Derbyshire PC who crashed police van and failed to report it is sacked

The officer knocked a wing mirror off a parked Transit van in Radbourne Street

A constable who crashed a police van into a parked vehicle and left without leaving his details has been sacked.

PC Joshua Beardsley failed to report the collision with a Ford Transit van while on his way to a fatal stabbing in Derby to senior officers.

A note was left by PC Beardsley with the broken wing mirror of the parked van he struck in Radbourne Street saying "found this on the street".

He added: "No offending vehicle but you can call 101 to report."

When confronted with CCTV evidence of the collision days later, PC Beardsley admitted fault.

At a misconduct hearing, it was found that PC Beardsley, a constable of two years, acted dishonestly and in a way that would discredit the force.

He was dismissed without notice.

The hearing was told PC Beardsley had been driving a police van with a colleague on board to the scene of a stabbing he had been deployed to on 11 June.

Brandon Froggatt, 21, fatally stabbed Corey Duffy four times during an attack in Cooper Street, parallel to the street where PC Beardsley crashed.

'Tried to deceive'

After leaving the note, he spent four hours at the scene of the killing, during which time he failed to report the collision.

After returning to Ilkeston Police Station at the end of that shift, he also failed to log the crash, before spending several days off duty on leave and study days.

In his response to his misconduct hearing, PC Beardsley said he felt he acted without "malice or forethought to deceive".

He added the note was written "in haste" and that he was "caught up" in the incident he was deployed to.

But the hearing found PC Beardsley's actions had breached police standards and amounted to gross misconduct.

Deputy Chief Constable Simon Blatchly said: "Collisions in the course of an officer's duty do happen - and there are clear procedures in place to deal with them.

"However, the collision is not why Joshua Beardsley was dismissed from the force - the reason he was dismissed was because he lied and tried to deceive the owner of the vehicle that it was not him that was responsible.

"He then failed to report the collision to his line manager, and it took CCTV to be shown to him for him to admit to his role in the incident.

"Both the force and the public expect that officers and staff behave in a truthful and trustworthy manner and his actions fell well below that level and he has, rightly, been dismissed without notice from the organisation."