200 'CORRUPT' POLICE FACE CHARGES

Up to 200 Metropolitan police officers could be implicated in the biggest
corruption inquiry in British policing for a quarter of a century.

A 180-strong investigation team set up by Sir Paul Condon, the Metropolitan
police Commissioner, has uncovered "criminality of the highest level" by
some of Scotland Yard's most prized detectives.

Senior Metropolitan police sources said that serving detective chief
inspectors and retired superintendents would be among those charged with
offences carrying sentences of up to 15 years. Corrupt officers have made
hundreds of thousands of pounds from organising major drug deals and armed
robberies. They are also implicated in contract killings.

Already 34 officers have been suspended, and large numbers of arrests are
expected later this summer.

The corrupt officers are believed to have been responsible for dozens of
wrongful convictions, and the investigation team and government lawyers are
trawling through their career histories looking for miscarriages of justice.

The investigation, which is growing by the day, is the biggest corruption
inquiry in British policing history.

A senior Scotland Yard source said: "We have been shocked by the level and
seriousness of the criminality and by the arrogance of the officers who
thought they could get away with it."

Of those officers confronted with allegations of corruption, three in ten
have so far agreed to co-operate with the inquiry and amnesties are being
offered to some of the minor offenders who agree to give evidence against
other officers.

Several of those giving evidence have had to be moved to safe houses and
one investigating officer has been taken off the inquiry after intimidation.

The corrupt officers have also gone to great lengths to cover their tracks
by living in modest homes and investing their illegal earnings in offshore
accounts. The detectives worked in some of the most elite units in the
police service, including the Flying Squad, the South-East Regional Crime
Squad, and the new National Crime Squad.

A Yard source said: "For 95 per cent of their time they were some of our
best detectives but in the other 5 per cent they became organised
criminals."

Networks of serving and retired police officers and villains have been
uncovered.

On Wednesday, as part of the corruption inquiry, a detective from the
National Crime Squad was arrested and charged with stealing cash from a
London police station, together with a detective sergeant from the Flying
Squad unit at Rigg Approach, north-east London. Hebecame the 15th serving
or former member of the Rigg Approach unit to be suspended as part of the
investigation.

In January, raids were carried out on the homes of 19 members of the unit.

Last week a 41-year-old detective constable, formerly with the South-East
Regional Crime Squad which targets major drug dealers, was charged with
plotting to supply cannabis and stealing UKP800 in public funds.

Scotland Yard chiefs have been so horrified by their findings that they
have been liaising with forces in other metropolitan areas where it is
believed similar levels of corruption may exist. South Yorkshire police has
suspended 11 officers and two members of its civilian staff in an
investigation into allegations of irregularities in the administration of
the Firearms Surrender and Compensation Scheme.

Details of the corruption scandal come as the force is bracing itself for
the findings of the public inquiry into the death of the black teenager
Stephen Lawrence.