Former drug squad chief Nick Bingham’s soft spot for users

He enjoyed a stellar 31-year career with the police, including five years heading the NSW Drugs Squad, but Nick Bingham’s unorthodox view about small-time users didn’t go down well with his bosses. LISTEN NOW

As a cop, Detective Superintendent Nick Bingham was never afraid to use the media to get his message across, which didn’t always go down well with his bosses.

Then Drug Squad Commander Nick Bingham views an illegal cannabis crop near Bellingen on the NSW mid-north coast. File picture

He firmly believed police had a responsibility to be visible and should use the media both to help in investigations and keep the public informed of the work NSW officers were doing.

When head of the drug squad, he created a furore internally and publicly when he suggested there could perhaps be a softer approach taken to drug users caught with small amounts for personal use.

It was a view he expressed again on retirement, telling The Daily Telegraph charging such people was useless, did nothing to address the war on narcotics — and merely clogged the court system.

“It is a waste of time. Invariably the courts will issue a caution with no conviction or a small fine,” he said.

LISTEN NOW: Hear Nick Bingham on everything from criminals’ threats to the moment a police listening device was mistaken for a bomb. WARNING: STRONG LANGUAGE

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After graduating from the Police Academy in 1985, Bingham spent his early years in uniform in the southern suburbs of Sydney, such as Kogarah and Rockdale, before becoming an investigator working for the drug squad in 1994.

He was then seconded to the National Crime Squad, working on a secret task force investigating Asian crime, an area he ended up specialising in over the next few years.

Schoolgirl Ebony Simpson was murdered in 1992.

In 2003, he became the Crime Manager at Liverpool where he said he dealt “with a lot of murders”, but the case that continued to haunt him was the shocking 1992 death of nine-year-old Ebony Simpson.

The schoolgirl was abducted as she walked home from school, sexually assaulted and thrown into a freezing cold dam to die.

“All murders are horrible but when a child is involved it does affect you more, I think,” Bingham told Police Tape.

“So I think every day about what those poor parents went through and that’s something that never leaves you … most days, I would think of them, her, all of them, some of them. I’m not sure it’s made me harder towards those offenders, but it certainly gives you a different perspective on life, how sacred it is.”

In a police career spanning 31 years, Bingham made his mark as the head of the NSW Drug Squad from 2008 to 2014, giving evidence to a parliamentary inquiry into the rise and deadly effects of synthetic drugs and being instrumental in getting legislation to help outlaw them.

He finished his career as the Commander of Polaris, a multi-agency task force which uncovered corruption on the waterfront and especially the infiltration of government agencies by organised crime.

Nick Bingham serving in Liverpool in 2005. Picture: Mat Sullivan

Bingham announces a major drugs bust to the media in 2014. File picture

THREE DECADES OF SERVICE

A breakdown of Nick Bingham’s career

March 1985 to November 1986

General Duties constable at Kogarah, Rockdale and Sutherland

November 1986 to May 1994

Criminal Investigation Duties at Bankstown, Bass Hill, G District, Liverpool and Moorebank

May 1994 to June 1997

Criminal Investigation Duties at Drug Enforcement Agency

July 1997 to September 1998

Criminal Investigation Duties at Crime Agencies Southeast Asian Organised Crime Squad

September 1998 to March 1999

Criminal Investigation Duties at the National Crime Authority Blade Team on Southeast Asian Organised Crime

March 1999 to November 2000

Criminal Investigation Duties at the Joint Asian Crime Group (AFP HQ)

November 2000 to January 2003

Criminal Investigation Duties at Liverpool (promoted to detective sergeant)

January 2003 to October 2003

Duty Officer Liverpool (Chief Inspector)

October 2003 to December 2006

Crime Manager Liverpool (Detective Chief Inspector)

December 2006 to November 2008

Commander (Detective Superintendent) State Crime Command Property Crime Squad (Arson, Motor & Breaking teams)

November 2008 to February 2014

Commander (Detective Superintendent) State Crime Command Drug Squad (including Chemical Operations and Cannabis teams)

February 2014 to retirement August 2016

Commander Multi Agency (AFP, ABF, NSWPF, ACC) Polaris Joint Waterfront Task Force

Originally published as Former drug squad chief Nick Bingham’s soft spot for users