Commissioner Ian Dyson

The head of the City of London Police traditionally holds the rank of Commissioner. With the exception of the Metropolitan Police Service, which has its own Commissioner, all other UK police forces have a Chief Constable at their head.

Ian Dyson has spent most of his life in London. He joined the Metropolitan Police in 1983, working in many different areas including crime and drug squads, vice and strategic planning. For 11 years, he was a public order cadre trained senior officer and has extensive experience of commanding the policing of large public events.

In June 2008 he joined Surrey Police as Assistant Chief Constable, overseeing some of the highest confidence levels in the country and improving neighbourhood policing.

Ian joined the City of London Police as Commander in September 2010. He led on organisational change and on economic crime, expanding the force’s national fraud responsibilities. He was also the National Police Lead for Contact Management and led the national roll-out of the 101 non-emergency number.

Two years later he was promoted to Assistant Commissioner. He led cultural change, leadership and development within the force, embedding staff empowerment and innovation. His portfolio covered:

  • performance management
  • business continuity
  • the transformation programme
  • strategic development.

He was promoted to Commissioner on 3 January 2016.

In June 2016 Ian stepped up further from his information assurance portfolio and took National Policing Lead for the Information Management and Operational Requirements Coordination Committee.

He was awarded the Queen’s Police Medal in the 2016 New Year Honours.

Assistant Commissioner Alistair Sutherland

Alistair Sutherland joined the Metropolitan Police Service in 1986 and served his early career in operational roles in Hounslow and Kensington spending time in uniform roles and within crime squads tackling burglary, robbery and drugs supply. As an Inspector he worked at Notting Hill and again at Hounslow leading uniform teams in both Neighbourhood Policing and Emergency response roles.

As a Chief Inspector he served at Lambeth Borough in South London in charge of policing operations to deal with emergency response, neighbourhoods, partnership and crime reduction. At this time in 2003 he began to serve as one of the Met’s senior officer cadre in charge of policing major public order events across London including sporting and ceremonial events, demonstrations and the annual Notting Hill Carnival.

On promotion to Superintendent and subsequently Chief Superintendent he was asked to remain within Lambeth Borough having forged excellent community and partnership links with the diverse communities around Brixton and Kennington and was successful in continually driving down crime and anti social behaviour during a five and a half year tenure.

In 2009 he was asked to set up a new unit that would take responsibility for the command and control of police firearms operations following the publication of recommendations from the Stockwell Inquiry into the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes and subsequent to this posting took charge of SCO19 Specialist Firearms Unit for a three year period. During this time he took on significant command roles at high profile public events including commanding the firearms security and response at the Royal Wedding 2011 and the London 2012 Olympic Games.

He was promoted to Commander in July 2014 and took on the role of Commander for Royalty, Diplomatic and Specialist Protection.

He joined City of London Police in April 2016 as Assistant Commissioner.

Assistant Commissioner Angela McLaren

AC McLaren started her career with Fife Constabulary in 1996 where she served in several operational and community roles up to the rank of Chief Inspector. 

In 2013, she was appointed Project Manager for the Pathways to Policing Project at the Scottish Police College and, on promotion to Superintendent in 2014, was posted to D Division, Tayside where she held various portfolios. 

In 2015, she was promoted to Chief Superintendent and appointed Divisional Commander of Fife Division where she led various operations and events.  She was later selected to lead a team to produce the first long term strategy for policing in Scotland. 

In June 2018, she was promoted to Assistant Chief Constable responsible for Operational Change and Resilience, a portfolio which included the Digitally Enabled Policing Programme and Strategic Design Authority.  

In June 2019, ACC McLaren became the Executive Lead for Organised Crime, Counter Terrorism and Intelligence.  

In December 2020, she joined City of London Police on promotion to the newly created role of Assistant Commissioner responsible for the Economic Crime and Cybercrime.  ​​​​​​​

Temporary Commander David Evans

As a graduate in IT, Dai joined the City of London Police in 1996. He served his probationary period at Snow Hill before moving into CID.

The majority of his career to date has been served in detective roles at all ranks between Constable and Chief Superintendent, including periods in Economic Crime, Special Branch, Major Crime and Covert Policing.

As a Detective Superintendent and a trained Senior Investigating Officer, he has led successful investigations into murder, rape, blackmail and drug importation and distribution. He is also a trained kidnap & extortion SIO and crisis and kidnap negotiator.

In 2014, he led the UK response to the MH17 air crash in Ukraine in his role as a Senior Identification Manager. He continues to undertake this role today, representing HM Coroner to families based in the UK.

As a directorate head for the City of London Police, he has been responsible for a wide portfolio including force intelligence, command and control, operational planning and information security.

In more recent times, he has taken on an increased number of command roles as a Gold Commander, coordinating the City Police response to large scale ceremonial events and public order. He was also the senior officer coordinating the force’s response to the 2017 London Bridge terrorist incident.

Dai took over the commander portfolio on a temporary basis in May 2019 in which he leads the operational activity of the force and, amongst other things, the force’s Secure City programme which aspires to make the Square Mile the safest city in the world.

Temporary Commander Clinton Blackburn

T / Commander Clinton Blackburn was appointed as the Head of the City of London Police’s Economic Crime Directorate in August 2020.

Over the course of his career Clinton has worked in a number key roles and specialisms. He began his career in Bedfordshire Police before joining the City of London Police. He also spent a short period of time working for Surrey Police when he took up promotion, before again re-joining the City of London Police on further promotion. Over the course of his career he has investigated a range of serious and complex investigations. He has also worked in intelligence and been a Firearms Tactical Commander.

As the Head of Economic Crime within the City of London he oversees a diverse range of operational units, each focused on complex and specialist aspects of economic crime. This includes investigations into serious fraud, money laundering, overseas anti-corruption, intellectual property crime, cyber protect team, insurance fraud enforcement and asset recovery. He is also responsible for The Economic Crime Academy which provides training and accreditation to a range of policing, law enforcement and private agencies. 

The City of London is the lead force for Economic Crime and T/Commander Blackburn coordinates that response across UK policing. As part of this portfolio T/Commander Blackburn oversees national services such as Action Fraud, and the National Fraud Intelligence Bureau, which incorporates the Economic Crime Victim Care Unit. His vision is to work with partners, to disrupt the activity of criminals across the UK, and to improve the effectiveness of the policing response at a local, regional and national level.​​​​​​​

Commander Blackburn also oversees a number of key national portfolios and most notably he is Co-Chair of the National LGBT portfolio.

Chief Operating/Chief Financial Officer Cecilie Booth

Cecilie Booth joined the City of London Police in January 2019 as interim Director of Finance, and moved into the post of Chief Operating / Chief Financial Officer in May 2019.

Cecilie is a CIPFA qualified accountant with significant experience in local government finance and in financial consultancy at a senior level.  Key areas include financial management, capital finance, treasury management (debt and investment), revenues and benefits, managing both small and large teams in a complex financial environment. 

As COO/CFO, Cecilie is currently responsible for Finance, HR, Estates and Facilities Management, Commercial and IT.

Service Delivery Director Chris Bell

Chris oversees the delivery of the services within the context of the National Fraud and Cyber-crime Reporting and Analytics Service.  Working closely with the force executive and heads of operations to run the existing service, he will also lead on the design, procurement, implementation and delivery of the next generation national service to victims of Economic Crime.  Day to day responsibility will include the contract and commercial management of the service and all aspects of its supply chain.