Phone hacking scandal deepens

[Jan Klimkowski]

Dick Fedorcio, Scotland Yard's top Press Officer, resigns directly after gross misconduct charges were launched by the Met.

Those charges can now not be pursued as Fedorcio is no longer a Scotland Yard employee.

Maybe Wallis and Fedorcio can get a job in Bahrain with Yates of the Yard....

Met's PR chief Dick Fedorcio resigns as force opens disciplinary action

Inquiry finds Dick Fedorcio should face gross misconduct charge for awarding contract to former NoW executive

Sandra Laville and agencies

guardian.co.uk, Thursday 29 March 2012 12.06 BST



Scotland Yard's head of communications, Dick Fedorcio, has resigned immediately after the force opened disciplinary proceedings against him.

An inquiry by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) into Fedorcio's award of a contract to Neil Wallis, the former deputy editor of the News of the World, found he had a case to answer for gross misconduct.

Fedorcio's resignation has curtailed any disciplinary action, but the IPCC will publish the inquiry's findings sometime next week.

Deborah Glass, the IPCC's deputy chair said: "In light of Mr Fedorcio's resignation today, [disciplinary] proceedings cannot now take place and I propose to publish our investigation report detailing our findings, in the next few days."

Civilian police staff are able to resign once disciplinary proceedings are launched and as a result avoid those proceedings. In doing so Fedorcio will not now face any sanction as a result of the inquiry into his alleged gross misconduct. The rules are different for police officers.

Fedorcio was under scrutiny for his decision to hire Wallis to provide PR advice for the Metropolitan police.Wallis's company Chamy Media was paid £24,000 by the Met between October 2009 and September 2010.

Fedorcio had been on extended leave since August pending the investigation into his relationship with the former News of the World executive, who was arrested on suspicion of phone hacking last July but has not been charged.

Glass said: "Our investigation found that Mr Fedorcio has a case to answer in relation to his procurement of the contract for Chamy Media. Last week the Metropolitan Police Service proposed to initiate proceedings for gross misconduct and I agreed with that proposal."

Scotland Yard said it could not comment on whether Fedorico would be entitled to his full pension rights as a result of his resignation.

Earlier this month the Leveson inquiry into press standards heard that Fedorcio invited people from leading PR firms Bell Pottinger and Hanover to submit rival bids for the contract that was awarded to Wallis.

Chairman Lord Justice Leveson suggested Fedorcio chose these companies because he knew they would be more expensive than the former News of the World executive, adding: "The point is, this is set up to get a result."

Fedorcio denied this, but confirmed that he initially wanted to award the contract to Wallis without any competition. Wallis offered his services as a PR consultant to the Met over lunch with Fedorcio in August 2009, the inquiry heard.

The Scotland Yard communications chief, whose deputy was on long-term sick leave at the time, discussed the possibility of hiring the ex-tabloid executive with then-assistant commissioner John Yates.

Yates said Wallis gave him "categorical assurances" there was nothing about the News of the World phone-hacking case that could emerge later to embarrass the Metropolitan police if he was given the job.

Fedorcio said he only became aware that Wallis was of interest to Scotland Yard over phone-hacking on the day of his arrest on 14 July last year.

Yates told the Leveson inquiry he was "good friends" with Wallis, and attended football matches and dined out with him.