Merseyside PC admits having illegal 40th birthday party during covid

A firearms officer who went to the pub while on-call maintains he was "fit for duty" despite drinking a pint 20 minutes before his shift came to an end.

PC Daniel Johnson, 43, had lunch with his wife and allegedly drank wine at the The Jug and Bottle pub in Heswall on April 30 2021 - the same day he was supposed to be serving an 8am-4pm shift as an on-call firearms officer. According to CCTV footage, he left the pub at around 1.20pm and returned with his friends at 3.25pm, and continued to drink alcohol.

At a misconduct hearing at Merseyside Police HQ today, the officer said he had "a sip" of his wife's wine during lunch, and admitted drinking a pint of beer at around 3.40pm, 20 minutes before the end of his shift. However, he claimed he was "fit for duty and available for any options", adding that he had never been challenged as being unfit during his whole 20-year career.

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He said it was "highly unlikely" that he would have been called out at 3.40pm, and that if there had been a call-out it would have been attended by on-duty officers, with on-call officers serving as a second option.

The firearms officer, who joined Cheshire Constabulary in 2003 before transferring to Merseyside in 2009, also denies stealing from his employer on no less than three occasions.

On August 4 2021, it is alleged he stole two battering rams from Smithdown Lane station as he "thought they would be helpful to weigh down his parasol at home". PC Johnson said he had taken the broken rams from a car park area known as "the ratting bins", where officers would frequently pick up old and disused pieces of equipment for personal use.

He said: "The only way I can describe it is like a bit of a jumble sale. A lot of mess, really.

"Clothing, old police equipment, operational equipment no longer fit for purpose but could be repurposed b other officers. Old police leathers, helmets, police bike leathers, handcuffs, old batons, jackets, boots. There was a plethora of police equipment that was discarded for other officers to help themselves."

He also denied stealing a saw blade from a storage room at Speke police station the following day, August 5 2021. The panel heard officers would frequently borrow equipment from the station, noting down what they had borrowed in a log book. However, the book contained no mention of the saw blade, despite PC Johnson being caught on CCTV taking the item.

He said this was because the log book was not in the room at the time. He said he never intended to keep the blade, and simply had not gotten around to returning it before taking paternity leave on August 25. He said: "That week was quite a hectic week. I was planning an operation for another force in Cumbria and we were constantly changing shifts, the blade was not on my mind at that time."

He also denied a further historic theft of a saw in 2017, claiming the item had been given to him by a now-retired constable after he asked him for help cutting down some trees in his back garden.

He admitted throwing a illegal house party in celebration of his 40th birthday in June 2020, breaching Covid-19 restrictions.

He is also accused of sending a colleague homophobic and racist messages. On March 12 2019, he sent a text message to a fellow officer describing two senior colleagues as "two p***s together", and on May 2 he sent the same officer a picture of a woman in traditional Islamic clothing on a fairground ride, with the words "detonator bombs away".

PC Johnson allegedly maintained "he was in no way homophobic" adding "it was simply a common term he used to describe anyone he thought was weak". He claimed he had shared the image of the Muslim woman because he thought it was "in bad taste".

The hearing continues.

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