Her lawyer, Grant Cameron, confirmed this week he had been advised
Snr Sgt Ealam had decided to leave the police, following a mediation process last week.
Snr Sgt Ealam, along with her immediate superior, Inspector John Canning, and fellow West Coast police senior management team member Senior Sergeant Philip Barker, have been locked in an employment dispute with the Tasman district Superintendent Karyn Malthus since early this year.
Snr Sgt Ealam entered mediation with the police hierarchy late last week, represented by the Police Managers' Guild.
In July, the Greymouth trio launched defamation action in the High Court against Supt Malthus after public comments she made about staffing in the West Coast police area.
Her comments followed a damning internal performance report she had delivered to Insp Canning, Snr Sgt Ealam and Snr Sgt Barker at the end of May.
All three senior officers subsequently went on stress leave, but returned to work together on July 20 in their normal roles ''as a result of communications with the department''.
They withdrew their joint defamation action in September after negotiations with the hierarchy.
Mr Cameron said at the time the background employment matters which led Supt Malthus to make her comment could be resolved in the Employment Court instead.
Mr Cameron also noted ''other matters'' had been at play affecting the employment of the senior management team.
He said this week he was not directly involved in the formal mediation last week as the next possible step could have been action in the Employment Court. Any court action would depend on a pending mediation process involving the rest of the area management team.
''It's progressing through the usual employment relations channels and we're expecting a positive outcome,'' he said.
United Kingdom-born Snr Sgt Ealam, a police officer for more than 28 years, has served on the West Coast since 2005 after moving on promotion from Canterbury.
Her husband, Phil Ealam, is also a Greymouth policeman, and son Thomas is a serving constable.
