Paul Oliveira’s original complaint against Police Chief Damian Kitchen and Superintendent Liam Johnson was rejected in June.
He alleged that there had been a cover-up of the reason he was removed from an approved list of interpreters used by law enforcement, which he suspected was related to his refusal to provide intelligence about the alleged activities of a senior statutory official.
The matter was referred to the Police Complaints Commission by the Home Affairs Committee in March, and was going to lead to an investigation by another police force.
However, after new information was provided in June, which included an email exchange between the complainant and a chief inspector, who has since retired from the police force, it was concluded that the conduct of the officers concerned amounted to neither misconduct nor gross misconduct and the investigation was abandoned.
Mr Oliveira, who is now retired, worked as a prison officer for 20 years as well as working part-time as an interpreter for 30 years. He said he was still none the wiser about the nature of that new information and the reason for the U-turn.
‘Where does the information come from that made them change their mind? They haven’t spoken to me,’ he said.
‘The whole thing is so small. If anybody had spoken to me to begin with, back in December, this would never have snowballed.
‘They refused to listen to what was, in my opinion, quite a reasonable request, and the whole thing could have been done, having not wasted time and money.’
In his appeal, he claims that the determination was based on the wrong question, focusing only on whether the decision to remove him from the interpreter’s list was justified, rather than whether the true reason for his removal had been covered up, as he had claimed.
‘That is the very substance of the allegation. Declining to consider it is a failure to determine the complaint that was made,’ he said in the appeal.
Mr Oliveira also pointed out that the determination relied on material that had been withheld from him, despite submitting a subject access request to Home Affairs, on the grounds that it ‘would be likely to prejudice the ongoing investigation’. He has still not been able to see the evidence that led to the dismissal of his complaint, specifically emails dating from October 2025.
As a result, he has also lodged a complaint with the Data Protection Authority.
Data protection commissioner Brent Homan said he was unable to comment on the specifics of the complaint or associated investigation.
‘Notwithstanding a significant increase of complaint volumes we continue to respond to and process complaints within service standards.’
Mr Oliveira said the reason he was refusing to give up is because he had nothing to lose now that he is retired.
‘I’m just going to tell the whole truth,’ he said.
‘I’m 70. I’m not after a job. I’m not after compensation. I’m not after a reward. I’m just trying to get you or your children to have a better working environment if they choose to join the States now.’
Speaking after the original complaint was dismissed in June, both Home Affairs president Marc Leadbeater and Mr Kitchen were critical of the police complaints regime, saying it was in urgent need of a review. Mr Kitchen also said that Mr Oliveira’s complaint had been shown to be ‘frivolous’.
They declined to comment on the subsequent appeal.