Met Police Commander who refused drugs test dismissed after five-year ordeal
A Metropolitan Police commander has been dismissed for gross misconduct after refusing to participate in a drugs test.
It comes after Cmdr Julian Bennett was first dismissed in October 2023 by an independent misconduct panel after he had refused to provide a urine sample for a drugs test on July 21, 2020.
The hearing heard that there was reasonable cause to suspect that Bennett had taken drugs and he was suspended four days later on the grounds of a breach of professional behaviour to the degree of gross misconduct.
Two further allegations were not found proven relating to incidents in February 2019 and July 2020, alleging that whilst off duty Bennett smoked cannabis and gave an untrue explanation for his refusal of the drugs test.
Following his first dismissal Bennett called on the Police Appeals Tribunal (PAT), an independently run process by the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime.
In July 2024 the dismissal was quashed by the PAT, which ordered a new hearing on the basis that the panel had ruled on a matter that was not part of the allegations they were asked to consider.
Bennett was put through a new misconduct hearing, having remained suspended through the course of the process.
A panel found the allegation proven against him at the level of gross misconduct.
Bennett will be added to the Barred List held by the College of Policing, which prevents those who appear on the list from being employed by police and other police-related bodies.
Ast Com Matt Twist said: 'I am enormously concerned that almost five years since this incident happened we have only now been able to dismiss Commander Bennett.
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'This should have been a simple matter. Commander Bennett has never disputed he refused a lawful order to take a drugs test. As a senior officer who had chaired misconduct hearings, Commander Bennett was highly experienced and knew full well what was required of him, yet he made a choice not to co-operate.
'He has been suspended on full pay for an extraordinary length of time. I am sure Londoners will be as outraged as we are at the utter waste of public funds spent paying a senior officer to sit at home suspended and not work."
Ast Com Twist added that the Metropolitan Police Service is "not responsible for all the delays" in the case.
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