Kebabs are loved the world over, from the coal pits of their native Middle East to Berlin’s Turkish district and the neon-lit shop at the end of your road that probably hasn’t cleaned its grease trap since the early 90s. The marriage of flame-grilled meat, spices, and vegetables; wrapped together in a fluffy pita or naan is one of mankind’s crowning culinary achievements.
Is a kebab worth risking your job for tho? A police officer in Cambridgeshire seemed to think so. PC Richard Musgrave has been sacked from the police force after going out to buy a kebab while on duty.
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A four-day misconduct hearing in Peterborough found that in July 2016, Musgrave went missing from a police station to give a lift to a woman and her friends. After this, he drove to an industrial estate to eat a kebab.
Unsure of where their colleague had gone, officers back at the station became concerned for Musgrave’s safety and triggered an emergency search. He said that he had driven to the estate for a burglary patrol, and that his watch had stopped, his earpiece was removed from his radio, and his mobile phone was switched to silent—which must be the most far-fetched excuse since you told your biology teacher you didn’t do the homework because you were attacked by a swarm of killer bees on the way to school.
Musgrave later “dishonestly told the sergeant that he had gone to the industrial estate to finish writing a statement and had fallen asleep there.”
And it gets worse. Still on duty, Musgrave drove a marked vehicle to meet a woman at a Wetherspoons pub and didn’t intervene when some of the group she was drinking with were alleged to have behaved in a drunken manner, and were refused service by bar staff.
Unsurprisingly, the Cambridgeshire Police hearing concluded that Musgrave had breached professional standards. He was dismissed without notice.
Let’s hope it was a good kebab.
