DETECTIVE ADMITS SELLING POLICE BADGE TO DRUG DEALER

A Sydney detective at the centre of a corruption inquiry today
confessed to selling a police badge to a drug dealer for about $2,000.

Detective Senior Constable David Patison told the Police Integrity
Commission (PIC) inquiry that the "bad side" of him took over when a
drug dealer asked him if he had a spare police badge.

It so happened that Patison had a badge which he had once reported
stolen, thinking it was lost.

"Circumstances just fell into place, so I agreed," a red-faced
Patison told the inquiry. "It was about $2,000 that he gave me."

The drug dealer planned to use the badge at rave parties to pretend
to be a cop and confiscate drugs, Patison said.

The admission was one more in a long list of corrupt dealings that
Patison has confessed to making over a 15 year period.

Those dealings consisted largely of stealing tens of thousands of
dollars found during drug raids.

A number of drug dealers were also making regular payments to Patison
and a fellow Manly detective, Detective Senior Constable Matthew
Jasper. But it wasn't greed that made Patison steal money or take
bribes, he told the inquiry today.

"I don't know if it's some sort of addiction, of just wanting to do
the wrong thing," Patison said.

The 1997 Wood Royal Commission - which exposed a number of corrupt
police - was not enough to deter him.

"You just look at the number of people who have come here and stood
here and lied and they believed that they got away with it," he said.

Even when Patison guessed that internal affairs was onto him he didn't stop.

"It didn't influence me. If you are doing the wrong thing you lie
about it," he said.

Patison suggested that random integrity tests would be the best
method to deter corrupt cops.

He was caught in one such test when he stole money at a set-up drug
raid on June 15 last year.

"That's concrete evidence," he told the inquiry.

"If you can get those (tests) on such a random basis that people are
just so aware that anything that they could do could be monitored, I
think you'll see a massive change."

Patison also blamed inadequate supervision at the Manly police
station for allowing the corruption to take place.

"Nobody really seemed to know who was doing what," he said.

But he nevertheless offered praise for his supervisor, Detective
Sergeant Ray Peattie, who was recently appointed to the NSW Police
Service's anti-corruption campaign.

He said Peattie had tried to sort out the organisational difficulties
at Manly police station.

The PIC inquiry, also known as the Florida Hearings, is the result of
a three-year investigation into corruption by Manly and northern
Sydney police.

Patison will continue to give evidence tomorrow.