A police officer who accesses confidential police databases and passes criminal intelligence to a known drug dealer commits a serious offence of misconduct in public office that would ordinarily warrant conviction and potentially imprisonment. The lenient sentence in this case (fines without conviction) was upheld only because of the constrained nature of the Director's appeal — the notice of appeal did not challenge the sentencing judge's findings of fact, and the Crown conceded that a higher fine without conviction might not have been manifestly inadequate. Future offenders in like circumstances cannot expect similar leniency.
The full text is available to signed-in members, including the 5 later cases that cite this judgment.
1 of the 5 citing cases carry a classified treatment. How each court treated it is available to signed-in members.