Today the Police Appeal Tribunal of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime overturned the 25 October 2023 decision of the Misconduct Panel, which after six weeks of hearings, ruled that the conduct of PC Clapham and PC Franks amounted to Gross Misconduct.

The misconduct proceedings related to an incident on 4 July 2020. Ms Bianca Williams and Mr Ricardo Dos Santos, both elite athletes, were stopped after being followed by Metropolitan Police officers as they were travelling in their car to their West London home from a training session. Police officers wielding a baton and glass cutter shouted orders at the couple to get out of their car. They were then handcuffed outside their home whilst their three-month-old son was in the back of the car. They were told by officers that they had been stopped on suspicion that they were connected with violent crime and may be in possession of weapons or drugs. A video of the incident went viral on social media.

The IOPC investigation found, that in saying that they smelled drugs, four of the officers present at the scene had lied. Last year the Misconduct Panel found that two of the officers, PC Clapham and PC Franks, lied in stating that they smelt cannabis. They were found to have breached the Standards of Honesty and Integrity and they were therefore dismissed from the Metropolitan Police Service.

The Misconduct Panel however also said “that cannabis is regularly smelt on the streets of London, we took the view that it was not implausible that there may have been a smell of cannabis in the area and that this had come from another source… for example a passer-by, a vehicle or a nearby building.”

Today the Police Appeal Tribunal held that it was irrational of the Misconduct Panel to conclude that two officers were telling the truth and two were lying about smelling cannabis, if they were of the view that there was a smell of cannabis in the air.

The findings to the Misconduct Panel against PC Clapham and PC Franks have been overturned, and they have been reinstated as police officers.

Ricardo Dos Santos reacted to the appeal outcome saying:

The appeal decision is disappointing. Our drive home from training in 2020, with our baby, should never have turned into a violent incident where we were wrongly accused of smelling of drugs. We are professional athletes. We pride ourselves on not doing drugs. The actions and allegations of the officers were completely unacceptable. The IOPC were clear that all four officers lied. We shall challenge today’s outcome in the civil courts.

Habib Kadiri, Executive Director of StopWatch, said:

We are disappointed by the outcome, and even more so by the misconduct process. The extremely poor decision of the original misconduct panel found that cannabis is “regularly smelt on the streets of London.” The potential implications of this view could effectively drag us back 40 years to the sus law days when officers would abuse their authority to make unfounded claims.

Lowering the standard of police conduct in this way runs contrary to College of Policing guidance, which states that it is not good practice for an officer to base his or her grounds for a search on a single factor such as the smell of cannabis alone.

Ultimately, the fact remains that relying upon officer discretion in determining the smell of cannabis disproportionately affects black people because of the racist assumptions underpinning the decisions they take. We can only hope that other courts realise this.

Jules Carey of Bindmans said:

It is unsurprising that the decision of the Misconduct Panel was overturned. It was irrational to say that some officers smelled cannabis and some did not. The panel got itself into a complete mess as soon as they settled on the bizarre view that the streets of London smell of cannabis. The IOPC were clear, all four officers lied and the violent conduct and detention of Ricardo, Bianca and their baby was wholly unjustified. The complaint system has failed again and it will be for the civil courts to address this result.

Emilia Pearson and Naz Mahmoudzadeh of Bindmans assisted with this case.