Joe GallopA Metropolitan Police officer has been sacked after pretending to be on duty to gain backstage access to AEG Presents-promoted All Points East festival (cap. 40,000) in London.
According to Hackney Gazette, a panel found PC Hasnain Awan committed gross misconduct after deceiving staff to gain free entry to the festival’s 2021 edition at Victoria Park.
A Police Misconduct Hearing held on 5 May found that Awan allegedly worked a shift for the Met Police at the festival on 28 August 2021, where he was given a wristband to enable him to enter the site and perform his duties.
The following day he was off duty but was said to have attended the festival with a friend who was not a police officer. Awan allegedly went to the festival accreditation desk and told staff that he needed a new wristband because his own had been seized as evidence after getting stained with blood.
He then allegedly gave the new wristband to his friend and entered using the wristband he had used the day before, meaning they both entered the festival without paying the £95 entrance fee.
It is then believed he tried to gain entry to a backstage area of the festival by showing his warrant card. After Inspector May-Robinson, who was responsible for policing at the festival, questioned him, Awan was believed to have said that festival staff knew he was not on shift.
He is then said to have resigned on February 19 this year after making a full admission. The panel said he would have been sacked if he had not already resigned.
The panel said, “By his own admission he lied on more than one occasion which the panel has found was for his own self-interest, that he knew exactly what he was doing and given this repeated behaviour is indicative of an attitudinal issue.
“He did not make open admissions at an early stage but rather initially sought to create yet another account and justification for his actions which, by his admissions and apologies, demonstrates that this too was a fabrication.”