Real Policing

Johnno,

The other evening I sat down to watch ITV’s live coverage of Liverpool’s Champions League match with Toulouse. Before the match started Liverpool paid a moving tribute to Rhys Jones who was so tragically murdered last week.  As a mark of respect the ‘Z Cars’ theme music was played, this in itself brought back many memories.

When I first joined the Police Service there was a certain bonding between just about every officer.  Everyone on each shift had close friends and the comradeship was second to none.  We would pull together in an attempt to achieve the right result.  We had less technology at our disposal but still managed to muddle through.  My word how things change….

Here we are in 2007, with state of the art technology at our disposal, however one has to ask why the modern day police force is so disjointed.  Comradeship appears to be a thing of the past.  Welfare has fallen by the wayside.  The majority of Senior Officers are no longer interested in Police Officers performing an extremely difficult role in policing the country at present.

We have become fragmented since the introduction of Specialist Departments, I refer to MIT’, Support Teams and so on.  Once upon a time Tutor Constable’s were officers who held at least 5 years police service.  Several of today’s tutor’s have 2 years at most.

One has to ask the question, ‘where has all the Experience gone’?

In my opinion the quality of Probationers coming through has deteriorated rapidly.  Some have little or no idea how to complete statements, and perform the most basic of duties.  Officers are placed in posts not by experience but by Competency Related Interviews which as we all know hold no bearing on whether a person can perform that role.  The police station where I am currently stationed is fast becoming over run with PCSOs.  Whilst I do not wish to overly criticise PCSOs we end up yet again with poorly trained officers, with limited powers.

Our role as police officers is changing at such speed that it is difficult to keep up with many of the changes.  We are bombarded with emails and training courses which are internet based.  The Criminal Justice Dept/CPS require far more work in respect of file submission.  Officers are given daily tasks to perform, alongside the pressures of detections and other time consuming issues which appear to be part of a police officer’s measured targets.  Basic things such as the welfare of an officer are no longer given the importance that it once was.  The once caring side to the Police Service died long ago!

We appear to have become more interested in tearing ourselves apart with Professional Standard Departments suggesting that police staff should bubble up another member of staff if involved in inappropriate behaviour.  Gone is the ‘happy ship’ that we once knew and loved.  With crimes of violence beginning to bite, we need to re-focus, adjust our methods of policing, and give the public what they want.  I refer of course to more police officers on the beat, less bureaucracy, and less of the target driven culture that our Government has imposed upon us. The police force cannot be run as a successful business, it never has and never will. The sooner someone tackles these issues, the better.  Modern day policing is at present a complete mess!

An ANON serving officer.

In January this year I became the officer in the case of a racially aggravated common assault.  The incident occurred at approximately 5.30am on new year’s eve and concerned a chinese lady who was racially abused outside her house by four stone-throwing youths.  My involvement led me to attend a strategy meeting on the estate where the incident took place.  The four suspects were among several youths aged between 12-18 years who were orchestrating a campaign of terror and intimidation of local residents.  The youths were “well at it” with a degree of regularity unmatched by seasoned law-breakers twice their age.  Some of the youths were from broken homes while others were not.  Some had suffered personal trauma while others had not.  What was common to all of them was a lack of adult supervision which left them without boundaries, sanctions or consequences for their actions.  Speaking to the parents and guardians of the youths resulted in little more than an indignant denial of the allegations which betrayed a desire for their children to be anywhere else but under their parents’ feet. 

As the term suggests, a strategy meeting is intended to bring together public bodies to develop a multi-agency approach to problem solving.  Strategy meetings involve prominent organisations such as social services, police, local council and community health services.  While such meetings can be productive in developing familiarity with the services other agencies provide, some may question their long-term benefit as long as there are those who avoid taking the responsibility they are content for other agencies to accept.  During the strategy meeting, I listened as the facilitator revealed the offending history of each child.  What soon became evident was the raised threshold regarding the level of crime considered unacceptable before triggering an Acceptable Behaviour Contract (ABC) or an ASBO.  Realistically, such a disproportionate response to an already advanced tendency to crime is unlikely to succeed, particularly in the absence of a solemn commitment from parents.  Multiple breaches of an ABC result in little more than candidacy for an ASBO which itself allows multiple breaches to go unpunished.  Placing children on ABCs or ASBOs presupposes that by virtue of being the subject of one they will automatically fall in line.  In lieu of stricter adult supervision, ABCs/ASBOs place a responsibility on youths to correct the kind of behaviour a lack of supervision has given rise to while breaches (which greater adult supervision could reasonably prevent) are insufficiently punished.  Without a commitment from and consequences for both the youth and their parents or guardian such breaches are, perhaps, inevitable. 

While I fully advocate personal responsibility, I have come to recognise the unrealistic expectations placed on those who have never been taught to accept it.  Conversely, through parental neglect, there are those among our youth who have been given too much responsibility and control over their own lives which does not translate into responsible behaviour within society.  Before joining the police I worked in a home for one or two children in need of intensive support as a result of physical, psychological and sexual abuse.  The staff were responsible for essentially re-parenting the children and providing the boundaries unknown to them before coming into care.  The children had to relinquish responsibility and control of their lives to the staff and (often for the first time) acknowledge their place in society as chilldren.  Some of those we cared for accepted their situation sooner than others.  However, in the early stages they all rejected boundaries and 24 hour supervision.  Until such time as they were able to accept the responsibility of behaving themselves with other children they remained closely supervised by staff.  Many of our charges were too psychologically damaged for the intensive support program to have any lasting effect but I believe the approach was correct.  It is imperative to remove the responsibility for their lives from those who should never have been given it in the first place and equally imperative that it is not returned to them until such time as they are able to accept it.  None of what I have said do I consider to be justification for crime.  Far from it.  I appreciate the value and importance of respect, boundaries and routine.  I am merely drawing comparisons between two examples which support what most of us already consider to be chief among the causes of violence, anti-social behaviour and social degradation in general.                       

Whether or not parental responsibility is reclaimed by those who have abdicated it to their children, the responsibility rests with the police to protect the public from its effects.  However, limited street resources, paperwork and targets ensure that the perpetual cycle of response policing remains unbroken and the thin blue line stretched to breaking point.  Meanwhile, polemics and pundits who are more concerned with statistics suggesting that violent crime has either increased or decreased overlook the grave consequences each occurrence results in and also the potential for further explosion.  The reality is one of the proliferation of guns and knives in the hands of those with a dismissive attitude toward human life and little to deter or punish them.  Therefore, police reform is imperative in order to better protect the public and regain their faith and trust.  Responsibility by the most efficient means possible to reclaim our streets must be swiftly returned to the police.  Responsibility for their children by those who have absolved themselves of it must be retaken.  Responsibility for their lives of those too young to cope with it must be removed forthwith.  To do otherwise will engender the kind of ruin of which we will all be forced to partake.   

I wish to offer my sincere condolences to the family and friends of little Rhys Jones.  If you have any information which can help catch Rhys’ killer, please contact the incident room on (0151) 777 8722 or text the word CRIME followed by your message to 61051 or e-mail your information to murder@merseyside.police.uk.  Alternatively, you can provide information anonymously by contacting Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/30/nrhys430.xml

On Monday, the front page of The Sun newspaper decried a state of anarchy in the UK.  In the days after the appalling deaths of Garry Newlove and Evren Anil, the Daily Mirror commissioned a survey of 1,400 people to establish exactly how many feared becoming a victim of crime.  From those polled the Mirror extrapolated that 42% of the public were too scared to leave their homes.  Further statistics revealed 175 knife point robberies in the UK every day, showing an increase during the last two years from 25,000 to approximately 64,000 per year.  Ensuing media debates sought to clarify to what extent the Mirror’s findings reflect the nation’s fears or whether such headlines are nothing more than scaremongering.  Whether accurately reflected in statistics or not, the fear of crime is real and justifiable to many.  Identifying the causes of crime is entirely necessary, however, that does not obviate the need to address a system of policing inadequate to deal with its effects.

One such debate took place during Victoria Derbyshire’s morning programme on BBC Radio Five Live to which I contributed.  Victoria asked whether the public were justified in their perceived fear of becoming a victim of crime considering that, according to Home Office statistics, crime is falling.  Based on my own limited knowledge, I wish to explain how crime statistics are compiled.  The Home Office takes police statistics (crimes reported to the police) which are then compared with those of the British Crime Survey (BCS).  The BCS measures the amount of crime in England and Wales by asking around 50,000 people aged 16 and over about the crimes they have experienced in the last year.  The BCS is considered to provide a better reflection of the true level of crime than police statistics since it includes crimes that have not been reported to, or recorded by, the police. The BCS estimates that only around half of all crime it measures is captured on police recorded crimes.  This is largely due to people who do not bother to report crimes because they think the crime was too trivial or the police couldn’t do much about it.  Interestingly, it was reported recently that the BCS was underreporting crime by about 3 million incidents per year because it did not allow for a particular person to be victimised more than five times in a year. The error means that violent crime is actually at 4.4 million incidents per year, an 82% increase over the 2.4 million previously thought.  It is understandable why many consider Home Office crime statistics to be unreliable, particularly as their processes do not factor in offences against those under the age of 16 and serious crimes such as rape, murder and fraud.  Similarly, those forces who engage in the multiple criming of a single incident in order to generate multiple detections further skew the sample. 

Regardless of exactly what crime statistics mean and what they are intended to convince the public of is just as much a subject of debate as the processes by which the statistics are compiled.  Statistics aside, the double-edge sword of media coverage of violence and brutality provides the public with their right to know while at the same time proliferating fear.  Yet, public fear is grounded in far more than what is read in newspapers.  It is compounded by a person’s experience of crime, the level of criminality in their community and the capacity of police to deal with it.  Regardless of what the Home Office wants the public to believe, the public are certain to lose confidence in the police if, after several calls from informants, the police fail to tackle ongoing anti-social behaviour or vandalism swiftly and robustly while supported by an equally robust justice system.  Indeed, the public recognise the absence of police on the streets as an opportunity for crime to take place and for their fear of crime to breed.  Statistics do nothing to abate fear legitimised by the lack of a visible police presence to prevent, deter and reassure.  Generally speaking, street police officers understand the needs and expectations of the public in a way that senior officers and politicians do not.  It is simply not good enough to argue based on statistics that the public’s fear of crime is both unreasonable and imperceptable as justification for maintaining the current state of inadequate policing.   

It is right for MPs and senior officials to identify the causes of crime but not without showing due regard to the capacity of the police to deal with the effects.  Whether or not crime is attributable to poverty, poor parenting, alcohol or drugs, and whether or not statistics are reliable and accurate in quantifying crime and the fear of crime, the question of the capacity of the police to respond remains.  Crime may well be going down overall but violent crime, anti-social behaviour and vandalism are increasing.  Indeed, statistics are like a bikini.  It’s not what they show, it’s what they don’t show that matters.  What matters to the public is reliable, consistent and robust street policing unencumbered by bureaucracy, paperwork (which has more to do with Government monitoring than police accountability) and targets.  What also matters is a reliable, consistent and robust judicial system whose sentences reflect an obligation to punish and deter while protecting the public.  If that requires more prisons to be built to accommodate those who won’t toe the line then so be it.  Either we pay with our wallets or we pay with our lives.  It should not be down to the likes of Norman Brennan of the Victims of Crime Trust or myself to provide the opposition to the poor management of our justice system.  Therefore, I am off to Whitehall this afternoon for an appointment with a senior politician whom I intend to tell all about it.     

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/2007/08/20/too-scared-to-leave-our-homes-89520-19660883/

http://www.conservatives.com/tile.do?def=news.story.page&obj_id=138129&speeches=1

At approximately 11.20am on Sunday 5th August, 2007, twenty-three year old Evren Anil of Upper Norwood, south-east London, was sitting in traffic as a passenger in his sister’s car at the junction of Central and Gypsy Hill.  One of two youths walking past tossed a half eaten chocolate bar into their vehicle.  Evren got out to confront the youths as to why they had thrown the bar of chocolate.  Without warning and almost immediately, one of the youths pulled a knife on Evren and held it to his throat.  A gentleman passer-by who attempted to intervene ran to Gypsy Hill police station 100 yards away.  The youth who threw the chocolate bar then punched Evren to the face with such force that he banged his head as he fell to the floor.  Both youths then made off on foot in the direction of the Central Hill estate where they apparently live.  They are also believed to be well known to the residents there.  The last words Evren said to his sister were that his head and chest hurt.  Evren fell into a coma and never regained consciousness before he died on Monday 13th August, 2007. 

Yesterday, Mehmet Aray, Evren’s cousin, appeared on Victoria Derbyshire’s show on BBC Radio Five Live.  Mehmet spoke articulately and sincerely about the circumstances surrounding Evren’s death and the utter devastation suffered by his family.  Mehmet described his cousin as a passive and non-violent young man who didn’t swear and who had recently received a first class degree in computer science.  Evren was the only member of his graduating class to achieve such a distinction.  Mehmet’s interview raised many questions, from the causes of youth crime, parental responsibility and self-arming in order to protect, to the role of the police in preventing crime and harsher punishments for carrying offensive weapons.  He also described the youths involved in the attack on Evren as black, aged between 16-24 years and wearing dark hooded tops.  Mehmet asked listeners who had witnessed the incident to come forward in order to bring the two offenders to justice.  The incident room number he gave is (0208) 721 4205 or, alternatively, Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.   

I spoke with Mehmet yesterday evening to offer my condolences and to reassure him that a campaign is already underway to bring an end to the kind of misery that his family and many others have had to endure.  Mehmet stated he doesn’t blame the police, whom he considers to be woefully undermanned.  He explained that Evren’s death under such pointless and callous circumstances reflect the lact of respect for authority and the loss of our sense of national pride and identity.  Mehmet also explained that he believes the Government, parents and the justice system must take responsibility in bringing about change.  He is quite right.  It should not be the responsibility of the police to parent errant children.  The police are not social workers in the traditional sense.  The role of the police is primarily to prevent crime and disorder (by being more visible) with the support of a robust criminal justice system.  Addressing the causes of crime is the responsibility of the Government, parents and, importantly, the perpetrators themselves. 

At 11.20am tomorrow, commencing in Hancock Road, Upper Norwood, will be a march to remember Evren.  The march is expected to draw in many participants and concludes at the scene of his assault.  Please show your support to Mehmet and his family by attending if you are able to do so.  To those who feel they would rather remain silent than be seen as a grass, wouldn’t remaining silent weigh more heavily on your conscience than being a grass?  Your silence makes the difference between bringing an offender to justice and letting him roam free to potentially end your life or that of someone you love.  Who else but you would know you’re a grass if, at the very least, you were to phone Crimestoppers and give your information anonymously if you are unable to identify yourself?  You may only be seen as a grass if you tell everyone else that you have given information to police.  There is much more to be proud of in assisting to bring an offender to justice than not being seen as a grass.

To the young lad who was with the youth who punched Evren, you were seen to look scared when your friend punched him.  You were seen to run away in fear knowing that he had involved you in a situation you didn’t want to be in and had no control over.  If the belief that what your friend did was wrong means more to you than protecting him, you must tell the police.  If all you did was witness your friend punch Evren before you both ran away, you have nothing to fear by telling the police what you saw.  Evren didn’t deserve what your friend did to him especially as he was not the kind of person who would’ve hurt either of you.  He didn’t deserve to be hurt and he didn’t deserve to die.  You can allow some small relief to the suffering of Evren’s family and those who loved him by telling the police what happened.                   

Lastly, to those of you who feel incensed by Evren’s death, please encourage your family and friends to sign the Real Policing petition in order that the police can reclaim our streets and once again occupy a position of respect and order.  We don’t seem to care about each other the way we used to.  I miss the sense of belonging, the pleasure, the satisfaction and sense of pride this feeling once engendered.  Don’t you?  We can realise it again.  It is surely not gone forever.  Our campaign is more relevant now than ever before.  Whatever it is the circumstances of Evren Anil’s death reflect in our society must not be forgotten in favour of tomorrow’s news.  His death imbues our campaign with an even greater meaning, impetus and legitimacy.  Widespread public support for police reform and the social change it can influence will ensure that Evren Anil did not die in vain.        

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6946608.stm

I had intended to write today’s blog questioning the wisdom of my joining force in recruiting two 16 year-olds as PCSOs.  However, in light of the senseless death of Garry Newlove in Warrington, Cheshire, a blog on any other subject would be wholly inappropriate.  I can add very little else to the cacophony of voices condemning the actions of the youths involved in Mr. Newlove’s death.  Reports in the media suggest that detectives believe the youths were drinking at the time of the assault.  Yesterday, Chief Constable of Cheshire Peter Fahy attributed the attack on Mr. Newlove to a combination of underage drinking and parents abdicating responsibility for their children.  Mr. Fahy’s view that excessive alcohol consumption and parental neglect are the root causes of youth violence is more likely than not to be true.  His comments will be welcomed by many whose lives have been made a living hell by seemingly uncontrollable youth drinking.  Regrettably, Mr. Fahy addressed every other aspect of the problem except the abundant police resources and unrestricted practices required to enforce the legislative changes he is calling for.

Indeed, Mr. Fahy proposed a number of legislative measures intended to confront the issue of underage drinking and anti-social behaviour.  Among his proposals was a ban on street drinking, raising the drinking age to 21, increasing the price of alcohol and new powers for police to order youths home when they are causing a nuisance in public.  If the drinking age were increased to 21, it would perhaps become more difficult for underage drinkers to purchase alcohol.  However, as a deterrent, that would do little to prevent those who ignore the current drinking age from finding a way to acquire alcohol.  Similar measures would penalise the responsible drinkers who are not the problem.  Obvious contributing factors to underage drinking are a lack of parental supervision, easy access to alcohol and an opportunity to drink openly on relatively unpoliced streets.  Attacking these three elements could lead to the same outcome as that intended by Mr. Fahy without penalising sensible young drinkers.  Besides which, his proposals would require the kind of robust enforcement of the law which the current system of bureaucracy, paperwork, targets and response policing does not lend itself to.                          

Assuredly, in lieu of greater control by parents over their children’s lives, more pressure is being placed on limited and easily stretched resources in their efforts to protect the public.  Similarly, soft justice and an overburdened judicial system ensures that each link in the criminal justice chain is as weak as the one before it.  Drunken youths setting upon innocent members of the public will continue with similar tragic consequences until disinterested parents take control of their children’s lives.  In light of his concerns and suggestions, I would like to ask Mr. Fahy whether he intends to address the effects of underage street drinking with the same vigour that he has addressed the cause?  For the good of both the public and his officers, can we expect Mr. Fahy to demand of Gordon Brown and Jacqui Smith the release of rank and file officers back to the streets to protect the public from the murderous, thieving and assaultive types who walk them?  Prevention of another death under such sickening circumstances provides ample justification.  Unless the public are expected to police themselves it is pointless to demand a change in legislation in the absence of the means with which to enforce it.  As Chief Constable he has a duty to demand change in the name of efficiency and public safety for which he simply did not go far enough. 

May I offer my sincere condolences to the family and friends of Garry Newlove.       

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/15/nthug115.xml

My disapproval of Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) stems both from operational experience and the misguided belief in them as a support for police officers.  The most effective support for sworn officers is more sworn officers.  Any copper run ragged as forces struggle to resource an endless succession of crimes in progress would concur.  At scene, a cursory attendance results in time enough to take a crime report and perhaps a statement from the aggrieved before the next incident in progress beckons (if one half of the attending unit hasn’t already been redeployed to another incident).  A return to the station to begin processing paperwork picked up that day is crucial before the self-perpetuating cycle begins again.  Not for nothing is the modern method referred to as fire brigade policing.  Amid such inefficiency and disorganisation is the sight of usually paired PCSOs walking the streets.  As their limited powers and their constitutions allow, PCSOs will decide either to get involved or call up for a uniformed officer to attend.  Exactly who is supporting who becomes more and more apparent as does the extent to which the support has become the substitute.             

Introduced by the Police Reform Act in 2002, PCSOs are intended to provide hi-visibility reassurance patrols, resolve certain low-level crime and gather intelligence.  Their role reflects those aspects of policing formerly tasked to a beat bobby for which many rank and file officers joined.  PCSOs cost approximately £10,000 less per year to employ than a sworn officer and require just three weeks to train.  Currently, there are an estimated 16,000 PCSOs among the 43 police forces in England & Wales.  The Chief Constable of each individual force decides which powers among those designated by the Home Office will be conferred upon their PCSO.  As a result, PCSOs are defined less by what they can do and more by what they can’t.  Their restricted powers and training compounds the burden on the front-line each time a sworn officer is called upon to resolve a situation in which a PCSO has quickly found themselves out of their depth.  Once resolved, the sworn officer returns to the station to process the mountainous paperwork the incident has generated whilst the PCSO remains free to roam.  It is understandable why being crewed with a PCSO is considered every uniformed officer’s worst nightmare.

Essentially, the station bound sworn officer has become the supportive pillar to the street bound PCSO.  A reversal of roles has occurred whereby the police officer becomes the PCSO and the PCSO the police officer.  To reduce the burden on the front-line the obvious solution would be to extend the powers of a PCSO.  Ironically, this would serve to enshrine support officers as a police substitute, undermine the status and powers of sworn officers, reinforce their confinement in police stations and reduce their role to that of administrators.  Indeed, we are already well on our way towards achieving such undesirable low-grade policing as 8 of the 43 forces in England & Wales predict they will recruit more support officers than police by 2008.  Other forces expect to record a reduction in the number of sworn officers.               

Moreover, PCSOs themselves require far more support than they in turn are able to provide.  Consequently, they can be regarded as little more than a quick-fix, a short-term measure or a cosmetic expedient.  The burgeoning number of PCSOs also reflects the general malaise of a Government who remain ignorant of what’s going on on the ground.  The Government’s poor understanding of the problem has given rise to yet another ill-fitting solution.  PCSOs are no more of an effective method of augmenting police numbers, creating reassurance and deterring crime, than downgrading cannabis was effective in freeing time for police officers to deal with harder drugs or changing the licencing laws was effective in reducing binge-drinking and alcohol fuelled anti-social behaviour.  In each case the lack of a sustained police presence to prevent crime before it takes place, or at least to be in the vicinity to deal with it when it happens, provides both the problem and the solution. 

Furthermore, making PCSOs more effective and less of a burden on the front-line entails increasing their powers.  However, expanding the powers of PCSOs will surely sound the death knell for sworn officers supporting those who have effectively become their street bound substitute.  Considering their inherent limitations, it is impossible for PCSOs to be more than the ‘eyes and the ears of the police’ the Government regards them as.  With many response sections countrywide operating below minimum staffing levels, mere ’eyes and ears’ who are more of a hindrance than a help is considerably worse than no help at all.  The seemingly inexorable march of PCSOs towards substitute policing must be halted.  Nothing less than widespread public disapproval is required to prevent sworn police officers from becoming our new PCSOs.      

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=473229&in_page_id=1770

http://police.homeoffice.gov.uk/news-and-publications/publication/community-policing/Consultation_Summary_Standa1.pdf?view=Binary

BBC Panorama’s broadcast on Monday 30th July featuring the recent trend of happy slappings and other violent confrontations between youths reminded me of the moment I realised that my tenure as a police officer was over.  At 7.45pm on Wednesday 14th February, a group of approximately twenty Austrian students between the ages of 15-17 years assembled outside Borders books and music shop to the left of the main entrance to Churchill Square shopping centre in Brighton.  The students were visiting our country as part of a week long intensive language and culture immersion course.  They had assembled in the city centre before heading down to enjoy the delights of Brighton pier.  While the students waited outside the bookshop, town-centre CCTV operators were focusing on a group of approximately eight youths sat on a bench nearby who were known to them as street robbers in the Brighton area.  The operators kept the camera fixed on the youths on the bench.  Their decision to do so would prove crucial to the investigation of what was about to happen.     

Almost without warning, the group of eight youths walked towards the Austrian students.  As they did so, two of them pulled the hood of their jumpers up over their heads in an attempt to conceal their identity from their victims and the CCTV cameras.  One of the youths spoke to an Austrian student and asked him what he thought of Eastbourne.  The student apparently had difficulty understanding the question and replied that he did not know Eastbourne as he was from Austria.  With this, another member of the group of youths shouted “Fight the Austrians” at which point the youths waded in and began punching and kicking the Austrian students.  One of the students in particular was punched to the back of his head.  The youths threw more punches before retreating temporarily down a set of stairs where they reconvened.  Moments later they carried out a further attack.  During the second bout one of the students was thrown to the ground where his head was repeatedly stamped on by two of the youths.  More punches and kicks ensued although some of the students had escaped inside the bookshop to find their teachers.  By this time a significant crowd had amassed, many of whom were believed to be associates of the local youths.  The youths are then seen to retreat and start waving their arms in the air and hug each other in triumph as they rejoice in their mindless brutality which can be neither justified nor excused on the grounds of a violent or disadvantaged upbringing or, for that matter, any other form of abuse.  Upon police arrival the youths are seen to run away as would any offender who doesn’t have the guts to stay and take responsibility for what they’ve done.  However, they didn’t get very far as seven of the eight were apprehended with the outstanding offender being arrested the very next day.

At 8.00am on Thursday 15th February, I came on duty and was asked to help out the main CID department with interviews.  The circumstances were explained to me and I watched the aforementioned CCTV footage.  I recognised one of the main offenders as a young lad who was on bail at the time for an incident of racially aggravated common assault for which I was the investigating officer.  I elected to interview him and gave a statement confirming his identity.  The content of the CCTV footage was so sickening that when I gave disclosure (an outline of the facts known to police at that time) to his solicitor, I remained focused on her in order to gauge her reaction.  She didn’t even flinch.  Needless to say she and I entered into a rather heated exchange during which I asked her, from one human being to another, whether she considered such images to be utterly sickening.  In her turn she told me that this was an inappropriate question to be asking her.  In interview the lad went no comment to all questions asked.  His sister, who was acting as his appropriate adult, winced at the moment in the footage when the Austrian student’s head was stamped on.  After the interview I spoke to another detective who revealed that when he asked his detainee why he did it, the detainee responded that the group were bored and when they’re bored, that’s what they do! 

Shortly after, I was asked if I would support a fellow trainee detective constable in her interview with another of the detainees whose mother was acting as his appropriate adult.  The boy’s mother began to cry and looked away when the violence began.  I berated her son for his disgusting brutality and the humiliation his mother had to endure watching him commit an act of mindless violence whether through boredom or merely because he had been a victim of it in his past.  Any number of people have been the victim of unjustified violence or abuse but do not go around inflicting it on others whether or not they are bored.  That is an excuse, not a reason.  Past wrongful acts explain much but justify nothing.  His lack of remorse during the interview sickened me almost as much as the footage itself.  I remain incensed by what I had seen.  I was thankful that CCTV had captured the incident from beginning to end, yet, regretful that a visible police presence was not in the vicinity to prevent the incident before the first punch was thrown.  However, attending officers acted splendidly by arresting seven of the eight offenders.  The young Austrian lad who’d had his head stamped on escaped with only minor injuries which was remarkable considering the force and the repetition with which his head was stamped on.

During four years in the job, I saw very little after three and a half years that I did not see after six months.  Indeed, I had seen more than enough to justify writing a thousand articles criticising the Government for their mismanagement of our police force but this particular incident disturbed me like no other.  The next I heard of this sorry tale was an article which appeared on the front page of the local newspaper, ‘The Argus,’ which revealed that the CCTV footage of the incident had been posted on Youtube.com by a group calling themselves the ‘Yung Offenderz.’  The footage itself was set to rap music.  I learned shortly after that the core offenders were charged with offences against the person to which they pleaded guilty in court and were given four month prison sentences.  Whilst I am grateful that their convictions resulted in custodial sentences, I do not believe, considering the gravity of the offence and the attitudes of the boys during interview, that their sentences can be regarded as either a punishment or a deterrent.  Unfortunately, I was under the misapprehension that the sentences applied to all eight defendants until I saw the headline in yesterday’s ‘The Argus,’ the link to which can be found below.  I have also included the link to the Youtube footage.  Should you wish to view it, I would offer a note of caution to turn your speakers down as the music the footage is set to is almost as unpleasant to the ears as the gratuitous violence is to other sensibilities.                             

http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/localnews/display.var.1599243.0.thugs_spared_jail_for_gang_attack_on_students.php

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbzUglnKKXo

Johnno,

Disciplined “service” or no, senior officers should be fighting our corner not pandering to the latest political diktat to ensure their pension.  Why are the rank and file never listened to?

Although your campaign is geared towards the paperwork, other aspects which have an impact on how well the police do their job are linked.

When I started at Wembley in January 1990, there were 15 forms involved in the paperwork for an arrest.  Some were sometimes not needed.  I could rattle them out fairly quickly.  Then the Manual of Guidance came into being.  Written by lawyers for lawyers was my impression.  The article “Paper Tigers” in the Daily Mail (19th April) lists 17 officers and 131 pieces of paper involved in a simple assault.  Then the CPS became more involved, eventually deciding on whether to take a case to court, their criteria being 1) Is it in the public interest? and 2) Is there likelihood of a conviction?  I thought (silly me!) that if there was enough evidence to charge, it was for the court to decide.  My experience of the CPS is that the duty brief at court seems to read the case file an hour or so before going into court.  They work primarily from the MG5 (case summary form) and if that is not laid out for them in simple terms and chronological order, they get a pasting from the defence brief, who has been working on the case for weeks, if not months.  The paperwork involved with children and juveniles also seems to put some officers off dealing with them.

Forms also seem to be generated by a fear of litigation and or complaints.  Some suspects will make complaints or allegations against officers in an attempt to divert attention from their case, as they know there is a good chance of the CPS backing off.  We had a lecture at Heathrow from an Inspector who was advising all stations on how much detail to put in their incident report books, as a couple of lawyers had written a book (costing £150.00) on how to sue police.  If they got a result against a particular officer, they would then attempt to contact defendants in cases involving that officer - going back up to 6 years - and say “We can get you some compensation”

Don’t forget the impact of dealing with prisoners property, which was horrendous at Heathrow since most of the people we nicked had several suitcases.  Then there would be the delay waiting for an interpreter, etc.  Making an arrest at midday when on early turn often meant being tied up dealing with the prisoner until gone midnight. Juveniles or mentally ill detainees also mean, especially at night, a lot of time spent trying to contact the appropriate services and then waiting for them to attend.

A big impact came with sector policing, imposed on us in 1991/2 if I remember correctly.  When I started at Wembley we still had the 3 relief system (which fortunately for me was kept at Heathrow). This meant the whole relief paraded at the same time, all the latest intelligence and items from the parade book were read out once, you could see how many officers were on and would be available if you needed assistance.  Then came sector policing.  At the time I was PBO for 7 Beat (Kingbsbury and Neasden - probably larger in total than most London inner divisions), and based in a police office on the Chalkhill Estate (now long gone thank goodness).  From my base I could walk to my beat in 5 minutes.  Wembley was divided into 3 sectors, Wembley, Chalkhill and Kingsbury.  The idea of sector policing was to have small teams of about 6 officers all coming on at different times, and low numbers of officers on duty at night.  Concerns were expressed by officers at a meeting with senior officers prior to going “live” with sector.  We were assured that there would be “safe minimum staffing levels” below which we would not go.

For a start, the teams were never actually at full strength, as team members were taken off for “core” duties - area car, CAD, etc.  We went live on nights.  I was detailed to be operator on the van, but was hauled off for aid in Central London, and the van was single manned on the first night.  In that first week we had two calls for urgent assistance - and no-one to send!  In one of them, at night, the van crew had arrested an Asian youth. His mates attacked the van to effect a rescue.  The Station Officer and the Sergeant CAD controller had to jump into a vehicle and dash out to assist - and they were still outnumbered.  Often units from surrounding divisions would have to be called in.

After the first year one of the skippers at Wembley was tasked to do a review of the new system.  She wrote a 94 page report which said, basically, that we didn’t have enough officers to do the job.  We were then reduced to 2 sectors, and I was ordered to parade at Kingsbury (for “administrative purposes”), which took me so far from my beat it took me 30 minutes walking to get to the boundary of it.  I was then expected to walk all the way back for refs (refreshments), and also for Station Officer duties in the middle of my shift.  It ripped the guts out of my patrols.  This was one reason I transferred to Heathrow.  In my first year as a Home Beat/Permanent Beat Officer, I would patrol all the back alleyways and rat runs.  I got to know the ground intimately as well as the villains, yobs and also got to know the dodgy addresses.  I spent more time on the street than in a response car, and would hear, see and smell things a vehicle crew wouldn’t.  I was approachable and a familiar face.  My old guvnor said to me once, “as far as I am concerned if you’re in someone’s house drinking tea, you’re working.”

Then computers started to multiply.  Used properly they can be a useful support tool, but they are worthless if officers are stuck in front of them reading emails, internal memos, and “distance learning modules!”  Some officers might spend an hour or two or more catching up with their e-mails, crime reports, intelligence reports etc at the beginning of a shift, and especially if they have been off or on leave, before setting foot outside the nick!  Officers should be out on the street for the majority of their shift.

Now we have call centres, introducing more levels between the public and police.  The local CAD operators would have local knowledge of places, buildings and local nicknames for them.  Because of it’s unique environment, Heathrow kept it’s CAD room, but I feel this approach of treating the police like a business is not just “inappropriate” to use a modern buzz word - it is totally wrong.

I took a crime report at Heathrow Station Office.  The alleged offence took place up North.  Because we could only transfer a crime report automatically on the computer within the MET, I had to print off hard copies and then fax it to the relevant crime desk.  Next morning I tried to phone the crime desk to simply confirm that they had received the crime report.  For an hour and half I was sent round in circles, constantly coming back to the call centre I had originally been put on to, who kept asking what crime I wanted to report.  I was tearing my hair out with frustration!  I said, “Look, I’m a PC at Heathrow. I’ve faxed a crime report to the crime desk at (I can’t remember the name of the station now) and all I want to do is confirm they have received it, and I’m getting the run around.  If that’s the service I receive, God help the public!”

Anyway, Johnno, it’s obvious there’s a lot of support for your campaign.  The question is, will this government or the Home Office take any real note of public opinion?

Regards,