A tale of two statements: Top cop's departure-news wrangle revealed
Amid the news hurricane, the relatively recent debacle surrounding the search for Victoria's new top cop feels a bit like a distant memory. But CBD most certainly remembers the game of hot potato in the months leading up to the hiring of New Zealander Mike Bush.
For a while, the then acting chief commissioner, Rick Nugent, was thought to be the frontrunner in the search, before bowing out of the race during the final sprint.
Internal documents released under freedom-of-information laws and seen by CBD reveal quite the back and forth in the wording of Nugent's withdrawal from consideration
The names were redacted from the documents so we can't tell you exactly who was making suggestions, but it's clear one sticking point was how much recognition he should give the Victorian government.
A proposed public statement put forward behind the scenes the day before his news was made public was pretty direct.
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'I will be advising the state government that I will remain in the role for as long as needed,' it read.
An edited release was circulated at 6.17am the following morning, yes the morning the news would break, omitting any reference to the government at all.
Just 11 minutes later, Nugent's inbox pinged with an updated statement to endorse, complete with a new sentence added in bold.
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