What the reports said about Simon Overland and his former deputy, Sir Ken Jones

DETAILS of various reports about allegations and counter-allegations relating to former Chief Commissioner Simon Overland and his then deputy, Sir Ken Jones

THE REPORTS.

There have been several reports into allegations made against former Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Simon Overland and his then deputy, Sir Ken Jones.

They contained claim and counter claim by the various players in the police leadership saga, including by the two government agencies which produced the reports.

KEITH MOOR details their major findings below.

1. June 19, 2011. Ombudsman George Brouwer tabled a damning report on the issuing of misleading crime statistics by Victoria Police. He said a whistleblower had complained to him in late February, 2011, that Victoria Police crime statistics released on October 28, 2010, had been manipulated for political purposes.

The then Chief Commissioner, Simon Overland, resigned within hours of the report being released. Mr Brouwer found Mr Overland's claim of a 27.5 per cent reduction in assaults on Melbourne's city streets was ''misleading and inconsistent with all other available data''. He said the decision to release the dodgy crime statistics on the eve of the then Labor government entering election caretaker mode was Mr Overland's ''and his alone''.

The then Police Minister Peter Ryan said the Ombudsman's report provided compelling evidence of the litany of mistakes made by Mr Overland. He said he rang Mr Overland late on June 18, 2011, the day before the report was made public, after spending 24 hours reading and considering the report.

State Ombudsman George Brouwer

Mr Ryan said he told Mr Overland he was seriously concerned about the issues raised by the Ombudsman and that Mr Overland then indicated his intention to resign and ''I indicated the government's preparedness to accept that resignation''.

2. October 11, 2011. First public sign of conflict between the Ombudsman and the Office of Police Integrity emerges. Ombudsman's report tabled into allegations the OPI abused its powers in its pursuit of then Deputy Commissioner Sir Ken Jones and Tristan Weston, the then adviser to Police Minister Peter Ryan.

While it said it had found no evidence the OPI had illegally tapped telephones, it also said Commonwealth legislation prevented it from investigating the allegation the OPI had abused its bugging powers. The report revealed it was Sir Ken who sparked the Ombudsman's probe into the alleged abuse of power by the OPI. Mr Brouwer warned the lack of scrutiny of warrants used by the OPI to bug telephones could lead to a situation where an improper use or overuse of bugging powers could go undetected.

The Ombudsman's report also revealed the OPI began its probe into Sir Ken after it was alleged he was the likely source of leaks of confidential information. The then OPI boss Michael Strong hit back at the Ombudsman later that day, saying every action taken by the OPI in its pursuit of Sir Ken and Mr Weston had been endorsed by the Solicitor-General.

3. October 27, 2011. OPI tabled its Crossing the Line report, which revealed claims by the OPI that it had uncovered a conspiracy to offer inducements to the then Police Minister Peter Ryan to support the reinstatement of Sir Ken. The report prompted Mr Weston to quit following findings against him of misconduct and Baillieu government MP Bill Tilley resigned as a parliamentary secretary after the report revealed he had secret meetings with Sir Ken while trying to persuade him to withdraw his resignation.

The Herald Sun revealed the following day that the OPI probe into allegations against Sir Ken was continuing and that the OPI did not have the power to make the final findings of the probe public as it was bound under the Whistleblowers Protection Act to hand its final report to the Ombudsman as it was the Ombudsman who referred the allegations to the OPI and it would be up to the Ombudsman to decide whether to table the OPI's findings in a report to State Parliament.

Sir Ken Jones before things turned sour.

4. June 21, 2012. Ombudsman tabled a report into whistleblower allegations that Mr Overland took detrimental action against Sir Ken because he believed Sir Ken was the whistleblower who prompted the Ombudsman's probe into Mr Overland's release of misleading crime statistics.

The report cleared Mr Overland of breaching the Whistleblowers Protection Act, but found Mr Overland's decision to force Sir Ken to take immediate ''gardening leave'' was significantly detrimental to Sir Ken and had an adverse effect on Sir Ken's professional reputation. The report found the actions taken against Sir Ken by Mr Overland were not taken in reprisal for Sir Ken being a whistleblower - but were taken because Mr Overland believed Sir Ken was leaking confidential information to the media - and therefore those actions did not constitute detrimental actions as defined by the Whistleblowers Protection Act.

The report also said no evidence had been found to support the allegation that Sir Ken leaked crime statistics information to anyone. It said Mr Overland had been unable to provide investigators from the Ombudsman's office with any evidence to support his view that Sir Ken was leaking information to the media. In his response to the report, Mr Overland criticised the Ombudsman's findings and claimed the Ombudsman didn't have jurisdiction to draw the conclusions he did.

5. October 9, 2012. Ombudsman George Brouwer tabled another report critical of Mr Overland. It criticised Mr Overland's handling of information sent to him about corrupt public servants possibly being involved in the death of Carl Williams. Mr Brouwer offered Mr Overland the chance to respond to the criticisms, which suggested Mr Overland failed to pursue what could have been vital intelligence about the 2010 murder of Williams.

Mr Overland said he disagreed with Mr Brouwer's findings, accused Mr Brouwer of prejudging him and said he wouldn't fully respond to the draft report because doing so in the past had made no difference to the final report. But Mr Overland did take the opportunity to try to blame Sir Ken for not chasing up the corruption claims, which were provided to Mr Overland four days after Williams was murdered.

''After passing such information to Jones, I would not have expected to be briefed further on the handling of the information, unless it turned into something significant,'' Mr Overland told the Ombudsman. Sir Ken denied Mr Overland passed the information to him and the Ombudsman found no evidence of Mr Overland having done so. In his response to the Ombudsman, Sir Ken said Mr Overland's explanations ``were not plausible''.

6. October 24, 2012. Another Ombudsman's report, this time by deputy Ombudsman John Taylor, critical of Mr Overland tabled in State Parliament. While it cleared Mr Overland of allegations of improper conduct it found that under Mr Overland's leadership a senior executive was provided with an unnecessary termination payment; a superintendent was reappointed without an open and competitive recruitment process and a superintendent under investigation retired after being alerted about a Victoria Police probe into the inappropriate use of email.

In his response to the report, Mr Overland questioned the Ombudsman's powers to probe him, saying the Ombudsman didn't have a general supervisory role over the chief commissioner and that some conclusions in the report were irrelevant.

7. February, 2013. Secret OPI report given to Ombudsman. The OPI was not able to make the report public as under the Whistleblowers Protection Act it had to deliver it to the Ombudsman. The Ombudsman referred the OPI report to Victoria's Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission (IBAC) for further investigation.

8. October 27, 2013. Sunday Herald Sun reveals the IBAC has appointed an independent figure to review all the OPI and Ombudsman's reports into the allegations.

9. November 26, 2013. IBAC tables report saying it has appointed former County Count judge Murray Kellam to investigate the OPI and Ombudsman's reports and that the Kellam report on the Overland/Sir Ken saga is expected to be tabled in State Parliament "in the near future".