Yard’s drugs chief ‘took magic mushrooms, LSD and cannabis on holiday’
THE Scotland Yard chief who wrote the force’s drugs strategy was himself a user of cannabis, LSD and magic mushrooms, a misconduct hearing has been told.
Commander Julian Bennett allegedly took the substances while on holiday in France and is accused of refusing to take a drugs test and lying about why he had not taken one.
The senior police officer with more than 40 years’ service was nicknamed ‘Sacker’ because of the high number of dismissals he oversaw while presiding over disciplinary hearings, including those concerned with drug misuse. Now he could be banned from the Met and have his pension cut if found guilty of gross misconduct.
Bennett, who is in his sixties, wrote the drugs strategy for Britain’s biggest police force for 2017-2021, titled ‘Dealing with the impact of drugs on communities’.
The strategy was part of the Met’s plan to raise ‘awareness of the dangers of drug misuse’.
His own drug-taking is said to have occurred between February 2019 and July 2020.
Bennett was suspended on full pay in July 2020 after allegedly refusing to take the drug test following a tipoff about substance abuse during a holiday in France.
He is said to have claimed he had taken CBD (cannabidiol), a legal derivative of cannabis, for the medical condition facial palsy as an explanation for his refusal, an excuse he ‘knew to be untrue’, the hearing was told. A photo sent via WhatsApp said to show cannabis on a table has been submitted as evidence.
Tribunal chairman James Tumbridge said: ‘The officer is accused of taking cannabis, taking LSD and taking magic mushrooms while on holiday in France.’
A full five-day hearing was due to begin yesterday but was adjourned until May 23 because Bennett’s lawyers argued they had not received all the messages and emails they wanted.
John Beggs QC, defending Bennett, said: ‘Although we are all committed to getting this hearing on the way in the public interest, in the interest of the Metropolitan Police Service and in the interest of Mr Bennett, fairness must trump disposition.’ Mr Beggs said the witness might have ‘cherrypicked’ the messages that had been disclosed.
Mark Ley-Morgan, representing the police, said they had disclosed all relevant material.
Commander Bennett, who joined the Met in 1977, was previously leader of the force’s Operation Venice, which targeted moped gangs.
He also ran a unit that planned for the 2012 London Olympics and was central and south area commander.
In 2019 he became the Met’s lead for criminal justice, ensuring that paperwork submitted by his colleagues to the Crown Prosecution Service was of sufficient quality. Bennett also presided over 74 misconduct hearings involving 90 officers between June 2010 and February 2012, according to a Freedom of Information request.
Out of these hearings, 56 officers were dismissed – more than 75 per cent.
He was chairman of the panel that fired PC Simon Harwood after he struck newspaper seller Ian Tomlinson with a baton and shoved him to the ground during the G20 protests in 2009. Mr Tomlinson collapsed and died minutes later.
Bennett was also chairman of the misconduct probe into five officers over the arrest of musician Sean Rigg, who died in custody in 2008.