Ex senior cop paid off
(CNS): Some three and a half years after he was suspended from duty, former deputy commissioner Rudi Dixon has agreed a financial settlement with the government and formally left the RCIPS. The figure remains under wraps, however, even though the cash comes out of the public purse. The governor’s office said that a settlement was reached with Dixon but a non-disclosure confidentiality agreement was attached to it, preventing officials from revealing the details of the deal with the former senior cop, which was reached around six weeks ago. Dixon was placed on required leave during the costly and discredited Operation Tempura investigation into alleged corruption within the RCIPS in March 2008 and never returned to his post.
Dixon was suspended along with the police commissioner at the time, Stuart Kernohan, who has a continuing legal dispute with government, and Chief Superintendent John Jones, who has returned to work. Shortly afterwards Dixon was arrested by UK officers from the special police investigation team (SPIT).
The senior investigating officer of the internal police probe, Martin Bridger, charged Dixon with two counts of misconduct in a public office and two counts of doing an act tending and intended to pervert the course of public justice. The charges related to two separate incidents in which Dixon was involved with individuals being released from custody without charges.
One of the cases against him relating to the arrest and release of a suspect on Cayman Brac over illegal numbers, which was dropped before it reached the court room. In the second case, which related to advice Dixon had given to an officer to release a former senior cop after a drink driving arrest, he was found not guilty by a jury. Following the court case, by which time the police commissioner had replaced Dixon with a UK deputy, the local senior cop remained on suspension on full pay while the RCIPS continued what it said was an internal “disciplinary investigation”, the results of which have never been revealed.
It is understood that since then, Dixon has been in negotiations with the Cayman government to agree a financial settlement that would see him formally depart from the service and compensated for the damage to what had been a successful career in the RCIPS up to that point.
It is estimated that Dixon would have been paid close to $500,000 over the last three years he spent on suspension in salary and benefits. The amount of the settlement is likely to have reached the millions of dollars mark, given the former cop's senior position and the potential length of service ahead of him. Dixon was a senior career officer who would have served until his retirement and had at one point been tipped to become the police commissioner, hopes of which were dashed once Bridger arrived in Cayman.
This latest undisclosed bill to the public purse is unlikely to be the last of the money to be spent mopping up after Operation Tempura. Former police commissioner Stuart Kernohan is continuing with his wrongful dismissal claim against the Cayman Islands government and former police officer Burman Scott, who was arrested by SPIT in relation to the same case as Dixon, has also filed a claim against the government.
Aside from the more than $6 milllion spent on the actual investigations undertaken by SPIT, which did not result in a single conviction for corruption, Operation Tempura also cost the Cayman public purse a further CI$1.3 million. This was for damages paid to Grand Court Judge, Justice Alex Henderson, who was unlawfully arrested by Bridger’s team and who won the payout following a high profile courtroom case in which the various allegations and investigations by SPIT began to unravel.
CNS contacted Dixon about the long awaited payout but he also stated that he was unable to make any comment regarding any settlement that may have been reached.
Category: Local News
Wish my company would pay me off with such a large sum!! PLEEEEASE!!!!
Good luck. Open your own private firm and assist solving crimes here. Start by looking for Ms. Anna Evans and Ms. Kerriann.
Rudy if I were you I would head on over to the Philippines and retire.
They have about 90 million beautiful ladies there who would appreciate a nice guy like you.
Why go there….? They are in ABUNDANCE HERE!! I think he's found some by now… retire here and spend here not there man…. join the band-wagon like all the rest of Caymanian men….
The only thing accomplished here was the UK effectively removed a caymanian who would have qualified for the post Bans now holds. Sad that the RCIP saga continues with a beach squad now.
Congrats Rudi
I agree that no amount of money can compensate properly for the loss of one's career and the stain on one's reputation. But a settlement in the region of say $1.5 million for 10 years of lost human capital would not be unjustified.
As there have been no indications that this arrest was tortious, I fail to see why any payout has been made.
The facts suggest that the arrest was malicious and prompted by an urgent need for Tempura to produce some results after spending a year and several million dollars of public money chasing shadows.
What amazes me is that the head of the investigation at the time has been allowed to walk from the whole mess leaving the people of the Cayman Islands to pick up the tab.
And this is how millionaires are made overnight my friend….
Thank god he is Caymanian, hopefully he will spend his money stimulatingg the economy.
SMH Crap like this really upsets me and disappoints me. I don't know why I'm surprised anymore.
So Justice Henderson gets paid off quickly and still gets to keep his job.
Mr. Dixon has to fight for his payout and is no longer employed by the RCIP after not being found guilty of any wrongdoing.
Was the payout that good that he could just up and walk away from his job, or was he forced out?
Cayman is an expensive place to retire. What may seem like a lot of money today will quickly dwindle away.
Mr. Dixon, while i am glad this ordeal is behind you, i think the Caymanian people would have much preferred to have you in the RCIP where seasoned officers of your calibre are sorely needed.
Good luck and Godspeed.
Yes, the payout was that good.
Based on the information noted above its almost a guarantee Mr. Dixon was never hurting during this "ordeal". According to the article, he received his full salary and benefits, a lump sum payout and I'm not sure how old he is, but he's entitled to a pension. He's definitely better off than you or I.
I agree,i dont know the man personally, but he seemed well of as matter of fact there were numerous pictures of him smiling in the paper while participating in various fishing tournaments… doesnt seem like he was hurting at all!
Did the British government pay this settlement? If not why wouldn't it be in the best interest of tax paying citizens to know how much Mr. Dixon received? After all he was still on full pay, it was like he never left the force.
As with all the Tempura foul ups CIG paid the bill.
Use of public money should be public knowledge.
Keystone kops………….. and Keystone government!
Waste of public funds!
Rudi Dixon was a good police officer. He deserved a lot more than $1Million for what was done to him!
2 million? 10 million?
Thats all good , money is one thing but people must work for it. If you don't work for it ,it may go lightly as it come. Lets hope he invest it in real things so he can live off it if he never works again. As a young man he has a lot of years in front of him.
Congrats to my brother, however no amount of money can repay you and all of us especially mother, for the stress and sleepless nights as we awaited the out come of all of this @#$%!!!!!.
Congratulations Mr. Dixon
Mr Dixon is a very lucky man. Only in Cayman,
What makes you think he is lucky.
We do not know what the internal disciplinary inquiry found but we can fairly assume I think that if the courts found nothing serious enough to arrive at a criminal conclusion then at worst I would guess he might have been found by the disciplinary folk to have done something that warranted a slap on the wrists.
Instead he was forced to stay away from the work he enjoyed and was good at / respected for and put in a position from which he could never return. That is not lucky in my book.
Ask Rudi if given the choice he would have taken the settlement or wound back the clock such that this never happened and he was still a highly respected full time career cop then ask youself whether you think he is lucky not having that choice.
Congrats Rudy!
Make them know Brac people are smart people and very educated. Only wish now we could go home and celebrate.
You try hush cause you dont sound so bright.
AND HOW DO YOU FIGURE THAT… WAS MY GRAMMAR BAD… ? ARE YOU A COP…?
Are you insinuating that Dixon wasn't educated?????? If so check your facts.
Don't need to be educated to be a cop though…..
Talk about Transparency! Mr. Governor, why are the figures hidden from the public if the public has to pay for the settlement??? That is not right! Anyone who agrees with me and believes that the UK's Foreign and Commonwealth Office is taking us for a fool, please click thumbs up.
The figures are hidden to avoid us knowing how much the FCO/Governor screwed-up and cost the Cayman Islands.
Not if, but when this happens again, I hope the Governor is made to resign.
It was the previous Governor that was involved in the whole saga.
Do you know why there is a need for a confidentiality agreement?
KA CHING CHING!
Oh, how I wish I could make $500,000 in 3 years for doing nothing! I dont blame Him.
YOU CAN!!!!!! Just get yerself elected!
If this money has come out of the "PUBLIC" purse, then it is the right of the public to know about it. No doubt deals have been made of which the perpetrators are ashamed of.
Government and the legal profession have lost all accountability to the people that they are supposed to be serving.
Where does the money come from to run a country? In Cayman, the money comes from its citizens and therefore all subsequent dealings which such monies should be transparent.
While I'm extremely happy for Mr. Dixon whom is most deserving of this favourable settlement, it's a "crying shame" that me and you as Caymanians had to pay for it.
This is what happens when you give Englishmen "Extreme Authority" to F _ _ _ around with locals as if it's a game they are playing in a pub. I can't wait for the " Bill of Rights" to come into place where victim(s) not only have the right to go after their employers for wrong doing; but also to vigorously persue and proceed against the individual(s) perpetrators themselves………. whether they are living in Cayman, England or elsewhere.
Exactly! What have the English ever done for us?
Clearly you don't know your own history. What have the English ever done for us? Hmm let me see……
Well, the first recorded visitor to the islands was an Englishman – Sir Francis Drake in 1584. the Great House at Pedro St James was built by an Englishman – William Eden. Oh yes, and lest we all forget, it is the English, well the British actually, who gave you that wonderful document called a British Citizen passport. Important to note the difference between that and a Cayman passport, although still British, doesn't allow you to go anywhere without all kinds of hassle.
Mind you, with a name like Judean People's Front, I doubt that you're really that interested?
Are you the People's Front of Judea?
You got a lot of tie on ya hand bredren
The aquaduct?
Monty Python?
Sanitation?
The mistake the British Govt made was to allow The Cayman Islands to remain as a British Colony when the rest of Jamaica was granted independance. This was done after strong representations from the community leaders in the Cayman Islands. Find out who they were, and point out to them that you think that they made a huge mistake.
Colonies are an out of date piece of history and pain inthe neck distraction, that the current British Govt surely wish that they didnt have to waste time on. However before you wish for independance, think through the consequences very carefully. So many former colonies are now run by nasty dictators, who line their own pockets and have no interest in the welfare of the majority of their populations. Of course that would never happen here would it ?
Encourged people such as Issac Bodden (Bowden) and the Watlers (Walters) to inhabit the islands..gave free land grants…provided deserters from the Cromwells Army, slaves… …do we need to go on?
12;05
You mean like the europeans did the native americans! sheesh we could have done without it.
I don't think you really know what you are talking about.
Any Bill of rights information information given to you was obviously wasted.
The Bill of rights is a direct lift from ECHR and does not apply to 'Employers' per se, it is there to stop the Interference and intrusion of Government and associated Government bodies of any intrusion of rights covered by the bill.
Therefore, if you are getting excited about it, you must bea Government worker as anything else will be a wasted effort.
I am happy for Rudi. He was not found guilty of any wrong doing or corruption. They tried so hard to pin "corruption" on the Cayman Islands. Of course, Cayman is not innocent, but we were spared from having to be in the same situation as what happened to Turks and Caicos Islands. The UK (then the Labor Party) declared full British rule, a dictatorship on the islandersjust to abolish their Constitution for another Constitution that does not represent TCI well. Also, their economy has plummet to rock bottom, and many businesses have left the islands due to the British administration. So they tried hard to take over the Cayman Islands and declare full British rule, but they had no grounds. Justice Henderson was unlawfully arrested and he put them in their place. Rudi Dixon and all those lost cases, are a just victory for this financial industry that was going to be ruin if they had their way.
The only way to stop this is to get our foil hats on and invade Area 51 and disable the transponder where the secret orders are received.
We just hope that Burmon is treated as fairly. After all he is a human being too, and he was locked down and humiliated.Also most people like to believe the negative. Once your name goes in the mouths of Cayman it is better that it was true. Burmon is a innocent and upright ex Cop just wish we had more like him .
How could these people from the Uk lock a man down with no evidence; especially, a police officer??? It is still mindbloggling to me.