A former Leicestershire police officer lied about knocking on the door of a man who reported a car crash in his street, then headed to McDonald's.

Former PC Emma Elliott was the subject of a misconduct hearing on Tuesday (October 13) after Ring doorbell footage showed she did not knock on the door of a man who had phoned police that same evening.

The panel heard how the man – named in the hearing only as Mr Matthews – called police on October 17, 2025, after a vehicle crashed into his neighbour's property before reversing into his own car and driving off.

The neighbour whose garage was damaged was on holiday at the time.

The incident was graded a priority response and officers arrived on scene at 11.14pm.

Despite reviewing the call log five times on the journey to the house and again just before midnight, former PC Emma Elliot failed to knock on Mr Matthews' door.

The doorbell footage showed she walked around the scene and passed Mr Matthews' property multiple times.

The panel was told she then updated the police software STORM with an entry indicating she had unsuccessfully tried to make contact and that she suggested trying the following morning.

A call handler who had spoken to Mr Matthews just an hour previously and knew he was waiting for a police visit questioned the log entry, but Ms Elliott again said there was no answer at the door.

She then missed an opportunity to return to the scene – as she was at McDonald's, former Deputy Chief Constable Julia Debenham, chairing the panel, said.

The hearing heard she failed to "remedy the situation" again when questioned by her sergeant the following day.

In her defence, Amanda Thwaites, from Leicestershire Police Federation, stated that Ms Elliott was aged 18 at the time and had earned independent patrol status just months before in June. She was still on probation at the time of the incident.

Ms Elliott had said she was probably "half asleep" during her 5pm until 3am shift and was concurrently experiencing personal pressures – including multiple bereavements and health concerns.

Ms Thwaites said that Ms Elliott was perhaps not "best placed" to carry out operation duties, and revealed that she had resigned this year after accepting that a police career was "not right for her".

The defence argued that Ms Elliott subsequently showed "genuine remorse" for her actions, accepting that the information she had provided was inaccurate but contesting the fact that it was "deliberately false or misleading".

However, Liz Briggs, representing the force, argued it was "inherently implausible" that Ms Elliott did not know to contact Mr Matthews given her repeated reviews of his call to the control centre.

The panel, led by former deputy chief constable Julia Debenham, concluded that Ms Elliott's actions amounted to gross misconduct.

She was found to be in breach of three policing principles: honesty and integrity, duties and responsibilities, and discreditable conduct.

The panel said she would have been dismissed without notice if she had not already resigned.

Ms Elliott was subsequently placed on the barred list.

Ms Briggs said there has been "national concern" about how the police are "accountable and transparent in their actions" and that this incident had caused "high harm" to public confidence in the constabulary.