A NORTH Yorkshire Police officer visited the home of a retained fire officer who had had an affair with his wife, a misconduct panel heard.

PC Christopher Parnell, stationed at Harrogate Police Station, is accused of breaching standards of professional behaviour and conduct.

At a misconduct hearing at North Yorkshire Police headquarters in Northallerton on Monday, the panel heard that in July last year PC Parnell’s wife began an affair with a friend – a retained firefighter who had carried out odd jobs around their family home in Boroughbridge.

Several weeks after the affair started, the firefighter discovered PC Parnell’s wife had confided in a friend at her local gym about the relationship and it had become local knowledge.

On August 11 the retained firefighter went to the home of PC Parnell and his wife. There, he told his mistress the public knowledge of their affair had “ruined his life” and he would have to go and confess their affair to his girlfriend.

He told the panel: “I asked her if Chris Parnell knew and she said, “no”, and asked me to cover it up by saying it was a lie and that she wanted attention.

"I said, 'no, it’s come out now' I wanted to tell my partner the truth.”

The next morning, he saw PC Parnell drive down his street at 5.50am and felt “scared”.

Later, the man rang PC Parnell and left him a voicemail, saying he was sorry for what had happened, “didn’t want to cause any harm” and invited him to speak privately with him.

He also told him in the message he felt intimidated by seeing him driving along his street.

The following day PC Parnell turned up at his home. The firefighter told the panel that PC Parnell had been wearing a civilian shirt and trousers with a lanyard around his neck.

He said his mannerisms were “anxious” and “angry”.

He told the panel PC Parnell demanded to come into his home and said he kept reassuring him he wasn’t going to do anything, but said “I still didn’t like his mannerisms towards me. They were very aggressive and abrupt.”

He said PC Parnell asked for him for his phone to look through his messages, he unlocked the phone for him and the police officer took it from his hand. He told the panel that even though the police officer kept reassuring him he wasn’t going to “get aggressive”, he didn’t know if he would hit him and was scared.

PC Parnell’s representative, Michael Rawlinson, questioned the witness over his claim that he didn’t know why PC Parnell had gone to his home. He said: “Had you not gone around to PC Parnell’s house, he would never have gone around to yours, isn’t that fair?”

He also put to the firefighter, that his description of PC Parnell coming to his door and ordering him into his house was incorrect, as a recording the police officer took of the conversation showed he said: “Hello mate, how are you?” and asked if they could have a quick chat before stepping into the house.

The hearing continues.