|
Sultan Alam joined the Cleveland Police in 1984 at a time when there were very few
Asian police officers.
On Joining the Road Traffic Policing department, he encountered racism of the worst
kind, and was eventually forced to make a complaint to the Industrial Tribunal in
1993.
On 27th November 1994, just months before the case was due to be heard, he was arrested
by the brother-in-law of one of the senior offices he had complained about and charged
with handling stolen goods. The Police Federation of England and Wales withdrew
their support soon after he was arrested. He was later convicted and served 9 months
in prison. On his release, it took him a year to gather sufficient evidence to present
to senior officers of Northumbria Police who launched a lengthy investigation named
“Operation Granite”.
In 2004, after a three and a half year investigation, Detective Inspector Stephen
BAKEWELL, ex-Detective Inspector, John Russell DAGLISH, D.C. Stuart HOPSON and D.C.
Martin EGGERMONT were jointly charged with Conspiracy to Pervert the Course of Justice,
BAKEWELL and HOPSON were additionally charged with Perjury and EGGERMONT was additionally
charged with Inciting another to steal. Evidence gathered by “Operation Granite”
clearly showed that these officers manufactured and manipulated evidence against
ALAM and had destroyed evidence that would have proved him to be innocent.
The Police Federation of England and Wales refused to assist ALAM in overturning
his conviction even though the evidence to do this was overwhelming. He then took
them to the Employment Tribunal, representing himself throughout these proceedings
and after 7 days of evidence, in September 2006 the Tribunal found the Police Federation
guilty of Racial Discrimination and of Victimisation against ALAM. This was the
first such finding against them. On 19th November 2007, ALAM’S Appeal against conviction
was heard by Lord Justice Moore-Bick sitting with two senior Judges at the Royal
Courts of Justice in London. The Crown Prosecution Service was in full support of
the conviction being quashed. Quashing ALAM’S conviction the Court ruled that, “police
officers have deliberately misled the court to suppress evidence” and described
this as “a very grave case” The very next day, ALAM was reinstated by Cleveland
Police and on 3rd March 2009 he was back on duty, in uniform, to start re-training.
However, for reasons that need not be mentioned here, on 3rd April 2009, he retired
from the police service on health grounds. It took ALAM nearly 13 years to clear
his name.
|