Scott Green has been appointed as acting chief constable after the retirement of Craig Guildford following mounting calls for him to step down
Scott Green has been appointed as Acting Chief Constable of West Midlands Police after the immediate retirement of Craig Guildford(Image: WMP)
After the announcement that the top cop of West Midlands Police is to retire with immediate effect, a new face is in charge of the force and crime across the region. The decision for former police chief constable Craig Guildford to retire was announced this afternoon after mounting calls for him to step down from the position.
It followed major criticism of the force’s decision to ban Maccabi Tel Aviv fans from a football match against Aston Villa in November. Police and Crime Commisioner for the West Midlands Simon Foster announced the news days after home secretary and Birmingham MP Shabana Mahmood said she had lost confidence in his leadership.
(Image: WMP)
In his full statement, he said it was in the “best interest” of West Midlands Police after Guildford had faced multiple calls to quit. Following the recent announcement, Mr Foster announced that Scott Green has been appointed as Acting Chief Constable.
Read more West Midlands Police live as chief constable Craig Guildford retires with immediate effect
Jen Mattinson was chosen by Mr Green to be Acting Deputy Chief Constable.
But who is Scott Green?
Mr Green has been in policing since the 1990s and has experience in various roles. He first joined South Yorkshire Police in a uniformed role, before rising through the Criminal Investigation Department in various ranks including working under for the forerunner of the National Counter Terrorism Policing network.
He had climbed to be Chief Superintendent, District Commander for Barnsley before leaving the force and joining Staffordshire Police as Assistant Chief Constable after passing senior policing assessments in 2020. There he had specific responsibility for contact, response, partnerships and neighbourhoods.
In September 2021 he moved to Greater Manchester Police as part of a new chief officer team brought together to help lead GMP out of special measures after inspectors found it had failed to record more than 80,000 crimes.
During his time there, he was responsible for all ten policing districts across Greater Manchester and was part of the chief officer team that led the force out of the measures in what was then faster than any previous police force in just over nine months,
He first joined West Midlands Police as the Deputy Chief Constable in April 2023 and now has even more responsibility as the Acting Chief Constable of West Midlands Police. He will be responsible for the force’s performance.
Mr Green is an experienced Public Order Gold Commander, Multi-Agency Gold Incident Commander (MAGIC), and Specialist Strategic Firearms Commander. He is also the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) lead for Alcohol Harm and Vulnerability.
Outside of policing, he holds a bachelor’s degree in Chemical Process Engineering and Fuel Technology from the University of Sheffield and a master’s degree in Criminal Justice from the University of Leicester – his master’s dissertation studied the impact on police training of the Sir William Macpherson Report into the death of Stephen Lawrence, who was murdered in a racially motivated attack while waiting for a bus on Well Hall Road in Eltham, on the evening of 22 April 1993.
He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA) and has previously been a Non-Executive Director of Sheffield Children’s NHS Foundation Trust, a governor of 3 schools, a Trustee of Bluebell Wood Children’s Hospice, and a Trustee of Sheffield Futures – a charity which supports young people and adults to achieve their full potential in learning, employment and life to achieve a better future.
