LONDON: A Metropolitan Police officer at Charing Cross police station in London has been sacked for gross misconduct after being secretly recorded in a BBC Panorama undercover investigation making racist comments and endorsing inappropriate force.
Philip Neilson was dismissed with immediate effect on Thursday after a Met hearing upheld three allegations against him, including making “highly racist and discriminatory remarks” about different ethnic groups.
Neilson was recorded by BBC undercover reporter Rory Bibb describing an “invasion” of “scum” from the Middle East, and making offensive remarks about individuals from Algeria and Somalia.
He is the first of 10 current or former officers to face a hearing as part of the Met Police’s accelerated misconduct proceedings regarding footage recorded during the Panorama investigation, according to the BBC.
The first allegation against Neilson involved glorifying the use of inappropriate force against a restrained detainee and promoting unlawful violence against migrants.
The second involved Neilson referring to Somalians as “scum” and claiming there was an invasion of the UK by migrants, comments the undercover reporter described as “floridly racist.”
Neilson was also recorded saying a detainee who had overstayed his visa stay in the UK should have a “bullet through his head.”
Commander Jason Prins, chair of the panel held in southwest London on Thursday, found all the allegations proven.
“It was or must have been obvious to him that the comments made were abhorrent,” Prins said. “The conduct of the officer is a disgrace.”
Neilson, who had worked for the Met Police for four years, denied being racist and said that the BBC undercover reporter had “breached his human rights.”
The officer acknowledged that the remarks were inappropriate, but argued that they only constituted misconduct, with some being made while he was intoxicated after consuming a large amount of alcohol.
A second police officer featured in BBC Panorama, Martin Borg, was also dismissed on Thursday after the Met’s panel upheld five out of eight allegations of gross misconduct against him.
The scandal is the second to affect Charing Cross police station in central London following the exposure of shocking messages exchanged by officers in 2022. Officers at the station were found by the Independent Office for Police Conduct to have joked about rape and domestic abuse, and also made racist comments in messages exchanged from 2016-2018, The Independent reported.
