New Assistant Chief Constable For Dorset

Dorset Police will welcome its new Assistant Chief Constable to the Force next month, following a selection process carried out by Dorset Police Authority.

Mr James Vaughan will take up the role of Assistant Chief Constable (Operations) from Monday 14 May 2012.

James is currently the Temporary Assistant Chief Constable at Wiltshire Police, with a crime, operations and criminal justice portfolio.

James Vaughan said:

 "I am absolutely delighted to be joining Dorset Police, which is an exceptionally well performing police force.

"My appointment comes at an exciting and challenging time for the county, ahead of a summer of celebration; not least Her Majesty's Jubilee visit to the county and the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

"I look forward to meeting and serving people in Dorset, Bournemouth and Poole and beginning work on Monday 14 May."

Chairman of Dorset Police Authority, Michael Taylor, said:

"The Authority is appointing an officer of extremely high calibre with a wealth of operational policing experience.

"Dorset Police is one of the most efficient and best performing forces in the country which also enjoys very high confidence levels nationally. As a new member of the Chief Officer Team, Mr Vaughan will play an important part in our relentless focus on making Dorset even safer."

Chief Constable Martin Baker said:

 "I could not be more pleased that we have been able to secure the services of someone so capable and experienced as James Vaughan to serve our communities.

"We rely on teamwork for our success and James already has significant experience of working alongside Dorset Police within the South West Region, so he will very definitely be able to hit the ground running during what will be an exceptionally busy year for the Force."

James Vaughan joined Wiltshire Police in 1992 and worked in various uniform and detective roles in the northern part of the county.

On promotion he served as a Detective Sergeant and Detective Inspector in Swindon leading up to 2005, when he was selected to join the High Potential Development Scheme.

As a Chief Inspector he was the staff officer to the Chief Constable and later led the centralisation of roads policing within the operations portfolio.

Promoted to Detective Superintendent in 2007, James led the Force's response to major, serious and organised crime and led numerous programmes of change to deliver significant capability development for the Force, whilst leading and managing numerous murder and other major crime investigations.

Upon promotion to Chief Superintendent, James initially led the development of Citizen Focused Policing, partnerships and Safer Neighbourhoods.

He has led various collaboration programmes regionally and developed and implemented force restructures to meet the austerity challenges.

James holds a masters degree in criminology and police management and has published research on his academic interests in child homicide. James is the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) lead for child homicide and infant death and the South West representative on the ACPO Homicide Working Group.

James is married to Sacha and has five children, two of whom are at university. He enjoys natural history, music, sports and keeping fit.

The appointment of James Vaughan follows the retirement of former Assistant Chief Constable (Operations) Mike Glanville.

Mr Glanville completed 30 years of service with Dorset Police before his retirement and served as the Assistant Chief Constable (Operations) from April 2009.