A police officer highly regarded as an “energetic and effective” crime-fighter did not suddenly turn “maverick” and become a drug dealer, a misconduct hearing was told. PC Jonathan Biggins’ colleagues “jumped to the wrong conclusion” that he had seized and then returned Class A substances to users on the street in Weston-super-Mare in exchange for information about dealers, his barrister Nick Walker told the panel.
Speaking on day four of the hearing at Avon & Somerset Police headquarters in Portishead on Monday, May 22, Mr Walker said the plain-clothes officer had never traded drugs for intelligence. PC Biggins, who has since resigned from the constabulary, is accused of breaching the standards of professional behaviour for police officers, amounting to gross misconduct.
He denies the allegations, including falsifying records of how many wraps of Class A drugs were seized in three separate stop-and-searches to hide that he had returned some to each user to get details about the dealers, all of whom were then arrested shortly afterwards. Mr Walker told the panel that both PC Lauren Rickwood and PC Ben Whitby, who gave evidence to say they had witnessed the officer handing back drugs including crack cocaine to users, had accepted they had not actually seen any substances during the alleged transactions and that they had “put two and two together to make five”.
Read more: Avon and Somerset Police officer allegedly 'gave drugs back to users' for dealers' details
He said: “Why would an officer with years in the job and a reputation for being an energetic and effective officer suddenly choose to act as a maverick? It makes no sense.”
Earlier on day four of the hearing, PC Leon Brueford, who was on patrol with PC Biggins and PC Rickwood on May 26, 2020 – one of the three occasions when drugs were allegedly returned – said: “It’s quite a common occurrence that people with drugs will give us information. A lot of county line drug dealers are violent and aggressive and use weapons.
“If you speak to 95 per cent of drug users in Weston, they are very reluctant to give information about local drug dealers but they are happy to about county line dealers because those dealers take advantage of vulnerable people and take over their homes.” Mr Walker told the panel that this “blew apart” the heart of the constabulary’s “rickety” case that drug users would never willingly give information to police about dealers because it could disrupt their supply and so it required an explanation – that PC Biggins must be supplying them with drugs.
He said: “There was no bargain struck for information, it was freely volunteered. These are such serious allegations for an experienced officer to have suddenly turned drug dealer.”
Barrister George Thomas, representing the force, said the dealers in two of the three cases operated locally and not via county lines. “So the suggestion that they were simply volunteering information does not apply,” he added.
The panel retired to consider its decision. Former PC Biggins has not attended the hearing.
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