Police officer sacked for watching porn at work blames own force

He watched porn on his work laptop every day - accessing one site 35,000 times.

“It is abundantly clear that Mr Connor accessed pornographic websites on a persistent basis over an extended period.”

A police worker sacked for looking at porn in the office has lost his case for unfair dismissal after arguing the force should have caught him earlier. Steven Connor was fired after he was found to have accessed X-rated websites over two years on an almost daily basis while at work or home using his police-supplied laptop.

An investigation found he had looked at porn on 299 days in 316 days and that one site he viewed had received an astonishing 35,000 hits via his devices. But after being sacked for gross misconduct, the married police worker argued that he had been unfairly treated because the police should have been better at watching his internet use and therefore stopped him sooner.

An employment tribunal dismissed his claim, citing the case of disgraced Tory MP Neil Parish as an example of why firing him was the right decision. “The police had to consider what the public would think if they were aware that an employee had viewed pornographic websites on 299 days out of 316 and remained in the respondent’s employment following a disciplinary process," the panel led by Judge Andrew James - said.

“One only has to consider the recent furore caused by a Conservative MP viewing pornography in the House of Commons on a limited number of occasions to imagine what the public might think of that.”

The tribunal in Sheffield heard Mr Connor joined South Yorkshire Police as an IT worker in 2002. During his time on the force, he worked for the local coroner's office and then as an administrative support worker in 2016. In February 2019, an internal internet monitoring system alerted officers that someone had been searching for the words ‘sexy’ and ‘porn’ using a police-issued device.

Concerns were raised about Mr Connor, and when he was confronted at his desk by officers, he had a tab open on his computer on a pornographic website, the hearing was told. He was suspended, and a full investigation was launched, which found that 'of the 316 days when the claimant was logged onto the police desktop between 5th July 2017 and 8th February 2019, he had browsed inappropriate sites on 299 days.

At a disciplinary hearing in May 2020, Mr Connor told the panel he was in “total shock that he had been capable of such bizarre conduct whilst at work”, the tribunal heard. “He said his actions were the result of the turmoil and deepening depression he was fighting at the time and that the frustration he had felt for some considerable time had overwhelmed him,” the hearing was told.

“He argued that he was exhibiting a compulsive behaviour that engulfed him.”

At the tribunal, Mr Connor said that although he admitted misconduct, he found it hard to believe he had spent so much time at work looking at such sites. He argued that in the case of the site that registered 35,000 hits, it was “because of pop-ups, or browser hijacking”.

However, the tribunal said this was irrelevant. “If that was the case... that was because of the claimant’s misconduct in accessing pornographic websites in the first place,” the tribunal said. “It was not down to the conduct of anyone else.”

After the disciplinary hearing, Mr Connor was dismissed without notice, and his last appeal was rejected. He took the police to the employment tribunal claiming unfair dismissal and disability discrimination. He claimed the force had not considered his suffering from depression and other physical ailments.

He also argued the police should have caught him earlier and therefore stopped his behaviour. However, all his claims were rejected.

“It is abundantly clear that Mr Connor accessed pornographic websites on a persistent basis over an extended period,” the tribunal concluded. “His access to pornographic websites was routine and daily, committed whilst both at his place of work and home, on work-issued devices.

“Dismissal without notice was proper and necessary to keep public confidence. Mr Connor has tried to argue that the police should have watched internet use more closely. If it had done so, he argues, the police would have found the pattern of behaviour he displayed over such a long period much earlier.

“That is a further attempt... to blame the police for his persistent misconduct. The fact that the monitoring could have been more effective neither excuses Mr Connor’s behaviour nor make his dismissal unfair.”