Court rules former Leicestershire police officer crashed into parked car and tried to cover it up

A misconduct hearing says his actions were deemed as gross misconduct

A former Leicestershire police officer crashed into a parked car on the way to work and then tried to cover it up, a hearing has ruled.

Former PC Maciej Dabrowski had been working with Leicestershire Police for just two weeks when the incident happened on Monday, April 3. He has since left the force.

Mr Dabrowski was running late for his shift after trouble starting his car. He then collided with a parked vehicle, damaging the wing mirrors of both cars, a misconduct hearing was told.

A colleague he was car sharing with alerted him to the damage, but Mr Dabrowski said they were running late and should just go. His colleague repeated that Mr Dabrowski should leave his contact or insurance details, but he said he did not want to.

The misconduct panel heard Mr Dabrowski ‘reluctantly’ left his details, but asked his colleague to not raise the matter at work. An hour after arriving at work, Mr Dabrowski still had not reported the collision, so his colleague did. Mr Dabrowski later admitted to the events.

The hearing concluded Mr Dabrowski had intended to drive off without reporting the incident and only left his details because he was pressured to by his colleague. He also sought to conceal the accident at work.

He acted dishonestly and without integrity, the hearing report stated, and public confidence would ‘undoubtedly be concerned by an officer who is willing to break the law and intends to coerce colleagues to do the same’, it added.

The report added that he may have been seeking ‘a financial advantage’ by not leaving his insurance details. The force accepted the incident might have been a ‘knock on effect’ of the stress of being late to work and Mr Dabrowski ‘might not have been thinking as clearly as he should have been’. But it ruled these as being ‘insufficient reasons’ for acting the way he did.

His actions were deemed gross misconduct. If he was still employed by the force, he would have been dismissed without notice.