A British court jailed the country’s most senior Asian police officer for four years on Monday for attacking a man and trying to frame him in a petty row over money.
Ali Dizaei, 47, was convicted of misconduct in public office and perverting the course of justice following a four-week trial in London and given a sentence that the judge said was intended as a deterrent for others.
The officer will now be sacked for gross misconduct and faces losing all or part of his pension under measures to punish corrupt officers. Investigators who led the probe against Dizaei branded him a “criminal in uniform” and said he had behaved like a bully.
The jury heard how Iranian-born Dizaei had met his victim, 24-year-old Iraqi businessman Waad al-Baghdadi, in a west London restaurant run by a friend of the police officer in July 2008.
The Iraqi approached Dizaei, who held the rank of commander and rose to become head of the National Black Police Association, and asked him for £600 (US$940) he was owed for building a Web site for him.
The policeman grew angry and confronted Baghdadi in a nearby side street where a scuffle took place and the Iraqi was roughly arrested and handcuffed. Dizaei called for back-up and when the officers arrived, he handed them the metal mouthpiece of a shisha pipe that was held on Baghdadi’s keyring and claimed that he had been stabbed with it.
However, a doctor later concluded that two red marks on Dizaei’s torso did not match the pipe and were probably self-inflicted. When Baghdadi was told he would not be charged, he complained about his treatment and suspicions were raised, marking the beginning of the end of Dizaei’s 24-year career with London’s Metropolitan Police.
“Dizaei behaved like a bully and the only way to deal with bullies is to stand up to them,” said Nick Hardwick, head of the Independent Police Complaints Commission.
“The greatest threat to the reputation of the police service is criminals in uniform like Dizaei,” he said.
Sentencing him at London’s Southwark Crown Court, the judge told Dizaei that his jail term included a deterrent element “to send a clear message that police officers of whatever rank are not above the law.”
“You knew how the system worked and you thought you would never be discovered. It is to the credit of the investigators in this case that early on they questioned your account,” he told the police officer.
Dizaei also made headlines in 2008 when he represented Tarique Ghaffur, then Britain’s top Muslim police officer, in threatening legal action against then Met chief Sir Ian Blair for discrimination and bullying.
Met chief Paul Stephenson said on Monday that Dizaei’s “disgraceful behavior” damaged the reputation of the entire police force.
“It is extremely disappointing and concerning that this very senior officer has been found guilty of abusing his position and power,” he said.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including