John De-Hayes

I joined Leicestershire Constabulary in 1993 as a response officer. In 1996, I moved from uniformed duties into the Criminal Investigation Department, where I investigated serious and serial crimes, including homicides, sexual assaults and fraud.

In 2002, I transferred to West Midlands Police (WMP), where I was promoted to Sergeant. I undertook a wide range of roles, including Custody, Licensing, Operations Planning and Response. As a Public Order trained supervisor, I was deployed to several large-scale policing operations, such as the London Olympics in 2012, the NATO Summit in 2014 and the Royal Wedding in 2018. In the last five years of my service, I worked at the Midland Region Tactical Training Centre, managing and delivering training in a range of disciplines, including Public Order, Taser, Command, CBRNe and DVI. During this time, I was promoted to Inspector.

I retired from WMP in 2018 and subsequently joined the University of Derby as a lecturer on their BA(Hons) Professional Policing degree course. I taught on the PCDA programme and also co-authored the DHEP programme. I joined Staffordshire University in 2022 and in 2023 I completed a Masters degree in Education. The subject of my research project was neurodiversity amongst student police officers. I bring a wealth of policing experience to my teaching and continue to keep abreast of developments in the field.