The hearing regarding former PC Joseph Wilby occurred on Monday and Tuesday of this week, with a police misconduct panel examining his conduct following allegations of pursuing an inappropriate relationship with a crime victim he attended to and providing false statements after contacting South Yorkshire Police regarding his ex-partner’s residence.
Nonetheless, Joseph Wilby failed to attend the hearing and offered no explanation for his absence.
Evidence from Joseph Wilby was obtained through three distinct interviews conducted between October 2022 and March 2023, and a pre-hearing established that no additional live evidence would be required; yet, the panel still anticipated his attendance.
The ex-officer resigned just one day before to the commencement of the hearing on April 27.
On August 29, 2021, Joseph Wilby was assigned to investigate a domestic abuse claim involving a 22-year-old victim referred to as Miss A.
His responsibilities necessitated his presence at her residence for a personal meeting.
While the case was formally recorded as a ‘no further action’ to be taken, only a few days later on September 3, Wilby continued to contact Miss A and as a consequence faced eight allegations of misconduct this week due to this correspondence between the initial incident and February 19, 2022.
On September 14 he visited her father’s home whilst on duty then contacted her by phone on February19, with further texts sent until October that year.
In these texts Joseph Wilby said that Miss A was ‘looking good’ and included kisses on the end of each message, which the panel had no hesitation in concluding was entirely inappropriate for a serving police officer to send to a former alleged victim of domestic abuse
Furthermore, on multiple occasions Joseph Wilby is found to have accessed police records without legitimate cause, once while talking on the phone with Miss A.
During his relationship with Miss A, Joseph Wilby failed to make a ‘notifiable association’ disclosure in relation to their connection, as required by policy.
In a separate incident, Joseph Wilby was also found to have ‘concocted a series of untruths’ after visiting the home of a 19-year-old girl – referred to as Miss B – on December 16, 2022.
While there, Joseph Wilby called the police to her home, dragging other officers to the address in an attempt to cause distress to Miss B and potentially another man at her home.
The panel found that a short-lived relationship which Joseph Wilby had with Miss B had come to an end at her instigation that day and that this had led to upset and jealousy over her potential affections for someone else.
The panel also found that Joseph Wilby knowingly gave a false account when calling the police and noted that the officer ‘who had expressed such care for the welfare of Miss B as her friend, in the phone call to police, did not remain or assist the police who attended at her address’.
He was found responsible for gross misconduct in seven out of nine allegations brought before the hearing and would have been dismissed if he had not already resigned, the panel concluded.
See the full police investigation into themselves here whilst it is still up, it will be down ASAP as soon as it blows over.
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