Much as I support the ACAB sentiment, the “leave without pay” thing is almost certainly due to bureaucratic requirements. Like, when I was in the military you could drop a video tape of you doing cocaine off a naked toddlers ass on your commanding officers desk… you’d still “have a job” at the end of the day. You’d be in jail, but actually processing you out would require all the paperwork to go through all the proper channels and be rubber stamped by all the right muckity-mucks, and it would often take a while. I can only imagine it’s similar with the police to a degree. Leave without pay is more than likely just saying “we need the conviction on paper before we fully shit-can you.”