MET COMMANDER ACCUSED OF DRUG USE WILL FIGHT TO REMAIN IN JOB

The police commander who pioneered a controversial relaxation of rules on
cannabis vowed to fight for his job yesterday as he faced an investigation
into claims that he regularly used the drug himself.

Brian Paddick, who has been praised for his "innovative" policing in the
crime hotspot of Lambeth, south London, said he was devastated by lurid
allegations about his private life made by a former partner.

The 43-year-old officer strenuously denied claims from James Renolleau, his
partner for five years, that they shared at least 100 cannabis joints at
their Westminster flat during their relationship.

Mr Renolleau, a former model, told a Sunday newspaper that Mr Paddick had
allowed him to keep a stash of the drug in their home and allowed him to
smoke it regularly.

The claims about drug use were accompanied by further allegations - also
dismissed as false by Mr Paddick - that he had been serially promiscuous,
picking up strangers on beaches and in a gay sauna.

Supporters claimed yesterday that Mr Paddick, who is Britain's most senior
openly gay police officer, was the victim of a "homophobic witch hunt"
aimed at ousting him from his UKP93,000-a-year post.

Senior members of the Metropolitan Police Authority, the governing body for
policing in London, will meet Sir John Stevens, the Metropolitan Police
Commissioner, today to decide whether to launch an inquiry. The authority,
an independent body which oversees police appointments, has the power to
dismiss senior officers if they are found guilty of misdemeanours by a
disciplinary panel.

Mr Paddick, who spoke yesterday to his superiors at Scotland Yard about the
claims, said he would not be chased out of his job. "I am still the
commander for Lambeth and I have done nothing which would make me change
that situation. I will have the chance to put forward my views and I will
do that when asked," he said.

"I lived with this man for five years in what I believed was an honest and
caring relationship. I am absolutely devastated that he should say the
things he has said. They are not true."

The commander, who revealed on Friday that his "softly, softly" approach of
cautioning cannabis users had led to a rise in arrests of hard-drug
dealers, said he had no knowledge of where Mr Renolleau, 36, had kept his
drugs.

Mr Paddick said: "I have never smoked cannabis. I don't know where he put
his cannabis and on the occasions when he smoked it in my presence I would
argue with him about it - it was not something I casually accepted."

His relationship with the Frenchman, who worked as a cashier at Westminster
Abbey in London, ended acrimoniously two years ago. A friend of the police
officer said: "These are wild allegations which are not founded in reality.
They are the product of an attempt to damage Brian."

Scotland Yard said it would not comment on the allegations pending the
meeting between Sir John and the police authority chairman, Lord Harris of
Haringey, a Labour peer.

A spokesman for the authority said: "We are assessing the information in
the newspaper story as well as any other material that comes to light. This
matter will be the subject of further discussion with the commissioner."

The publication of the claims by The Mail on Sunday, which is believed to
have paid Mr Renolleau UKP100,000 for his story, completed a torrid week
for Mr Paddick. On Monday, he was given a dressing down during a meeting
with Sir John for freely expressing his views on anarchy and recreational
drug use on a radical website.

His remarks on the internet chatroom that he found the concept of anarchy
"attractive" and that society should "screw the dealers" earned him the
tabloid sobriquet "Commander Crackpot".

But supporters of Mr Paddick said his work in Lambeth had earned the
respect of a community in a part of London where the police had long been
mistrusted. Lee Jasper, chairman of the Lambeth Community Police
Consultative Group, said: "It is extremely important that a first-class
officer is not destroyed by some homophobic tendency in our society. These
allegations are part of a homophobic witch hunt."