A HEARING into the ‘deplorable’ behaviour of a senior police officer is entering its final stages.

Detective Inspector John Stansmore is accused of getting drunk and sending inappropriate messages on WhatsApp during a two-day cybersecurity conference in Cardiff.

The Cleveland Police officer categorically denies getting drunk but accepts that he had missed some sessions to go to the pub.

DI Stansmore left the conference early and headed to the pub with a colleague where he spent the afternoon drinking, a disciplinary panel heard.

And the detective then failed to turn up for the second day as he was suffering from a ‘hangover’, it is alleged.

The senior Cleveland Police officer is also accused of sending inappropriate messages to a WhatsApp group for colleagues from forces across the region, which were described as ‘ribald and Carry On style humour’.

The panel, sitting at National Museum of the Royal Navy, how he was described as being 'mortal drunk' and 'stumbling around'.

Earlier in the hearing, Detective Sergeant Wayne Sinclair, from Durham Constabulary, told the hearing that DI Stansmore had been drinking while at the conference but denied the officer had done anything inappropriate.

The hearing continues.

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