More crooked cops in the Australian State of Victoria

It must be getting hard to find any honest ones

A PROBE into possible criminal behaviour at a high level of Victoria Police has intensified with three reviews started. And in a radical bid to fix the corrupt culture, the force is trying to move part of the police IT section linked to irregular multi-million dollar blow-outs. Sources told the Sunday Herald Sun an internal corruption probe by the Ethical Standard Department was scrutinising all links to a corrupt senior police manager. The manager, who stepped down while under investigation, was recently convicted of obtaining a financial advantage by deception.

Senior sources said the corruption probe - which has been running for six months - could soon net more scalps. Victoria Police did not rule out further criminal charges.

A review of top management was in progress while Business Information Technology Services was under examination. Victoria Police was trying to separate and move the procurement division of BITS into a different part of the Flinders St headquarters. The move came after a police contract with IBM blew out by $85 million.

A Sunday Herald Sun investigation also found:

SOME police staff who were whistleblowers and informants in recent probes and audits felt victimised by colleagues and management.

TWO senior managerial positions for BITS section had recently been advertised.

THE restructure moves were rubbing staff the wrong way, with a potential industrial showdown looming.

Victoria Police spokeswoman Joanne Hammond confirmed an internal audit had identified "a range of matters around process". "The audit team is currently working with BITS management to rectify these issues," she said. In relation to criminal charges of police employees, Ms Hammond said the investigation was ongoing and would not comment further.

Victoria Police has been involved in scandals about IT contracts, computer fraud and database breaches. One senior manager was discovered with child porn links on his laptop, scores of mobile phones and other items were missing and financial record keeping was highly irregular. Workers with the police's technology partner IBM were also found with keys and security passes for police headquarters up to year after they left the company. Kickbacks to police employees from suppliers and embezzlement were also being investigated.

Original report here. (Via Australian Politics)



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