A British Transport Police detective who was among the first officers to respond to the 2017 London Bridge terror attack has been dismissed after a misconduct panel found he repeatedly used offensive and discriminatory language targeting Gypsy, Roma and Traveller people in a private WhatsApp group with colleagues.
Detective Constable Mark Luker, a member of the Major Serious and Organised Crime team, sent a series of messages in a group chat called “Selbie Gumshoes” between December 2024 and March 2025 that the panel concluded deliberately linked the Irish Traveller community to criminal behaviour.
In one exchange on New Year’s Eve, discussing a bottle of whiskey won in a raffle that still had a security tag attached, Luker wrote a message referencing “mobile type homes” and used the term “dags” — a reference to a scene in Guy Ritchie’s film Snatch in which a Gypsy character’s accent is mocked. He also referred to a colleague as the “MSOC pikey liaison.” The panel found these messages were deliberate and clearly intended to associate the Traveller community with theft.
In a separate exchange in March 2025, after a group member shared a video of a St Patrick’s Day parade, Luker replied with a joke about “scrap metal, lead roofing and cable.” He later used the word “pikey” again in a further message.
The misconduct panel ruled all three instances amounted to gross misconduct, finding that as an experienced officer Luker would have been aware the language was offensive to a minority community. However, the panel stopped short of concluding he was “inherently racist.”
Luker told the panel he had not intended to cause offence and said humour had been one of his coping mechanisms since his involvement in the London Bridge attack response. The panel acknowledged his account but found the messages were nonetheless deliberate and discriminatory.
He has been dismissed from British Transport Police.
