FIVE Basingstoke police officers have been sacked after they were secretly recorded making ‘shameful’ racist and sexist comments. 

The officers from Hampshire Constabulary’s northern ‘toxic’ serious and organised crime unit have been dismissed with a further 11 members of staff punished for their ‘unacceptable’ comments. 

Bugging devices placed in the team’s office at Basingstoke Investigation Centre in Jays Close recorded them comparing a Black officer to a dog and saying Albanians should be killed with ‘nerve agent’. 

Officers likened the unit’s only black officer, DC Solomon Koranteng, to a mixed breed dog, sang the Bob Marley song Buffalo Soldier at him and said he had been flown ‘from Africa in a crate’ and taken to London Zoo.

The squad also placed a map of Africa above the area in the office where DC Koranteng and another officer of African heritage sat and nicknamed it ‘African Corner’. 

Prosecutor Jason Beer QC said that although the recording only lasted for 24 days, between March and April 2018, the investigation uncovered ‘enough racism and sexism to last a lifetime’.

You can read the full story in this week’s edition of The Gazette. Also in this week's paper:

  • A popular gamekeeper has lost both of his legs after he was hit by a car on New Year’s Eve.  
  • Coronavirus cases have tripled in one week in three parts of Basingstoke, government data reveals.
  • A new Covid-19 vaccination centre is launching in Basingstoke in the next few weeks to enable more people to have the vaccine in the area.
  • The former owner of a CBD store in Basingstoke has pleaded not guilty to importing cannabis.
  • A charity fundraiser from Basingstoke described as ‘loving and compassionate’ took his life after struggling to come to terms with the death of his baby daughter, an inquest heard. 
  • Families who received substandard free school meals packages should raise it with their local council, the leader of Basingstoke Liberal Democrats has said.
  • A popular business owner and theatre performer has died after contracting coronavirus in hospital.
  • Two political parties in Basingstoke have been criticised for delivering leaflets during lockdown.
  • PLUS: All the latest from Basingstoke Magistrates' Court.
  • Two pages of your letters to the editor.
  • Pictures: 'A touch of frost'
  • The latest news from our communities.
  • An eight-page puzzle special.
  • Two pages of business news.
  • Three pages of entertainment news.
  • Four pages of sports news. And much more!

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