PSNI asked to review decision not to discipline inspector involved in Glenn Quinn murder case

The TUV leader has been meeting with the family of Glenn Quinn, who was found beaten to death at his home in Ashleigh Park in January, 2020, and had a further engagement with Mr Quinn’s mother and brother following the publication of a police ombudsman report.

Having examined the circumstances of the 47-year-old’s murder, the ombudsman found that the PSNI had “failed to deal properly” with intelligence that said there was a threat to Mr Quinn’s life days before he was brutally attacked.

The deputy chief constable has apologised to Mr Quinn’s family for how the anonymous threat assessment was handled, but said that intelligence was “not an exact science”.

The ombudsman recommended that a duty inspector should be disciplined for this failing, and said she would have made a similar recommendation about another duty inspector who had since retired.

But the PSNI decided that the serving officer had no case to answer for misconduct and should not be disciplined, and instead should receive additional training, the ombudsman said.

On Monday, Mr Allister said: “I was pleased today to have a further meeting with the late Glenn Quinn’s mother and brother, following the publication of the recent police ombudsman’s report.“Given the stark findings of the ombudsman, I am appalled that the PSNI rejected the recommendation for disciplinary action against an inspector”.

Ombudsman Marie Anderson said her inquiries established Mr Quinn was not told about the threat because he was not associated on police systems with the address given in the intelligence.This led to police failing to identify him as a target,” said Mrs Anderson.

“However, if police had visited the address it is likely that they would have been able to confirm that he lived there, which would have verified the credibility of the threat”.

Mr Allister said he would have expected the duty inspector to have taken the “elementary step” of calling at the address referred to in the threat warning.

"It is astounding that such a basic step was not thought appropriate,” he said.

Mr Allister said the “failure to take disciplinary action” had been endorsed from the highest level of the PSNI, and he has “written to the chief constable calling for this decision to be reviewed urgently”.

He added: “The Quinn family has shown tremendous courage and tenacity in standing up to the thugs who murdered Glenn. The least they should be able to expect is meaningful PSNI action when their failings are exposed.”

Deputy Chief Constable Chris Todd has apologised to the family of Mr Quinn on behalf of the organisation, and said that new recommendations have been implemented to ensure that incidents of a similar nature do not occur again.

“Policing is a human endeavour and sometimes mistakes are made. The scale and complexity of this work is exceptionally challenging.Intelligence is not an exact science and police often have to work off a partial picture,” he added.