[2025] EWHC 2684 (KB)

DC Baker retired from the Norfolk Constabulary in September 2020 at the rank of Detective Constable and with 28 years’ service.

It was suggested to DC Baker that if the investigation had not proceeded to a prosecution he would have been very disappointed and that he had a personal desire to see the Claimants prosecuted through to a conviction. However the very clear view that I was able to form having heard his oral evidence was that DC Baker personally would have returned to other major investigations; murders etc relatively happily and he was not overly enamoured with being involved in a large scale fraud investigation of this nature. He did not possess the eagerness to see the case through to a concluded trial which was suggested to him. DC Baker was as he stated doing what he was told to as part of the team and no more. As he said at the outset of his evidence he was not “excited” about being involved in the investigation; “fraud would not fill me with excitement”.

As with DS Brownsell, DC Baker provided a comprehensive statement in chronological order setting out the steps which he took within the investigation. It is not necessary to set out the detail except in relation to specific issues raised with him.