Misconduct action against a new recruit to Avon and Somerset Police has been dropped after allegations she made racist comments were not proven.
Colleagues accused PC Andra Serbanescu of saying an Asian man was the “type who would have a bomb” and that she knew two black men would be arrested as soon as she saw them.
She claimed her words had been twisted by her tutor, PC Oliver Howe, and that he had tried to sabotage her career in the police.
A misconduct panel was not persuaded by the arguments put forward by the force.
Representing Avon and Somerset Police, Mark Ley-Morgan said PC Serbanescu’s remarks were “discriminatory, racist and wholly inappropriate”.
He said her counter-claim against PC Howe was extremely serious, adding: “It’s an allegation of corruption and serious dishonesty. It’s PC Serbanescu who isn’t telling the truth.
“Would PC Howe be so determined she doesn’t become a police officer that he would be willing to lie about it? He has absolutely nothing to gain by lying.”
PC Howe said he could clearly remember what PC Serbanecu said after they spoke to an Asian man waiting to pray at a mosque in Weston-super-Mare at 4am last July. He claimed she said it was “nonsense”, a “waste of time” and the man was “the type who would have a bomb”.
Another officer, PC Joshua Osborne, claimed PC Serbanescu said she knew two black men would be arrested as soon as she saw them.
He admitted there could be “101 reasons” why she said it, but the force contended the remark was racist.
PC Serbanescu, who joined the force last March as the country went into lockdown and worked in Weston, denied the comments.
She told the panel: “I can’t believe this is happening. It hurts me so badly. I’m not racist.
“I realised he [PC Howe] didn’t want me to be a police officer when he started twisting my words.”
She accused him of bullying and humiliating her.
Ramin Pakrooh, defending, said PC Serbanescu, originally from Romania, had attended events organised by the black police association and embraced a “cosmopolitan way of life”.
He said PC Howe had paraphrased and exaggerated her comments, who was “reckless” about their accuracy, and that PC Osborne’s recollection of her comments was also inaccurate.
Mr Pakrooh told the hearing at Kenneth Steele House in Bristol on February 25: “The accusation is a trigger that has been pulled too carelessly by PC Howe.
“If that evidence is enough to result in a finding of gross misconduct then the force is at risk of encouraging and creating a dangerous accusation-based culture and of cutting away its own real diversity in officers like PC Serbanescu.”
Misconduct findings are decided on the balance of probability. The panel found that the force had not discharged the burden on it.
