BRITAIN: Five British police officers filmed making racist remarks in an undercover television documentary resigned yesterday.
Constable Rob Pulling, one of eight officers featured in BBC1's The Secret Policeman, resigned from North Wales Police yesterday morning as a top officer in his force admitted having felt "physically sick" watching the film. By the afternoon, three more officers from Greater Manchester Police and one from the Cheshire force had stepped down.
All five officers had been suspended over racist behaviour captured on secret cameras for the hour-long documentary screened last night.
Before the programme was screened, the BBC was criticised by Home Secretary Mr David Blunkett for not handing over evidence of racism before broadcasting its documentary.
But today, Mr Blunkett added his voice to the many senior police officers who admitted feeling sick and ashamed by the extreme racist behaviour by young recruits in the programme.
One top officer said he had felt "physically sick" at racist comments captured on film by undercover reporter Mark Daly. Another said he felt "ashamed to be a member of the British police service", while Mr Blunkett said the extent of the racist behaviour in the film, broadcast last night, was "horrendous". A new training scheme on diversity should now be adopted nationwide, the Home Secretary said.
The Secret Policeman showed racism among a number of trainee officers from forces in North Wales, Cheshire and Greater Manchester after Mr Daly (28) posed as a recruit armed with an array of hidden cameras. The Glaswegian journalist spent seven months with Greater Manchester Police compiling a dossier of evidence against seven recruits and one serving officer before being exposed and arrested.
Constable Pulling, who was based in Rhyl, north Wales, was seen wearing a home-made Ku Klux Klan-style hood, saying he would bury an Asian under a train track and that Hitler had the "right idea".
Murdered black teenager Stephen Lawrence had "deserved it" and his parents were "a f****** pair of spongers", he added.
Acting deputy chief constable of North Wales Police Mr Clive Wolfendale said: "It is frankly hard to imagine more despicable words." Chief Constable Richard Brunstrom would now write to the Lawrence family to apologise.
Mr Wolfendale said it was "scant comfort" that "raw recruit" Pulling had never walked the streets of north Wales unsupervised.
He said: "I felt physically sick as I watched The Secret Policeman last night and I suspect some of you did.
"Pulling has shamed his colleagues, his uniform and his service. He is a disgrace." Greater Manchester deputy chief constable Alan Green said any case the racist recruits were involved in would have to be reviewed.
"It is fair to say the programme last night, which we had not seen previously, has really shocked, certainly me. It has made me ashamed to be part of the British police service and it has saddened me greatly." The police service had to use "any tactics" it could to root out racists in the ranks, Mr Green said.
"I am not prepared to go into details but this is a big wake-up call for us and I know (Chief Constable) Michael Todd is determined we will leave no stone unturned in rooting out these people," he added.
Mr Todd, currently at a conference in the United States, said he was "personally offended" by any racism or discrimination. "Such behaviour from police officers or our support staff is totally unacceptable and disgusts me as a fellow officer."