A police officer accused of stealing almost four kilos of cocaine from his own force was caught after he accidentally dropped a wrap of the drugs in the grounds of his daughter’s primary school, Liverpool Crown Court has heard.
CCTV footage from the school today showed the small bag falling out of Constable Andrew Talbot’s back pocket in 2020, which was later confiscated by his employer, Greater Manchester Police.
The 54-year-old father-of-two faces 13 charges, including taking 3.9kg of cocaine from Greater Manchester Police’s serious crime division between April 2017 and January 2020.
Prosecutor James Lake told the jury today that Talbot admits stealing the cocaine and accessing the computer system to search for known or suspected drug dealers in his local area.
He also admitted conspiring with a convicted drug dealer to misbehave by using his position as a GMP officer to help him recover a drugs debt.
The former police officer also pleaded guilty to accessing GMP computer systems to provide information to a close friend who was being investigated for assault.
Greater Manchester Police Constable Andrew Talbot was charged at Liverpool Crown Court on Tuesday with stealing almost four kilos of cocaine from GMP’s serious crime division.
When interviewed in February 2020, the defendant said he had been a cocaine user since 2012 and claimed he brought the drugs to work because he did not want to leave them at home where his children were.
However, Talbot denies any misconduct in public office by accessing GMP intelligence information about known or suspected drug dealers in the Greater Manchester area between May 2018 and 7 February 2020.
Mr Lake said that while he accepted searching computer systems, he denied doing so for supply purposes and was not guilty of misconduct.
He also denies breaching a notice under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act which Lake said involved Talbot failing to provide the investigation team with the correct PIN number for his phone.
Mr Lake told the court that at the time of Talbot’s suspension he was working in the Serious Crime Division at Nexus House.
A police investigation revealed that he had “committed criminal misconduct in his role as a police officer. He had systematically and blatantly abused the trust that the public had placed in him,” it said.
After the investigation began when the drug wrap was found in early 2020, he was searched at work and more cocaine was found on him and in his car.
Drug paraphernalia and bags with traces of cocaine were also found at his home.
‘Following the discovery of the cocaine at work, officers investigated his access to the Nexus House property store and his specific interest in large quantities of cocaine seized in two police investigations, Operation Gamber and Operation Cosmetic.
‘The cocaine seized in these operations was weighed again by the Forensic Science Service and just under four kilograms (3.943 kg) were missing from the corresponding exhibition bags.
“The Crown says that four kilograms of cocaine is too much for personal use, even for someone who was a consumer, as he was.”
When the memory card of his mobile phone was examined, the contents revealed the involvement of drug dealer Keith Bretherton.
Investigations showed he had accessed police systems on numerous occasions to track down a man who owed Bretherton money for drugs.
Mr Bretherton used the information to visit the man, who had moved from Manchester to Dorset, and get him to pay the debt. Talbot then posed as a police officer carrying out a bogus investigation on the man “to encourage and intimidate” him into repaying the £20,000.
Talbot had also accessed the force’s Opus computer system to update a friend on an investigation into an assault at the Lock Bar in which he was a suspect and provided him with the victim’s address, Lake said.
Photographs of the cocaine seized in Operation Cosmetics were found on his mobile phone and Mr Lake said they were taken to show potential buyers the quantities of cocaine he could access.
Mr Lake claimed Talbot had “an unhealthy and criminal relationship with Keith Bretherton” and that he was one of his outlets for stolen cocaine.
The defendant had previously claimed he had been using cocaine since 2012 and brought the drug to work because he did not want to leave it at home where his children were. He said he bought an ounce at a time for £800.
The trial continues.
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