VICTORIA’S Office of Public Prosecutions has rejected a recommendation to pursue criminal charges against a senior Bendigo police officer and a colleague for allegedly fabricating evidence in two high-profile murder investigations.Detective-Inspector Paul Newman, together with Senior-Sergeant Martin Allison, will instead face disciplinary charges for allegedly falsifying documents to allow them to bug homes and telephones while investigating the deaths of transsexual prostitute Adele Bailey in 1978 and Jennifer Tanner, sister-in-law of former detective Denis Tanner, in 1984.Detective-Senior Sergeant Bill Nash, who headed the four-year probe into how the investigation was handled, alleged in his report that there had been 11 counts of attempting to pervert the course of justice.“The OPP said there was little chance of a conviction, without explaining why,” Mr Nash said.“It’s disappointing . . . but there is not much I can do about it.” It is believed Mr Nash was keen to pursue a criminal prosecution and believed he had the evidence to do so.However, an OPP spokeswoman said a Senior Crown Prosecutor found that “the evidence was insufficient to sustain convictions for any criminal offence.”Barrister and National Crime Authority member Greg Melick will conduct the disciplinary hearing, expected to start next month.Mr Nash confirmed that the allegations of attempting to pervert the course of justice related to improper applications to install bugs in the homes of Denis Tanner and former senior detective Gerry McHugh.Mr McHugh was awarded up to $380,000 in compensation by Victoria Police in 2006 for being wrongly implicated in the murder of Ms Bailey and having his Mildura home bugged.Bugs were placed in his home in 1999 after detectives swore an affidavit that they had information linking him to Ms Bailey’s death.Her body was found down a mine shaft near Bonnie Doon in Victoria’s north-east in 1995.A taskforce was set up to investigate the death of Ms Bailey and Jennifer Tanner, who was found shot dead in her Bonnie Doon home on November 14, 1984.A police investigation at the time found that Mrs Tanner’s death was suicide, even though she had been shot twice in the head and through both hands.A coroner’s open finding on her death in December 1985 was quashed by the Supreme Court 11 years later and a new inquest in 1998 implicated Denis Tanner, then a police detective sergeant.State Coroner Graeme Johnstone said at the time: “He was the person who shot Jennifer Tanner.”Denis Tanner was also a suspect in the murder investigation of Adele Bailey.He has denied any involvement in the murders.The Age