Andrew’s alleged offence must pass several tests to be a crimepublished at 11:34 GMT
11:34 GMT
Dominic Casciani
Home and legal correspondent
Misconduct in Public Office is a really complicated offence. It
essentially boils down to an allegation that someone who was doing a job on
behalf of the British public did something seriously wrong, knowing it to be
wrong.
There are four “elements” or factors that police must focus on
during their investigation so that prosecutors can later decide whether or not
someone should be charged.
First, the police must establish whether the person they’re
investigating was a “public officer” and the incident in question was plausibly
part of those duties.
If that’s agreed, detectives will then look for evidence that the
incident in question saw the suspect “wilfully” neglecting to perform their
duty or wilfully misconducting themselves in some other way. That wordy
definition has long been a source of legal debate – more on that later.
The next question is whether the action they committed was so bad
that it was “an abuse of the public’s trust”.
Lastly, if the evidence has passed those three tests, police need
to examine whether the person under investigation acted “without reasonable
excuse or justification”.
That final question is crucial. It’s a fundamental principle of
criminal justice that someone suspected of wrongdoing is given an opportunity
to put forward their side of the story – and that starts when the police come and knock
on their door.