A former Sussex detective inspector has been jailed for three years for the sexual assault of a 16-year-old girl in 2019.
Dominic O'Brien, 55, was convicted of four counts of sexual assault and sentenced at Brighton Crown Court.
He met his victim in 2019, sexually assaulting her while out on bail for a previous sexual offence.
Records for his offending date back to 2006, when he was suspended from duty after sending sexual messages to a 14-year old girl who was the daughter of a murder victim in a case he'd been investigating.
Shortly before his disciplinary hearing, he resigned from the force and prosecutors decided not to go ahead with the prosecution.
Then in 2020 he was caught by undercover police in Leicestershire, speaking to people online about wanting to rape an 11-year-old girl.
He appeared at Lewes Crown Court and was handed a six-month suspended sentence.
Sussex Police said:
"Dominic O’Brien resigned from Sussex Police 15 years ago whilst under investigation. The allegations made against him were fully investigated at the time, but the CPS determined that there would be no criminal prosecution.
"Police officers who abuse their position of trust have no place in policing and we are committed to proactively rooting them out and ensuring victims feel confident to come forward."
Sussex Police also told us that changes to national police regulations since 2007 now mean that police officers will still face misconduct charges even if they resign from the force.
The full police interview with O'Brien under caution, and the full disciplinary papers, were all retained electronically and made available to the Leicestershire Police investigation team in 2017. However, paper-only material would have been routinely deleted as per national police guidelines.
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