a bomb goes off?” said one Met official.
The married father of two has been quizzed about his relationship with Sergeant Heidi Tubby, his former staff officer. Tubby is said to have accompanied him on foreign business trips at public expense but is not herself under investigation.
She worked as Hayman’s staff officer when he was chief constable of Norfolk police and followed Hayman to London in 2005 after Blair, then newly promoted to Met commissioner, offered his former protégé the job of assistant commissioner in charge of specialist operations.
Hayman has also been questioned over why he claimed expenses for staying at a hotel at Heathrow when he has a publicly funded “grace and favour” apartment in central London.
Senior sources say Blair’s decision to tolerate Hayman’s spending shows a “lack of control” at the top of Scotland Yard. The commissioner has faced criticism over corporate spending after a separate investigation into Amex card use by 3,000 officers.
[…]
There is no suggestion that Hayman has broken the law. But officials say the inquiry has raised serious questions about his judgment. One official said: “Andy can be very charming but he has been reckless with his professional standards. He has been spending thousands of pounds of public money consuming inordinate amounts of alcohol with his staff.
“He thinks he should be allowed to do this. But there are questions about whether this breaks Met rules.
“The Heathrow hotel matter has also raised eyebrows. He is in a highly sensitive post running all Britain’s counter-terrorist operations.”
Another said: “As a former head of the Met’s professional standards directorate, Andy should know more than others that questions could be raised about such behaviour
[…]
Tubby is said to have stayed at the Heathrow hotel before they both took an early morning flight abroad. Blair and Paul Stephenson, the Met’s deputy commissioner, have also challenged Hayman about why he takes Tubby, in her early thirties, on foreign trips.
The sources said that Hayman had been questioned about a two-week trip to the United States last year. One said: “Stephenson discovered that Hayman had taken Tubby on that trip and called him in to explain himself. Andy insisted their relationship was entirely professional and that nothing untoward was going on.”
To be fair there are those who doubt the original Sunday times expose: Tory blogger Ian Dale, for instance, has his doubts about the story and thinks it may’ve been Ian Blair and other senior figures looking for a sacrificial lamb.
But these latest allegations are merely the lateast to mire Hayman in controversy. He’s no unimpeachable Dxon of Dock Green. Here are some recent Hayman career highlights :
- Accused of failing to tell the police commissioner Ian Blair and keeping from him suspicions that an innocent man had been killed.following the extra-judcial murder of Jean-Charles de Menezes
- Criticised by the Independent Police Complaints Commission of leaking info about the case to the media and making ‘misleading statements’ to the public and the media
- Forced to apologise after the Forest Gate anti-terrorism raid in which two innocent brothers were arrested, one shot, their home was trashed and they were smeared with false accusations of possessing child porn, .
- Attempting to pressure the government into allowing detention without charge for 3 months.
Mohammed Abdul Kahar, 23, broke down in tears as he described being wakened by his younger brother’s screams as 250 police stormed his house in Forest Gate, London, on 2 June.
“I thought, one by one they’re going to kill us. At that time, I thought I was going to die,” he told a news conference.
He said he was shot and kicked in the face, before police officers dragged him downstairs and outside, slapped his face and told him to “shut the f*** up”. He was then taken to hospital where he was given morphine and where he said surgeons were “pressured” by police to release him.
Speaking about his ordeal for the first time, Mr Kahar, a Royal Mail driver and part-time supermarket worker, described being hit in the chest by a bullet as he and his brother set off downstairs to investigate what they thought were armed robbers.
“I saw an orange spark and a big bang,” he said. “There was blood coming down my chest. The first words I said to them was ‘I can’t breathe’, and the first words they said to me were ‘shut the f*** up’.”
Mere days later Hayman was given the CBE.
Even after that catalogue of malfeasance Hayman never resigned. No, brutalising innocent citizens in their beds is all fine and dandy with the Met. No, it’s the accusation of adultery that appears to have really finished him off:
It is thought Hayman was concerned about the effect his increasingly high-profile public role was having on his wife and two young teenagers
Oh, I bet. Not nice to find out from the papers that your dad is accused of being greedy, a liar and an adulterer, rather than the pillar of the community you thought he was.
Of course Hayman could easily have protected his family from any unpleasant fallout by not doing anything to cause it in the first place, but he categorically denies any allegations of wrongdoing:
Assistant Commissioner Andy Hayman said the “time was right” to leave the high-profile job, after facing “hurtful” accusations.
He said in a statement: “Recent weeks have seen a series of leaks and unfounded accusations about me, which I have and will continue to refute strongly.”
So. It’s not hurtful to be called a liar and a scheming incompetent by every paper in the country, but having an affair with a colleague (allegedly) is a resigning offence?
Speaking of which, I note that the Inland Revenue boss, who supposedly resigned following the loss of discs containing the details of 25 million child benefit recipients, has been given another job in Whitehall, at the Cabinet Office.
Integrity really is a very flexible thing.
Note: edited later to make grammatical sense,