Drunk police officer beat up her own mum in a stranger’s car on dual carriageway

A police officer has been fired for beating up her mum in the back of a stranger’s car after getting drunk on Fireball cocktails.

PC Leanne Counter repeatedly punched her mother, Julie, after a passerby found the drunken officer and agreed to give them both a lift home.

The Cleveland police officer was so drunk on Fireball that she knew nothing of the attack until her father came to her home the following day, they heard.

The incident happened after a family Christmas erupted into chaos on Boxing Day 2023 after the Counter family had been to the pub and went back to PC Counter’s sister’s home on Teesside.

PC Counter’s behaviour became so rowdy that her sister threw her out and her mother agreed to make sure she got home safely.

The pair got into a taxi which was bound for PC Counter’s home, but her behaviour towards her mother was so alarming that the cabbie drove away after they pulled into Wolviston service station, County Durham.

Cleveland Police’s Mark Ley-Morgan recalled PC Counter yelled: ‘Some Mam you are, f*** off, you never have anything good to say about me.’

The taxi driver threatened to call the police, at which point Mrs Counter told him: ‘She’s in the police.’

PC Counter screamed: ‘You have ruined my cover’ and later called her mother a ‘c***’.

It was while mother and daughter were abandoned at the service station that they encountered Lewis Failes and his brother-in-law, Mark.

In a statement to the police disciplinary panel, Mr Failes said: ‘I was approached at the service station by a lady in her mid to late fifties. A younger female was shouting at her and the older woman was trying to calm her down.

‘Both had been drinking but the younger woman was a lot more drunk. I recall the older woman telling her she would get into trouble if she did not calm down. She asked me to give her a lift because her daughter had joined the police and she wanted to get her away before she got into trouble.’

Mr Failes agreed and set off along the A19 towards Middlesbrough with his brother-in-law in the passenger seat.

As they drove along he could hear PC Counter being abusive to her mum and felt the car ‘bouncing’.

He added: ‘She had moved across the back seat to get to her mother. Mark got up and climbed into the back seat. I was close to pulling over and putting them out, I had only had the car a couple of days and I did not want it getting damaged.’

Julie Counter was left with a cut under her nostril, a swollen left cheekbone and bruising to her forearm, which she had raised to defend herself.

She told police investigators: ‘I have been crying because it was my daughter who attacked me. I cannot even look at Leanne.’

PC Counter was arrested on suspicion of assault causing actual bodily harm and answered ‘no comment’ to all questions. No criminal charges have arisen from the incident.

The day after the attack, PC Counter texted a police colleague to say: ‘I am not in the good books with my family,’ blaming the Fireball drinks she had consumed for the fact she could not even remember the assault.

While under investigation she was asked whether it was an isolated incident and PC Counter confessed that on a previous occasion, she had put her father’s girlfriend in a headlock during ‘an altercation.’

Mr Ley-Morgan said the attack breached the standards expected of police officers and was discreditable conduct which amounted to gross misconduct and should lead to the immediate dismissal of PC Counter.

He said: ‘Mr Failes, his passenger and the taxi driver were all aware that she was a police officer. A reasonable member of the public would be concerned that an officer was unable to control their drinking and then resorts to violence when drunk.’

Paul Crowley representing PC Counter, who attended the hearing, said: ‘She has been consistent in her account that she does not recall the incident. She was upset and unreservedly apologetic when she was spoken to by her father about it.

‘She is devastated and does not recognise the behaviours that have been alleged against her and has never shied away from the fact that the consumption of alcohol was a factor. It is completely out of character for her, she has an unblemished criminal conduct record.’

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