tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9807316348638136482024-03-14T01:06:41.927-07:00Colin SuttonColin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.comBlogger27125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-9256966218533023262017-07-27T03:46:00.000-07:002017-07-27T03:46:35.829-07:00Stop & Search or Stab & Bury?<i>I was given the opportunity to appear in a live studio debate on Knife Crime during the Channel 4 evening news programme on 27th July 2017. They said it would be 7 or 8 minutes - a really long slot for TV news. I readily accepted, volunteering to waive the usual fee because it is a subject so important that I wanted the chance to explain some important points.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>In the event, I met Sheldon Thomas and in the green room before we had a good chat; I think we were both surprised by how much we agreed upon. The actual televised debate was, though, frustrating for me as there was a lady on the line from Birmingham whose contributions were so long that I got less than a minute to speak. I had done quite a bit of preparation and yet was only able really to make one of the points I had up my sleeve - so I thought I would write this so as at least some people will get the chance to read what I wanted to have said:-</i><br />
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There is no doubt that enforcement is not the only way of tackling this scourge. Education, societal changes, family support all have an important role. But they generally need funding which is not available and in any case are long-term solutions which, even if successful, will not address the acute problem we are facing. So other tactics are needed to stop the carnage while the long-term action takes effect. Re-education alone will never be enough.<br />
<br />
An analogy can be found in drink-driving. We accepted very nearly 50 years ago that it was a problem, it caused death and serious injury and we should try to reduce or eradicate it. Re-education has, to a large degree, worked - it is seen now by most people as wrong, not just legally but socially. However, at no time during the campaign to re-educate has enforcement of the law stopped; indeed, when the re-education campaign is stepped up so too, often, is the rate of enforcement. Every Christmas most police forces mount additional anti-drink driving enforcement campaigns to coincide with the re-education / public information campaigns run seemingly annually by central Government. And it works.<br />
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If it is accepted that reduction of dangerous, illegal and anti-social behaviour needs to be addressed by enforcement as well as education then it leads us, in the case of knife crime, to just one tactic - stop and search. What other way is there - the ill we are trying to prevent is the carrying of knives in public places? Since many knives are easily concealable on the person then detecting their possession on the streets can only be achieved by stop and search - there is no other practical and effective way. This is why one of the few points I was able to make on C4 News is so important:<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>In the context of knife crime the phrase 'Stop and search' means enforcement of the anti-knife laws. So when the Prime Minister and the Mayor of London said they aim to reduce Stop and Search they might as well have said they aim to reduce the enforcement of anti-knife laws - because that is exactly what their pronouncements mean.</b><br />
<br />
Would increased enforcement reduce stabbing? Well, I disagreed with Sheldon Thomas when he said there is no correlation (but never got a chance to say so). All the information I have seen shows that as Stop and Search has decreased since 2010 so stabbings have increased. The intuitive correlation which seems sensible and logical is borne out by the numbers. So the next question to be addressed is why Stop and Search has declined.<br />
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Like so many features of 21st-century life in the UK, difficult issues can be clouded by awkwardness whenever race is - or is perceived to be - a factor. Not only does it stifle debate but it also causes many to adopt deeply entrenched positions which skews objective thinking. My view is that knife crime is an issue for all of society, it is a criminal problem not a racial problem. Sheldon made a very valid point to me while we were chatting - criminal gangs are the ultimate equal opportunity employers, they really don't care who you are so long as they can trust you and you get the job done. Equally therefore we can assume that they are similarly non-discriminatory about who they choose to stab - gang-related violence is just that, not a hate crime, not racially-motivated, just gangsterism plain and simple. Interesting though wasn't it that Channel 4 news chose two black contributors to take part in the debate. Do they, even subconsciously, support the proposition that it is a black problem?<br />
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But, and it is a big but, there is an obvious perception that Stop and Search is a tactic which has been abused to the disadvantage of the black community. I understand this and I am neither so naive nor so blinkered as to refute this out of hand. I don't believe abuse of the power is anything like as widespread as some suggest but equally am sure that it happens. I tried to get some idea of how often by a little research. My starting point was that if unlawful Stop and Search happened there would be no shortage of lawyers willing to take cases to court and thereafter no shortage of journalists happy to tell us all about it. In the event it seems difficult to find reports of more than a handful of cases. It is probably an area which merits greater and proper research - if anyone knows of where I can find some then I'd be grateful for a signpost. <br />
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One must assume that the motivation for politicians to pledge to reduce Stop and Search is to reduce or eliminate the friction between communities and the police caused by the tactic. I understand and recognise the aim. It is a reasonable position to take but like many difficult choices it requires a compromise, one which becomes stark and almost insoluble when you replace the words 'Stop and Search' with 'enforcing anti-knife laws'. Because then the question is do we reduce the friction and aim for better relationships between police and communities and accept that, as a result, some of the young members of those communities will suffer wounding or death, or do we try to reduce the carrying and use of knives and accept that, as a result, some members of the communities will feel resentment towards the police and that they are being unfairly targeted? I go for the latter, my simple reason being that at least they will be alive and have the opportunity to feel resentment. <br />
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<b>Due to the focus of my police career I spent many more hours talking to parents and friends of stabbing victims than I did to people alleging unfair treatment, so perhaps I have the bias of my experiences to contend with. What I know for sure is that every one of those mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers would have given anything for the stabber to have been stopped and searched before he got to their loved one.</b><br />
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Sadly, it is now not just a question of an edict from on high going out to say - "Enforce the knife laws". Stop and search requires not only the political will and leadership to make it happen, it requires officers to do it. The first word I said on C4 news, replying to the question "what does it need?" was "Money". By that I meant public money, to fund the diversion schemes, the family support, the re-education programmes which are needed - but also, to deal with the acute crisis, to fund policing in a way which allows enforcement. Even if police were not discouraged by their leaders from using their powers to stop and search they need to find the time for it. Patrolling officers are now far fewer in number than they were even five years ago; half as many as I knew when I was last a uniform officer in 1992. And yet the demands upon them have soared. Those that remain blue light from call to call almost constantly. They now have to spend much time getting to their patch from distant patrol bases and then travelling to and from distant custody centres if they arrest (both new wastes of their time caused by the need to sell off valuable police stations to deal with decreased budgets). Then there is the time they spend dealing with increased bureaucracy and in dealing with the gaps caused by the reduced operational hours of other agengies dealing with mental health, social work and housing (cuts hitting home again) and they simply do not have the time for much proactivity. It is amazing really that they manage to find the knives they do.<br />
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Reinstating enforcement of anti-knife laws is hardly a knee-jerk. It needs no new legislation, no greater powers, no longer sentences. The law is all in place - the offence of carrying the knife since 1953 and the power to search since 1986. It simply needs the will to use existing legislation and the numbers to do it. What would help would be a significant number of the most vocal in the community to accept that more Stop and Search is preferable to more Stab and Bury. Would it work in the short-term? I think yes. How many people deliberately carry a knife if they are about to board a flight, or to enter a court building? Very very few, because they know they will be searched and they will at best have it confiscated and at worse find themselves arrested. Our aim should be that the likelihood of your knife being discovered on the High Street is also so great that the risk isn't worth it.<br />
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<br />Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-6165140174243390592017-07-26T02:36:00.000-07:002017-07-26T02:36:16.244-07:00My advice<i>There is lots of reflection on policing and police at the moment so I thought it might be time to share the email I wrote to my son a few years ago as he embarked on his police career:</i><br />
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<br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white; font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As you become the fourth in five generations to join the Met,
these are slightly updated versions of the rules I was given by my own father and his
colleagues in 1981, with one or two additions from my experience. </span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I am proud you have made this choice to serve, entirely of your
own volition. Keep safe, watch your back and watch out for your colleagues.
In every sense of the phrase.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I hope you will grow as a man and as a human being to the same
extent that I did in The Job. And have as much fun, so that, whenever you
finish your time, just like me you will be satisfied that you have done some
good and wish you could do it all over again.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You will see and hear the phrase TJF. The Job's F***ed. By
my standards of 1981 it is, but by my Dad's standards of 1956 it was when I
joined. If you could go back over each generation all would say the same.
But you must take as you find - and you will probably just find that, compared to what we knew, TJD
- The Job's Different.</span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Anyway, the rules:</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">RULE 1 - THE GOLDEN, UNBREAKABLE IN ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, RULE. </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You have a warrant card in your pocket. It was hard work getting
it. You only ever give it up when you are ready to, so everything you do
on or off duty has to be incapable of allowing anybody to take it from you.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rule 2 - </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Your warrant card sets you apart. It gives you power but
also imposes duties. You act as necessary in circumstances where most people do nothing.
Be proud of that.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rule 3 - </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You are joining a new family. It is a large one with
members across the country and indeed the world. Like all families, there
are falling outs. Some members will irritate you, upset you and
occasionally let you down. You will have to learn which ones you trust
and which you can't. But also like all families, when the chips are down
they are there for each other. They will be for you and you for them - always
bearing in mind Rule 1.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rule 4 - </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Take each and every training opportunity offered to you. You
never know when having that skill will make the difference between getting to
do something you really need to, or being somewhere you really want to be. </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rule 5 - </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You must be respectful to rank and seniority - despite the best
efforts of some, it is still a disciplined service. But it is entirely
possible to be questioning in a respectful manner. Decent senior officers will
show respect back to a junior who politely but reasonably argues their corner.
Even if they disagree and you lose.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rule 6 - </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Aspiration to roles and ranks is fine, but the whole
organisation works best when everybody at every level does their best. The
pride is in being an officer, whatever the rank or role you hold. You will find
your niche one day, it might take two years it might take twenty. Nobody has
anything but respect for somebody who finds it and stays, excelling in it - no
matter what they wear on their shoulder. It isn't a competition with your
friends (or family!)</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rule 7 - </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">You will see the best and worst of human nature. You will
see sadness and joy. You will go places and see things that most people
will never be aware exist, let alone witness. Keep smiling if you can, if not then talk about it.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rule 8 - </span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Cock ups are understandable, covering them up isn't. Put
another way, to err is human, to hide it is criminal. See Rule 1.</span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rule 9 - </span></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: black; color: white;">You see policing every day, the member of the public you talk to might experience
it once a decade. Make sure they tell their friends how good it was.</span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: black; color: white;"><br /></span></span></b>
<br />
<b><span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Rule 10 - </span></span></span></b><br />
<b><span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The unofficial Met mantra must always be borne
in mind - "If you can't take a joke you shouldn't join the Job".</span></span></span></b>Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-70123692589901414712017-05-09T12:01:00.000-07:002017-05-09T12:01:40.651-07:00Madeleine McCann and Operation Grange At the outset I should say that I don't know what happened to Madeleine McCann. All the evidence available to me – and there is more and deeper information available to the public on this than any case I have looked at – does not convince me of any theory or scenario being proved. Soon, in the coming months when my other projects are less busy, I hope to take a proper analytical look at it all and come up with some conclusions. But as things stand my position is that I don't know.<br />
<br />
Having said all that, there are aspects of the case which trouble me already and the main one is what the Metropolitan Police set out to do in Operation Grange. My brush with that investigation – and I call it that because I was never actually involved with it – has been the subject of a fair bit of comment, embellishment and misunderstanding. So it is right I think that I set out clearly what happened and what did not.<br />
<br />
On Sunday 9th May 2010 the News of the World published a story which suggested that the Met was going to reinvestigate Madeleine’s disappearance and that I would be asked to lead it. This was news to me on both counts. Nobody from the Met had, or indeed ever did, make such a request of me. <br />
<br />
The only official news I heard about the reinvestigation was a week or two later when I heard that the idea of such a reinvestigation had been shelved for the time being in the wake of the change of Government. You will recall the note by former Chief Secretary to the Treasury Liam Byrne, apologising to his successor that there was no money left. The rumour in the Met was that, unless and until the Government were prepared to fund it, we would not undertake such an expensive operation which, as desirable as it might have been, was not really something on which Londoners should see their Council Tax spent.<br />
<br />
However, before this, just a few days after the NotW story I did receive a call from a senior officer in the Met whom I knew quite well. This officer told me I would do better to avoid the McCann investigation if it did happen, because <i>"You wouldn't be happy leading an investigation where you were told what you could look at and what you could not"</i>.<br />
<br />
That is the totality of the advice I received. It was made clear that this was an ‘unofficial’ call and that it was made in my interest – so that I might not end up taking on a task which would ultimately frustrate me. As such I never pressed the caller for more information, nor will I ever be in a position to disclose who the officer was.<br />
<br />
I was familiar enough with the reporting of the McCann case in the media to understand that there was a widespread reluctance to talk of any scenario which did not involve an abduction and in which no blame or complicity was to be attributed to the parents and their friends. This struck me as odd but, in those days, quite frankly I was busy enough with he investigations I was involved in without undertaking any 'off the books' look at what had gone on in Praia de Luz. I had assumed that there was good reason for this; that those who had been involved had satisfied themselves that was the case.<br />
<br />
I retired after 30 years service in early 2011. At the time I retired there had been no decision made to mount the Met operation. As I embarked upon a new career writing and commenting I looked at the case a little, sufficiently enough to provide sensible assistance to the media when they asked me. This was, though, always around police procedures and techniques. Nobody ever asked me what I thought might have happened, only what the police were doing, why and what they might do next.<br />
<br />
Last year Sky asked me to a meeting to discuss what a ten-year anniversary film might achieve. I explained that I would be willing to take part but that my position was one where I was as sceptical of the accepted (abduction) theory as I was of any other. I said I would also like to make the point that Operation Grange was so restricted from the start as to be destined to fail. In support of this I presented the original Grange terms of reference and told them of the advice I had received in the phone call. <br />
<br />
To their credit (and, actually, to my surprise) they accepted that this was a valid point of view to hold and one which should be presented in their film. Within the limitations and constraints of legal matters, the editing process and the need to present a rounded story, I think the Sky film was pretty good. It is certainly the most balanced mainstream report I have seen and one with which I am entirely happy to be associated. I also think it represented my views well.<br />
<br />
I am neither an anti nor a pro – of the McCanns or the media or the police. I felt, feel indeed, that the limitations which seem to have been imposed on Operation Grange were worthy of being publicised and would inform the debate. I am not necessarily advocating that it be started afresh, just that it is understood what it was and what it tried to do. <br />
<br />
I do though think that a point worthy of reinforcing is that a proper, conclusive and reasoned elimination or implication of Kate and Gerry McCann would have been in everyone's interest, most of all theirs. That would have been my first objective had I been leading Operation Grange and so that is the biggest issue I have with how that investigation proceeded. To eliminate or implicate those closest to the child in this type of case is not only the documented best investigative practice but is common sense. Had Grange done this then everything would be a lot clearer. I have no idea why this was not done but I am satisfied on what has been said by the Met and what is available that it was not.<br />
<br />
I want to continue to raise and discuss issues around Madeleine’s disappearance when it is appropriate to do so. I am mindful that, to maintain credibility and access to meaningful platforms that I will need to do so in a considered, reasoned and evidenced way. If I don't offer support to theories and assumptions it doesn't mean I don't understand or believe them, just that I don't think it is appropriate to adopt them or comment upon them at the moment.<br />
<br />
Finally a paragraph on me. I am nowhere near naïve enough to have thought that I could become involved in this debate without suffering some abuse and denigration. While it is water from a duck’s back I won't expose myself to it unnecessarily. Hence I won't take part in discussions on the various forums and I am likely to block those on Twitter who can’t be reasonable and polite. Like us all I am far from perfect but I did give many years of service to the community – as do thousands of others – and during that time I was lucky enough to achieve some results of which I will always be proud. My expertise and reputation is well-regarded by the media and I have no need to raise my profile; I turn away as much media work as I accept. I am not writing a book on Madeleine McCann and I have no motivation other than that which has been with me for many, many years – to get to the truth. So I will continue to tweet about the case ( <a href="http://www.twitter.com/colinsutton" rel="nofollow">@colinsutton</a> ) and when people raise good questions I will try to respond quickly.<br />
<br />
<a href="mailto:colin@cs-i.co.uk" rel="nofollow">colin@cs-i.co.uk</a><br />
<br />Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com29tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-45558004535908339362015-11-01T11:26:00.001-08:002015-11-01T11:29:49.229-08:00A right old Poppy Show?<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
I have hinted a few times on Twitter
and Facebook that I think Chief Police Officers are crying wolf a little bit
about the cuts they face. Not that the
cuts aren’t real, or savage, or deep.
Just that, in order to emphasise their political point and to try to
gain public support for their opposition to them, they are selecting examples
that they think will have the greatest impact.
I suppose that is human nature.
They cite forensic examinations only at odd-numbered houses; not
visiting every residential burglary; not investigating serious assaults; email
us your own scenes of crime photos – all these have been chosen for maximum
public impact and to shock. Because the withdrawal
of officers seconded to diversity outreach projects, or writing ‘Equality
Impact Assessments’ (which, by the way, you really should search for on your local
force’s website), or ceasing to cover for local authority agencies which refuse
to maintain a 24-hour service just do not excite the vast majority of the
population in the same way, do they?
Even if, truth be told, they should be the first place the axe falls.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
They have though, now, gone too
far. By refusing to enforce road
closures and thereby depriving towns of their traditional Remembrance Day parades
the leaders in places like Essex and South Yorkshire (although I am sure there
are others) have struck gold. I can just
imagine the gleeful grins at the Chief Officer group meetings when somebody
came up with the idea. Because not only
does it strike at the heart of the community, not only does it give a hugely
visible demonstration to everybody of the wickedness of the cuts but it also
fits in neatly with the mistaken, but oh-so politically-correct view that Poppy
Day, parades and honouring our war dead is just a little bit right-wing,
nationalistic and of course, racist. So it
is a win-win: Demonstrate the effects of the cuts and wave the flag for how
on-message and inclusive we are too, all in one two-line decision. And all the
opposition will be turned on the cuts, not on the Police decision. I mean, we aren’t going to see the Epping
Royal British Legion instructing counsel for a judicial review, are we? As much as I would love to. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Obviously nobody had the wit to
realise or suggest that the dishonour is equally applicable to the many black,
Asian, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh and Jewish men and women who have given their lives
for this country.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
I have advised reading this piece
– <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/7908488/Free-the-police-and-save-billions.html">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/7908488/Free-the-police-and-save-billions.html</a>
– before. It shows that our policing is
ridiculously expensive, that it is the bureaucracy and the non-core activities
which have added in the cost. Strip
these away, concentrate on policing and the available funds, even after cuts,
will be able to provide much more. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
As a minor example, consider the ‘Equality
Impact Assessments’ I referred to above.
My local force, Suffolk Constabulary, has 80 or so of these available on
its website. Covering many different
policies and practices. Each is a
multi-page document, written by somebody, monitored by somebody and updated by
somebody. Who knows, maybe they are even
sometimes consulted by somebody and found useful, but this might be
fanciful. They contain a few gems – my favourite
so far is here:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="https://www.suffolk.police.uk/aboutus/yourrighttoinformation/freedomofinformation/publicationscheme/idoc.ashx?docid=942c704e-a420-410e-848d-1c6f02360a2f&version=-1">Suffolk Constabulary EIA</a> </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
It is an assessment of the impact of their traveller encroachment
enforcement policy (which, as far as we residents see, in practice is to do nothing) on transsexual
travellers resident on an illegal site. Forgive
me if I have an advantage here, but I have spent quite a few hours of my life
on traveller sites, for one reason or another, back in the days when the policy
wasn’t to do nothing. And not only have
I never seen a transsexual, the attitudes displayed towards anybody not
conforming to their distinct lifestyle and principles was less than tolerant,
so much so that I suspect Suffolk Constabulary’s policy might be the least of
worries for that individual. Where does
all this utter garbage come from? Well,
there is a requirement in law for each Chief Officer (i.e. Chief Constable) to
certify that all new policies have been assessed for their potential impact on
equality. Which of course is fine,
except that it has spawned a whole new assessment industry, costing not just
paper and ink but people and time. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Now,
staying with Suffolk Constabulary, there is a certain sharing of Chief Officer
functions with its neighbours in Norfolk, but the salary costs for the joint top
team will be at least £500,000 per year.
I do not begrudge them one penny
of their salaries, but I expect that for our money we might expect a bit of
leadership and responsibility, in all areas.
And one of those ought to be equality impact. Why do they need a team, an assessment, a
document written by others? Surely they
have the intelligence and experience to look at their new policy and decide
that it complies, or needs to be changed to comply. Why can they not just be a leader and do
this, cutting out all the bureaucracy and cost of these documents full of
drivel? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Did anyone just shout out “Responsibility”? Of course, how silly of me. If the assessment is done by others and it is
wrong, there is the corporate responsibility / organisational contrition /
institutionalised incompetence defence still available. If somebody puts his or her name to it then
there is always the chance they might have to take responsibility
themselves. And 21<sup>st</sup> century
Police leaders really don’t know how that works. Perhaps they could outsource it? The assessments I mean – they outsourced personal
responsibility years ago. That might
save some money and we could get back to having Remembrance Day parades. </div>
Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-76034808091258931272015-08-06T01:36:00.000-07:002015-08-06T01:48:29.476-07:00Just say "No".<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjF9uINZkeuWQWcizJ9rdS43Y422mIjm0sGyuDefk6ucQ68gPGuFri55mElgfJqcFUol06terySEAsJh98GIw2nLcmLJfNnoSJFOvd8i8pcUFfMtSgz8jaqpu9YuFWH-1mKkRcr2_FOnAE/s1600/11369383_124313162588.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjF9uINZkeuWQWcizJ9rdS43Y422mIjm0sGyuDefk6ucQ68gPGuFri55mElgfJqcFUol06terySEAsJh98GIw2nLcmLJfNnoSJFOvd8i8pcUFfMtSgz8jaqpu9YuFWH-1mKkRcr2_FOnAE/s200/11369383_124313162588.jpg" width="188" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Oh, the irony. As we are told that Leicestershire Police are
rationing resources by investigating your burglary vigorously only if your door
number happens to be odd, as Sara Thornton doubts whether police could or
should visit burglary victims anyway, what happens? Five forces embark upon another series of resource-intensive
investigations which cannot possibly result in the suspect being prosecuted. Because he is long dead.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
The one senior police officer to
get it anything like right this week was Sir Peter Fahy when he tweeted: </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify;">
<i style="background-color: #cfe2f3;">“</i><i><span style="background-color: #cfe2f3;"><span style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; color: #292f33; font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Just
because we are there 24 hours a day does not mean that we are always the best
suited to deal with vulnerable people after 5pm</span>”</span><o:p></o:p></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify;">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
At least I think he did. If I have interpreted the tweet correctly it
fits exactly with a principle growing ever-stronger in my thinking: That Police
must concentrate what they have on policing, that they must pull in the
tentacles which have been stretching ever-further for the last 30 years and
stop filling in for deficiencies in other public services. As unpalatable as that appears for an
organisation which, as a whole and through its individuals, actually does care.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
How does this fit with the Edward
Heath story? I will explain. Ignore the strong possibility that the
politically-motivated, the insane and the spiteful might make false
allegations. Let us assume there is
something in the claims. In the
situation where 70000 officers have apparently been lost, where residential
burglary is being placed on the back burner, where officers of all ranks are
squealing every day about their inability to police the community properly,
what is the point in spending time and money looking into allegations of crimes
many years ago where the alleged perpetrator is dead and therefore no
prosecution can follow? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
“The victims”, I hear the
resounding cry. Yes, of course. If there are victims they need caring for. Indeed
– and I promise this is without cynicism – they might also need
compensating. Is the best way to meet these needs really as
by-products of a criminal investigation which cannot possibly achieve the
outcome for which that process actually exists?
That is of course, identification of the offender and adjudication on
his guilt of innocence, followed by sanction if it is found proved.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Victimisation comes in different
forms. We tend to think immediately of
the criminal justice system as the first call to help victims simply because
crime produces more of them than negligence, faulty products breach of contract
and the like, or indeed than accidents and natural disasters. But there is no doubt that non-criminal acts do
leave us with victims – who also need support and compensation. And for which there are mechanisms in place –
counselling, social services, charities and of course litigation. That is where the support and redress for any
victims of Edward Heath should lie. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Consider a person going to see a
solicitor, saying I was abused by Edward Heath in the 1970s and I want to sue
him. How might the solicitor
respond? I suspect that professional ethics
would mean a referral for counselling and support, and a judgement would be
made about the possibility of a successful claim against his estate balancing
the likelihood of acquiring sufficient evidence to prove the case and other considerations
such as time limitations. If the lawyer
thought the claim must fail then that would be the answer. I much prefer this as the sensible way for any
Heath victims to seek assistance.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Why then use police resources to
facilitate help for victims of historical crimes where the suspect is
dead? Because the perception is there is
nobody else? Because only Police can
investigate? Of course not, once more it is police leaders making decisions
because they lack the courage to say no.
Because they fear the consequences (to themselves, their reputation and
career) of a clamour of criticism if they point out the truth - That any
investigation must go nowhere, that the sensible thing to do is to direct the victims to those who can help them and to concentrate what is left of their investigative capacity on
current child-abusers who not only might one day end up gripping the rail at
the Crown Court but more importantly present a current and future danger to our
children. Which is the vital thing for us to get right.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
Please do not think in any of
this that I am showing any contempt or lack of compassion. We know people were abused in the past, both
by the famous and by the unknown. We must acknowledge that, offer assistance to those who have suffered and
learn so we can prevent abuse going forward.
There is a judicial inquiry in to child sex abuse already established. Perhaps the sensible thing to do is to widen
its remit so that the Heath allegations are looked at there? As that inquiry progresses it is likely that
it will uncover evidence of offences committed by persons who are still alive;
of course it is right that those offences are referred to the police for
investigation and action. That would be very worthwhile, there would be an
obvious reason to do that. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
But let us not detract from the
ordinary, necessary, policing of our communities by diverting resources to
pointless investigations which can be adequately and thoroughly dealt with
elsewhere. On this, as with many other
extraneous demands, Police need to learn to say “No”.</div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-18149695500407816572015-07-15T02:13:00.000-07:002015-07-15T02:29:27.771-07:00<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Like using a Model T Ford on the M25</span></b></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">- </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">A romantic curiosity, historically significant but totally unsuited to modern life.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaNBRRlibC6hoagQUlR6N649wbRTRup4WaVQkleB8xPKQEgSdL-_7MPoB9USDOqZgQTKoXEkyFZGjk0b3bwFbQPpbme6A3hEmSNAg36eRntWqvhW6Ub8QSEhLMK2WIYzFi6iBRKp3zEPo/s1600/police1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaNBRRlibC6hoagQUlR6N649wbRTRup4WaVQkleB8xPKQEgSdL-_7MPoB9USDOqZgQTKoXEkyFZGjk0b3bwFbQPpbme6A3hEmSNAg36eRntWqvhW6Ub8QSEhLMK2WIYzFi6iBRKp3zEPo/s320/police1.jpg" width="214" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">Nick Alston used the announcement
of his stepping down from the role of Essex Police and Crime Commissioner at
the next election as an opportunity to state a view about how we do
policing. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">While it was picked up by local
media, I believe it is one which is deserving of much wider coverage and
debate.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;"> </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">Quite simply, he thinks that
foot patrols, the beloved ‘Bobby on the Beat’, is an outdated and ineffective way
to try to police 21</span><sup style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">st</sup><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;"> century Britain; that the resources supporting it would be better used elsewhere. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;"> </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">And I think he is correct.</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The public clamour for visible
foot patrols has frequently been described as “harking back to a golden age of
policing which never existed”. The
principle is often associated with references to ‘Dixon of Dock Green’ – a TV
series which ran from 1955 to 1976 and which itself was a spin-off from a
feature film, ‘The Blue Lamp' from 1950.
In which the principal Bobby on the Beat was shot and killed. Despite this, Sir Ian Blair is credited with
trying to perpetuate the concept in 2002, while Deputy Commissioner of the Met,
by inventing Police Community Support Officers as a cheaper way of providing
visible, reassuring foot policing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Why do we, almost uniquely in
public service, try to cling on to the methods of the 1950s in policing? Times change, the way in which we live has changed and technology has made life in 2015 in many ways unrecognisable from sixty
years earlier. Hospitals, paramedics,
firefighters, schools, social services – the list of agencies which have moved
with the times is virtually endless. But
we cling stubbornly to a romantic notion of a man or woman wandering
around a small area, smiling and chatting, admonishing now and then and making
the people who see them feel safe, apparently.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">If you have the opportunity to
speak to those who actually did street policing in the 50s and 60s – as I,
fortunately, do quite often – you will learn that it really wasn’t all smiles
and stroking small animals. Policing was
confrontational, in many ways much more so than today.
Foot patrols were the default because there was no real alternative. Far fewer officers could actually drive
vehicles for one thing; more importantly communication with them was difficult –
there were no radios, no mobile phones or pagers. Messages got to officers in one of two ways –either
the Police Box or Post, where a flashing light would alert the passing officer
to a message, or another officer being sent to find the patroller to pass it on
by word of mouth. In order to make this
work officers were assigned to relatively small beats and required to make regular
‘rings’ – calls in to the station from a box or post to see if there was
anything new to learn and also to confirm they were where they should be. The regimented discipline which required them
to remain on their beat was part of the best system of command and control which
technology then allowed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">By the early 1970s things had
changed, radios and the greater availability of vehicles had led to the adoption
of the ‘Unit Beat Scheme’, almost always referred to as Panda Cars. In the same way as modern leaders have embraced
advances in technology and integrated them into policing, those in command in
the mid 60s saw the opportunity to modernise and mechanise and provide a better
service. But the mid-60s also saw the
rise of challenge to police authority, fuelled in no small way by disgraceful corruption
cases, free-thinking media and energised lawyers supporting victims. Though the two developments were separate and
parallel, many viewed them as cause and effect.
Bobbies in cars didn’t speak to the public, hence they were becoming
aloof, unapproachable and remote.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In 1972-3 an experiment was
conducted in Kansas City to see what effect patrolling officers had on reported
crime, by varying the levels of patrol across discrete but similar beats from
none to saturation level. The short
answer is there was no discernible difference, in reported crime, fear of crime
or public satisfaction. The details of
the experiment are freely available, for example <a href="https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCsQFjABahUKEwino4OGzdzGAhXGadsKHdZdCJ4&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.policefoundation.org%2Fcontent%2Fkansas-city-preventive-patrol-experiment&ei=LAqmVafdK8bT7QbWu6HwCQ&usg=AFQjC">HERE</a>
. I read this paper at Bramshill in 1984
and was fascinated, as it seemed to point against many of the commonly-held
beliefs in policing that we were still trying to serve. I then came across some
other research (which I now cannot find but would very much like to) which said
that on average an officer on foot patrol would pass within a quarter of a mile
of a burglary or robbery in progress once every (I think) 12 years. It might have been 2 years, or 22 years, I
cannot remember but it is largely irrelevant, since it went on to point out
that, even if the officer were aware of the crime, he/she would not necessarily
thereafter be able to prevent it or apprehend the perpetrator. So much for the reassurance of foot patrols.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I took this thinking with me
throughout my police journey, from London to Yorkshire then Surrey and back to London. Ploughing the major crime / covert policing
furrow that I did I never had the chance to implement my ideas, but I still
spoke about them. And got sideways glances
and rolled eyes when I did. It was a
heresy, just as some commentators are now describing Nick Alston’s views.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What are the justifications for foot patrols? Two
main ones I think, first community intelligence – the public police officers speak to are
their eyes and ears is the common phrase. Are they, really? I am sure there will
be anecdotal evidence of snippets passed on which have resulted in successful operations
and improvements to community life.
Equally there will be many other officers who, like me, never had a
sniff of useful information from anybody who approached me on foot patrol. But in any case, now everyone has a phone, most a mobile
phone. There is Twitter, Facebook, email, Whatsapp (for the moment), Snapchat,
Instagram and hundreds of other apps I have never heard of. Do we really think that anybody will not pass
information on unless they can do it face to face? When it can be done in those ways remotely,
no meeting, where nobody can see and indeed with relative
ease, anonymously? </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>The key to attracting information
is not a physical meeting, it is for the person with it feeling sure that it is
worthwhile to pass it on – often, that something will be done about it. And that concept leads on to my ideas on the
second justification:</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Reassurance is the other aim of
foot patrols, we are told. By which is
meant making people feel safe when they see a Bobby on the bet. Which is fine, for the individual actually
seeing that Bobby at that time (and assuming they haven’t read the Kansas City
experiment). There are though a few
holes in this argument. First, the vast
majority of this country is simply unsuited to foot patrol. Outside of the cities and large towns each ‘beat’
is just too big to be patrolled on foot.
Rural areas have never really had foot patrol, sometimes bicycles but
mostly motor-cycles or cars. Even the
Ladybird book from the 1960s gives a simple and graphic snapshot of how
policing was then. (Although if you do Google it, make sure you get the real one, not the very funny spoof). </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In the cities, the concentration
of residents, residences and places of work means that the actual visibility of
a patrolling officer in terms of the percentage of the population is similarly
low. Think of it like penetration of the market. Let’s say London’s residential and working
population is sitting at 10 million people at some point during the night,
there are some 58000 individual streets and we know there are less than 800
officers on duty. Even in the impossible
event that all these were on foot patrol (actually at least 700 of them will
not be) each one would have to cover 70-odd streets to give everybody a chance
of seeing them. If everybody else is awake, on the street or looking out of the
window and remaining stationary. This is the absurdity of foot patrol as
reassurance – your chance of being reassured is many, many thousands to one.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The question I would like considered by police leaders and especially
by the public is this: What is more
reassuring, seeing a police officer walking past you once or twice a year or
knowing that, when you need them, a phone call will bring two highly-trained
efficient officers to you within minutes?
<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A good analogy is with breakdown cover.
Would you sign up with the firm which says they have three vans driving
around your town and if they see you broken down they will stop and fix your
car, or with the company which promises to attend your breakdown within 30
minutes if you phone them?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My plan for action? Put the
scarce resources currently used for local or neighbourhood foot patrols into making sure there is an excellent response to calls from
the public. Calling for police for good
reason to be told there is nobody available is not going to work. What about that PC handing out cards to kids
in the street, or the one sipping coffee at the day centre? How are they reassuring me when somebody is
breaking into my car or spraying graffiti on the bus shelter?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Then, make the response meaningful
– we need quickly to rid the community of the mindset they have been
railroaded into that it isn’t worth telling the police because nothing will be
done about it. It is really difficult to
get police to respond to some calls still – even if you know what you are talking about and point out the actual offences which are being committed as you speak. Yes,
that was my recent experience in
Suffolk, I shudder to think how those without my background view such antics. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The community can be your eyes and ears, but what is the point if the
brain and body will not respond to the messages? This can only be achieved by prompt, efficient
and decisive response becoming the norm.
The public will then trust that calling the police is not the futile
exercise it so often is at the moment.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Lastly, police leaders –
including PCCs – must have the courage to tell the community how it is. Yes, of course listen to their concerns and
priorities but you have been seduced for 50 years into trying to deliver the
results the public wants by the methods they (misguidedly) think they
need. We would never accept the
community dictating methods to firefighters or the NHS, why do we allow it in
policing? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>Police must listen to the public but the public must also listen to the
Police. Its leaders must be permitted to
use their professional knowledge and judgement to deliver results in the most
efficient way – which, in the 21<sup>st</sup> century, cannot include a
romantic notion of adhering to a past perceived as glorious</b>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 8.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="color: #999999;">© Colin Sutton 2015 All rights
reserved</span><o:p></o:p></span></h1>
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Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-81018909089854790662015-05-14T03:07:00.000-07:002015-05-14T03:15:01.570-07:00Thoughts on the PCC's meetingI feel enlightened. I am not sure that is the aim of the Suffolk PCC's series of public meetings, but that was the effect. Having been forced by my last 9 years of police service and the subsequent 4 years of media work into the very interesting, often exciting but ultimately rather narrow bubble of murder and major crime, my thinking needed a jolt back into more general topics. And the meeting last night has provided it.<br />
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So much has passed through my head since I left the community centre last night, much of it with me standing in a new position - that of a resident, a citizen, a person looking at the police and policing from the outside. It has taken a while, but I am there.<br />
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Which meant that, as the Chief Constable talked about serious and organised crime, the need for a Cybercrime unit, tapping in to regional resources I was thinking "Fine, but this is about the people who live in Mid-Suffolk." How much of that actually touches them, has a malign effect on their everyday life? Sure, many of us have had our cards skimmed, but the banks, willing to accept the risk rather than implement cumbersome and expensive security procedures, pay us back. We don't actually lose out. Yes it irritates that crooks are making money from it, but is it a priority for us? Is it what we really want our scarce police resources being targetted on? Investment fraud practised on the elderly by cold-callers. Now there is a real issue that actually causes losses, but try to get the police involved in that. Good luck, I have - from the advantageous position of working as a consultant inside two different Trading Standards Units. It was a nearly impossible task, even though the losses were measured in millions.<br />
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The businessmen in the audience were nodded to, "You know what happens when your supply lines get disrupted". To which one reasonable answer would have been, "Yes, we have to find another supplier and the price goes up". That is, I think, just the economics of the market and applies just as much to drug supply as it does widgets and thingmybobs. Of course the drugs problem as perceived in communities cannot be addressed by mass arrests and prosecutions of users, as one man suggested. The police, CPS, courts and prisons would be swamped, they just couldn't cope with the numbers. But it fails at the first hurdle in any case - as soon as officers make an arrest the tedious custody, processing and administrative tasks take them out of the game for hours. <br />
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Of course investigation and prosecution of dealers up the chain has to go on, often by specialist units and regional or national agencies. But let us not pretend that it has any measurable effect on the ills experienced by communities due to drug use. So let us rely upon it neither to do so, nor to justify taking resources away from local policing. Indeed, the only drugs operations I have been involved in which made a real difference in quality of life for communities were those aimed at disrupting overt sales and use on the streets - Operation Welwyn in King's Cross where I was the Detective Inspector, and its child Operation Rockwood which I ran as Head of Intelligence in West Yorkshire some years later. Street undercover operations in order to disrupt supply and take it away from ordinary people to make their streets safer. But I would never pretend it was anything approaching a complete solution to the drugs problem, just a way of making life more pleasant. And while it would have relevance in a few areas of a handful of Suffolk towns it has little I think to offer the rural rump of the county.<br />
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Speeding. The bane of rural life some would say, and despite my credentials as a fully-fledged petrol-head, motorsport competitor I would agree. Perhaps because, in small part, of that. But as the Chief said, it isn't just exceeding the limit which causes danger. Many of our roads have 60mph limits yet 45 can be dangerous given their nature and the type of traffic using them. I am surprised that much more use is not made of s.59 notices - the power under the Police Reform Act 2002 to warn drivers using vehicles in an anti-social way. First notice is a warning, the second in 12 months means the vehicle can be confiscated. Perfect to deal with drivers who are inconsiderate, careless or driving on footpaths or bridleways. No equipment needed, just an officer with a pen and paper, minimal bureaucracy. Assuming of course there is an officer available.<br />
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Which leads neatly on to numbers, resources, funding. It is not going to be easy, we accept that. Whatever your view on cuts, they are here for the immediate future. We either shrug our shoulders and accept a worse service or get clever, get smart and get innovative. Can a better service be achieved with less? I think so, as does this former UK officer now working in Canada: <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/7908488/Free-the-police-and-save-billions.html" style="line-height: 100%;">http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/7908488/Free-the-police-and-save-billions.html</a><br />
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The key to that seems to be the reduction in bureaucracy and time taken for officers to deal with the administrative tasks which now beset everything they do. Which is a problem for us, in that much of it is imposed at a national level, by Parliament or the Courts. But a good and achievable start would be to restore the authority to charge for all but the most serious of offences to police, obviating to need for ponderous file preparation and liaison with the CPS before charges are laid. Watch some of the TV films showing procedures in custody offices now, and see if you think to precautions taken, the questions asked of prisoners, the things done to accommodate them are sensible or unwieldy. I wonder sometimes if the Custody Officer's badge ought to say "Police"; "Holiday Inn Express" might be more accurate.<br />
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I am sure the public desire is for police to enforce. Not to advise, not to mediate and certainly not to ignore. Yes, the process and our convoluted, cumbersome, over-sophisticated criminal justice system does not lend itself to a presumption of arrest and prosecution in every case but, to coin a phrase, other enforcement methods are available. I have referred to the s.59 enforcement notice for vehicles already, similar provisions are in place for anti-social behaviour in terms of fixed-penalty notices and ultimately ASBOs. Confiscations of uninsured vehicles, prohibition notices that sort of thing. Indeed, just turning up and showing that the police care - that the community cares - with a firm word will have an effect. Zero Tolerance doesn't have to mean arrest, it ought to mean that we don't ignore things.<br />
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The two pillars of local policing for local people are community and response. Yes it is reassuring to see patrolling officers (despite all research pointing to their having virtually no impact on crime levels) and the link they provide - eyes and ears - is too useful and integral to policing to be lost. Yet there is also, isn't there, a great reassurance in safely knowing that, when the chips are down, when something is happening and you really need police help, quickly, one phone call will deliver two professional, trained and competent officers at your door within minutes. Personally I think this is the most important reassurance, others disagree. Whichever way you think, can we agree that they are both desirable? A feature of the tale from Canada in the link above is the high proportion of the workforce which is available for street duties. I have no idea what the similar proportions are in Suffolk, but I am certain it will be nowhere near. Despite the massive civilianisation programme the British police underwent since 1997 there are still too many officers in all forces in non-patrol roles. The key to this is a multi-functional workforce with a default position of patrol, in community or response roles. Where other demands arise they can be switched to a different role while the need persists, but we cannot afford a standing army of backroom staff at the expense of more visible policing.<br />
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Which also means that police must restrict themselves to policing. I was interested in the Chief Constable's remarks about looking at the whole public service demand. Yes there is overlap, with Social Services and Children's Services in particular but also with health and housing. But there must be a clear understanding of who does what and despite all these professions being staffed as they are by those who care, the temptation formally to fill the gaps caused by the shortcomings of other agencies is to be avoided. We have already, in most places, washed our hands of lost property and a few other things the police have always done because there was nobody else. Nothing should be ruled in or out other than patrol and response; some traditional functions will and ought to be examined carefully to see if their contribution to what the community wants from its police justifies their existence. It is all scary and yet refreshing in equal measure.<br />
<br />Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-54223615049009883292015-05-14T01:36:00.002-07:002015-05-14T01:36:48.619-07:00Mid-Suffolk PCC Public Meeting, 13th May 2015Despite my interest in policing I've never been to a public meeting with the police before, at least not as a member of the public. Perhaps I was just too scarred by the experience of being savaged in Islington in the 80s or frustrated in Bradford in the 90s while sitting on the other side of the table, but more that I didn't think I would want to put myself in a position which would probably just result in my sympathising with the speakers rather than the audience.<div>
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However, a less-than-satisfactory telephone encounter with Suffolk Constabulary earlier this week caused me to be looking at their website, and I saw that there was a meeting last night in Eye, the large village/small town just 3 miles away. Speaking were the Police & Crime Commissioner Tim Passmore, the Temporary Chief Constable Gareth Wilson and my local Inspector, Tristran Pepper. So it was I arrived, early as usual, in the Community Centre car park waiting to play my part in feeding back community views on policing.</div>
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As is often the case, I found some humour in the situation straight away. Four youths were, as I arrived, sitting on the playground equipment smoking. Now it might have been that they could only afford the one cigarette and that was why they were passing round between them, but I suspect there may have been a less legal reason for it. And while they certainly looked up (and stopped sharing) while first the Chief and then the Inspector walked into the building in uniform it didn't actually put an end to their fun. How ironic, I thought, if someone were to mention youths taking drugs in public areas in the meeting about to begin. I wasn't disappointed.</div>
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As the meeting began I looked around at my fellow participants. Around 20 members of the community and a handful of staff from the PCC's office I guess. A man videoing the meeting for later upload to the website and a lady serving the free teas and coffees. With biscuits. Our part of Suffolk is very rural and eyeing the public attendees I realised that all were 10 years or so older than me with the exception of a 40-something man in a tie sitting behind me who seemed quite organised, being in possession of some sort of PCC publicity material upon which he had made copious "black spider" notes. I tried, mentally, to predict the issues to be raised. Cynics in the Met always say that, whatever the crime situation, the public always complain about dog mess on the pavement. I discounted this, if for no other reason than that the area actually has very few pavements, and put my imaginary bets instead on speeding, drugs use and visibility of police.</div>
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The meeting began pretty much on time and for once the audio and visual equipment worked flawlessly, at least after the PCC had found the button on his radio mic. He started, inevitably running through the financial challenges facing the Constabulary, the changing demands it faced and reassuring us that he would not be "chucking other people's money at it". Of course, not Mr. Passmore - you are a Conservative - we all know that is Labour's method. There was a quick reinforcement of his view that he was right to refuse to amalgamate the Constabulary's Control Room with our neighbours in Norfolk - the one most contentious decision of his reign to date - although without offering any reason for his conviction. Perhaps it has been all been done before; certainly nobody seemed to want him to expand. He ended by explaining that much research had been conducted on domestic violence and acknowledged that "the system does need improvement" and then touched on innovation, referring to an initiative titled "Evidence-based policing". Which, I thought, didn't <i>sound</i> all that innovative - surely policing had been based on evidence for a very long time. Or at least ought to have been?</div>
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The Chief was next. He has a pleasant and relaxed style which I warmed to. He stressed the changing nature of demands, that "cyber-crime" and other new problems had largely filled the gaps in demand created by the fall in more traditional crime, hence the overall demand levels had changed, he said, very little. He accepted that staffing levels would continue to fall and suggested that this could only be met by reducing calls for service, which would enable him to do a better job but with fewer resources. He was keen to talk about serious and organised crime, the Eastern Area Specialist Operations Unit, Counter Terrorism unit, the ATHENA regional intelligence project, mobile working and body cameras. I couldn't help but think that, as interesting and exciting as all that might be it was possibly a little beyond the issues that this audience was keen to explore. The course of the discussion later confirmed this to me. Lastly, and what was much more relevant was his desire to "understand the demand on the public sector in the county" - with a view to reducing demand by identifying duplication and overlap. </div>
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The final presentation was Insp. Pepper, who ran us through the (improving) figures for victim satisfaction and reductions in anti-social behaviour and domestic burglary in the area. He was entirely reassuring and gave the clear impression that he was a man who cared about his role and succeeding in it.</div>
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So, on to questions from the floor. First up a well-spoken man in the 'pole-position' seat, by the aisle in the front row. He advanced his view that drugs were the root cause of all crime, and expressed his horror that he had recently heard there was heroin in the area. The PCC sympathised, said that he personally loathed drugs and that it was the top priority of the policing plans, adding somewhat curiously that we should "rest assured that everything is being done that can be done, but we can always do more I suppose". Eh? A few more comments from the floor drew the expected and ironic reference to drug-taking in public areas and then the microphone was passed to the man behind me with the notes. Who started eloquently but suddenly and without warning flew into a 'hang em and flog em' rant as to how all drug users were criminals and had to be treated as such, arrest them and prosecute them and it is problem solved. He used the phrase 'nail them' a number of times; I don't think he was actually advocating crucifixion but to be honest I don't think any of us was absolutely certain. It was a very interesting point in proceedings for me - how would this largely senior, probably pretty conservative audience react? I was a little surprised and quietly relieved that he received absolutely no support. </div>
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A few references to policing hunts followed, from which I learned only that it is a subject which polarises opinion - as if we didn't know that. And then on to speeding. The Chief was, as throughout, calm and measured in his responses, explaining that the mobile speed cameras were not a cash cow, were sited so as to have the maximum impact and that Community Speed Watch schemes were expanding and successful. A few eyebrows were raised when he said that on some rural roads it was difficult to enforce speed limits because it was dangerous to put officers there - due to the speed of passing traffic......... He quickly qualified this by saying that of course it could be done but that the officers' safety had to be paramount. We knew what he meant but it was just a slightly clumsy way of expressing it I suppose.</div>
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We went on with a discussion about 'eyes and ears' which enabled me to make my point about the difficulty of getting deployment decisions right; I was entirely happy that my feedback was well-received and will be taken into account. Those on the platform appeared to accept that new methods and processes were unlikely to be right first go and that adjustment would made where it was needed. </div>
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The last point was made again by the man with the notes. He started by apologising for his earlier rant, and in complaining about the lack of police visibility in the town of Stowmarket even made passing reference to Roy Jenkins and the Unit Beat scheme of the 1960s, before spoiling his apparently comprehensive knowledge and research by getting the year of the Brixton riots wrong and repeating an urban myth about the role played by local officers in it. Which upset me a little, but not as much as it did the pole-position drugs man, who stood up, turned round and forcefully accused notes man of monopolising the meeting and ruining it for everyone else, High drama.</div>
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Except it wasn't quite the end, as the microphone then got passed to an elderly man who had so far remained silent, and who proceeded to ask the PCC a question about youth engagement. Which was a little odd in that there had been scarcely a mention of this throughout the rest of the meeting. The PCC though clearly relished the question and gave us a 5 minute run-through of the 3 initiatives he was working on in this area. It was certainly a friendly question to ask him and actually made me wonder if it wouldn't have been better for the answer to have been delivered as a statement in the PCC's opening remarks.</div>
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That, then, is my factual report of the meeting. In my next blog I will try to unpick a few of the issues it highlighted to me.</div>
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Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-76575067276341209882014-12-09T10:47:00.000-08:002014-12-09T10:47:04.428-08:00Emobilize - computer scam by internet and phone<div style="background-color: white; margin-bottom: 6px;">
<span style="color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.3199996948242px;"><b>I came across a genuine scam today which is worth passing on, especially to those who are not as computer-savvy as some.</b></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.3199996948242px;"><b>A window pops up on your PC and says that you have loads of infections and your hard drive is about to expire irretrievably. It looks like it is a Microsoft pop-up. There is an 0800 number so you call it, it is free after all. A convincing Indian man will then explain the risk, say that he is from Microsoft and somehow put a piece of software called Remote Rescue or similar on your PC to analyse it. He will then tell you they can clean it for a price, in this case it was £300 by credit card. They then draw a few pretty patterns on your screen, tell you it is done and off you go. What then becomes of your credit card numbers is anybody's guess.</b></span></span></div>
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<b><span style="color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, lucida grande, tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.3199996948242px;">The company doing this call themselves E-mobilize, www.emobilize.net The number they use is 0800 0588121. They are run by 3 Indian nationals called Saurabh Basak Born Sep 1987; Muthuraja Mani Born Jul 1979 Shaswat Ravi Born 2Dec 1984. The company is registered to a very low rent accountancy firm called Husain Bulman & Co, 258 Merton Road </span></span><span style="color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.3199996948242px;">London SW18 5JL. </span></b></div>
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<span style="color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.3199996948242px;"><b>They process their payments through a firm called Pinnacle E-Serve who are run by another pair of Indians, Mrs. Shivani Jain Born Nov 1976 and Mr Sudhir Abba Born Oct 1970.</b></span></div>
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<b style="color: #141823; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.3199996948242px;">Enquiries continue, but please warn your friends and share as widely as possible.</b></div>
Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-78660011174769235972014-04-07T11:22:00.000-07:002014-04-07T11:22:33.730-07:00Duty to Levi? - It's not right, but it's not surprising<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Levi Bellfield found bullying the vulnerable
easy. He intimidated women and weaker men with his size, backed up by
dreadful violence if it were needed. But when it came to a more equal
fight – such as when it kicked off in a club where he was working – he would be
nowhere to be seen. Perhaps one day the video we found of him supposedly
‘bare knuckle boxing’ will make its way on to You Tube, and the world can share
the laughter we on the enquiry team burst into when we saw it.
‘Bare-knuckle running away’ was a more accurate description.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">So it is no surprise that he was assaulted
and was unable to defend himself in Wakefield Prison. There are some
genuine hard men in there who, whatever they had done to be put away, were
still decent enough to take exception to Bellfield killing young girls, beating
up women and raping anyone he fancied. It was only a matter of time
before somebody took him on. It isn’t right, but it also isn’t
surprising.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Equally, it is completely understandable that
the Prison Service chose to settle his claim. £4,500 is a tidy sum, but nothing
like the amount they would have to spend on a full trial, even if they
won. The Service is just as cash-strapped as the rest of the Public
Sector, and its bosses have to make business decisions, with sound economics
winning over common sense morality. And indeed £4,500 is drop in the
ocean compared to the many millions the public purse has spent on trials
already on Bellfield’s behalf. You and I pay and the only winners are
Bellfield and the lawyers. It definitely isn’t right, but as distasteful
as it might be, it also isn’t surprising. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">But if you want real proof that the whole
system is messed up, look no further than the scale of compensation paid by the
Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority to the families of murder
victims. For a single relative the maximum is £11,000, and for multiple
relatives £5,500 each. So, currently, the parents of Amélie Delagrange,
Marsha McDonnell and Millie Dowler - who not only endured the loss of their daughters
but the heartbreak of trials, of Bellfield sneering at them and having their
lives dissected by his legal team – would each be entitled to just £1000 more
than Bellfield has been given because the warders at Wakefield could not
prevent him from getting a few scratches from a sharpened toothbrush.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">And that is so not right as to be off the
scale, and puts this whole ridiculous business of a duty of care being owed to
monsters like Bellfield into a sickening perspective.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-13277291922330937692012-10-22T16:02:00.001-07:002012-10-22T16:28:02.237-07:00The Truth: Hurts.<br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Senior
Investigating Officers make hundreds of decisions, most of which are actually
of very little consequence. Of the few
that do really matter, some are surprisingly easy. At least I suppose that
many others will be surprised that they
are really what seem these days to be called ‘no brainers’. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">A
strangely frequent no brainer is whether to secure some evidence of a serious
crime in circumstances where it is obvious that the admissibility of that
evidence might at some later date be called into question. My thinking in these situations was pretty
swift, and went along these lines: If we
don’t get the evidence now, we might not ever get it. It won’t then be available at court. If we get it but it is challenged, the learned
Judge might exercise discretion against us, and we might lose it. It won’t then be available at court. But he or she might just let it in, and we
will have it. So let’s get what we can,
and then let the court decide - the worst that might happen is that we end up in the same position we would have been in had we not secured it. There is nothing to lose. At least that was how it seemed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">But
this thinking relied upon two principles which we took for granted, but which
the shameful treatment of Detective Superintendent Steven Fulcher has now called into
question. First, our criminal justice
system eschewed the American doctrine of ‘the fruit of the forbidden
tree’. Essentially, evidence which was
obviously correct, which pointed to an incontrovertible objective truth, was
admissible even if procedure had not been followed in unearthing it. So a search without reasonable suspicion,
without a warrant, even an irregular interview, were of no consequence if they
yielded sound evidence.
Jurisprudentially, the concept of objective truth was accepted and it
trumped whatever procedural niceties the Judges’ Rules or then the Police &
Criminal Evidence Act threw up in the path that led to it. Secondly we, the SIOs, knew that our first
duty was to the community we served, and that we could justify decisions as
being faithful to that duty without fear for our reputation, career or
pension. Which is how it should of
course be, unless we want those who take the decisions in major investigations
to be putting themselves before the people they have sworn to serve.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">The
awful and unwarranted predicament in which Steven Fulcher now finds
himself has cast serious doubts on all this; doubts which have terrible
implications for us all. When confronted
by a self-confessed murderer telling him of the location of a further victim,
Mr. Fulcher had to take a decision. But
it was a no brainer. He could comply
with PACE, return to the station, and commence an interview, at some point
after a solicitor had been summoned, advice given and the tape machine switched
on. If, as the result of advice, or a
change of heart, “no comment” was the result, the opportunity to find a body,
to resolve a case and most importantly to let a family know what had really
happened to a loved one, would have been lost.
The alternative was to carry on, to strike while the iron was hot and
allow the admission to be made and the body to be found. On the basis that, if the suspect were to
indicate the spot and the body to be found, it was pretty self-evident that the
suspect knew a great deal about it, an objective truth would have been
uncovered and the lack of strict procedural correctness therefore judged
irrelevant. Which is what Steven Fulcher
did, and which – I hope – any SIO worthy of the name would have done.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">I
can just about understand the </span><span style="font-family: Arial;">Judge’s ruling that the evidence of the second murder is inadmissible. I do not agree with it, however I am sure he was applying the law faithfully as he saw it.</span><span style="font-family: Arial;"> But what I cannot fathom is the decision - presumably
taken by the top team within Wiltshire Police - to suspend Steven Fulcher and
call in the IPCC. Because SIOs are going
to take note and inevitably factor their own career prospects in to similar
decisions in future, to the detriment of victims, their families and the
community. Which will equally inevitably
mean bodies not found, crimes not solved and victims not satisfied.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">Police Officers who take money, who falsify
evidence, who are too lazy to act, who use excessive force – these are the ones
who should be suspended, investigated and dealt with. Those like Steven Fulcher, who do the best
they think they can, honestly, in a considered manner and prioritising the
interests of victims and the community, should be applauded, not suspended.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-28941409966202523412012-09-19T05:02:00.001-07:002012-09-19T05:16:01.568-07:00The pen is mightier than the sword<br />
Or, updating the adage for the 21st century, the computer is mightier than the gun.<br />
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Arming every officer, even if it were logistically possible, even if they were all suitable (which it isn't, and they aren't) would not prevent tragedies such as we saw yesterday. Policing is a risky business at the sharp end, and where a madman does things so far off the scale of reasonableness and predictability the risks are impossible to eradicate. And to alter the essential character of our policing to such an extent in the hope that it might help is, sadly, simply not worth it.<br />
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But what we must do, what the leaders of our Police Service are duty-bound to do, is to take every possible step to make sure that our policing of our communities by consent is safe. In this context that means making sure that every single piece of information and intelligence which might help inform officers attending every call for help is available to them and those who direct them.<br />
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There is a long-standing issue with the dissemination of information gleaned from major investigations, which few forces, if any, have come to terms with. Typically, a force will have three computer systems relevant to this issue - Command and Control, which logs calls for help, who is responding, how the incident is dealt with and the result; an intelligence database where information, graded for reliability, is kept in cross-referenced indices with entries relating to persons, vehicles, premises and locations; and the HOLMES (Home Office Large Major Enquiry System) database upon which every piece of information relating to major investigations is kept in discrete accounts.<br />
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The Command and Control system has a facility whereby as an incident log is created any flags attached to the address entered will be displayed. These may relate to the occupiers or the location and are essential for the dispatching officer to make an informed decision as to the risk to officer safety. In some forces these flags still have to be entered manually whilst in others information will be copied across from the intelligence system automatically. But of course even in the latter cases, manual entry on to the intelligence system is required, so there is a dependence on somebody, somewhere, deciding that the information is worth recording. The ultimate systems might be where the Command and Control logs themselves automatically write back to the intelligence system, but the issues of duplication and data standardisation here are proving difficult to overcome.<br />
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At a divisional level intelligence staff are pretty good at updating the Command and Control database. But it all becomes a bit murky when you start to try to include HOLMES. Culturally it has taken some years to arrive at the position where detectives investigating the most serious of crimes have accepted the necessity to put everything they do, see, hear and take possession of on to 'The System', that is, to record it on the HOLMES database. The additional burden of separately submitting an intelligence report for the different database seems to have been taken on only by the more conscientious and far-sighted officers. Despite repeated efforts it has not been possible, to my knowledge, to arrive at a reliable means of achieving the automatic transfer of information from HOLMES to an intelligence database, certainly not in a foolproof and operationally sound way. So we are left to rely upon the judgment of individual intelligence officers attached to major enquiry teams, who have as a priority the gathering of information for dissemination to their team and perhaps understandably therefore are frequently too busy to push information out from the team to the wider force in any comprehensive or reliable manner. I doubt there is a Senior Investigating Officer past or present who has not wrestled with this problem, tried to address it but ended up uneasy that it has never really been solved.<br />
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Why is all this relevant? Because the fact that there is a vast mass of useful intelligence lying dormant in HOLMES accounts across the country means, generally, that opportunities to solve or prevent crime, and to mitigate risks to officers, are not available to those who would like to take advantage of them. Because, I fear, it is very likely that despite the huge external and internal publicity generated by Greater Manchester Police in the hunt for Cregan, there will be information in the HOLMES account that would have led to his capture had it been available to a wider audience. Or, more devastatingly perhaps, which would have linked Cregan somehow, maybe through a few degrees of separation, with the house in Abbey Gardens.<br />
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This piece is written not to criticize nor carp, but rather to offer a suggestion at a time when all of us, especially those who have worn the uniform, are hurting. It is extremely difficult, extremely unpalatable. But it would be some additional respect to the memories of Fiona Bone and Nicola Hughes if their painful loss were to inspire each and every police officer and staff member to ensure that every conceivable snippet of information they acquire is shared as widely as it can be. Computers, not guns, ought to be giving our dedicated frontline officers the increased safety they deserve, but as ever, they can only be as good as the information they are fed.<br />
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Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-3677528560767050592011-11-02T15:10:00.000-07:002011-11-02T16:36:49.915-07:00The Enfield Crime Squad. Allegedly.Allegedly. Was the word really even in common use before Have I Got News For You? I'm not sure it was, and I am equally sure that it is not one I have regularly had recourse to. But that was then, and this is now. One of the difficulties in commenting from afar rather than knowing from the thick of it is that I have to rely on information which I cannot completely verify. So all of this post is, as usual, what I think, but what I think in this case is based upon things I have heard and been told, but which I do not know for sure to be accurate. So just think 'allegedly' before you read each paragraph and we should be fine.<div><br /></div><div>It was only a few years ago, maybe 10 or 15 at most, when <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Enfield</span>, the Borough of my birth and childhood, was treated with a little disdain within the Police. Those of us fortunate (!) enough to work in the tougher neighbouring Borough of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Haringey</span> thought they had it easy there. No real crime, no real public order, nice people who made you cups of tea. Didn't the main radio set in Yankee 5 have a snooze button?</div><div><br /></div><div>As inner London's problems migrated ever-outwards, after the turn of the century it became obvious that there were no soft Boroughs in the Met any more, and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Enfield</span> was no exception. What had been a cosy posting for years suddenly became populated by gangs, robbery and violence. As the Borough rose to the top of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Met's</span> murder charts Edmonton became known as 'Shank Town', while one street earlier this year was still rejoicing in the nickname 'Stab Alley'.</div><div><br /></div><div>Somebody within the local police presumably thought enough was enough, that the growing gangs and rising crime rates were unacceptable and that tough action was required. How this was devised and '<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">operationalised</span>' (see - I learnt some spectacular made-up words in the Met) I am not sure, and is pretty much irrelevant. The outcome was that the Borough Crime Squad was, by 2009, the most successful in the capital. Its arrest and conviction rates were high, crime rates were falling. Robust and effective enforcement, combined with practical cooperation with the local authority to prevent crime, was slowly turning the tide and making the Borough a palpably better place to live and work in.</div><div><br /></div><div>The senior officers in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Enfield</span> were apparently aware of the Crime Squad's methods and gave at least tacit approval to them. And why wouldn't they, given the successful results? There was no question of anything illegal taking place, and certainly no question of personal enrichment or gain for the officers involved. They were, it has been suggested to me, a bunch of good young coppers, working hard to put away criminals and make their Borough a safer place. </div><div><br /></div><div>One of their more unusual practices was to use property seized from their criminals. There is no suggestion this was for any purpose other than to make their jobs easier - for example, seized vehicles may have been used to conduct observations from, mobile phones used within the office to make covert or unattributable calls, TV sets to view CCTV recordings. Essentially, goods which might ordinarily have sat in a storeroom or compound pending a trial were used to help the fight against those who had stolen them, or bought them with illicit funds. </div><div><br /></div><div>Now somebody took exception to this. Reports have described her or him as a '<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">whistleblower</span>'. I think this is unfair and misleading. Most of us will understand that term as a co-worker reporting malpractice. That is far from what happened in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Enfield</span>; it seems that to a man and woman the operational officers and staff within the Borough were supportive of the Crime Squad - and why wouldn't they have been, given the real benefits the community was deriving from them. The so-called <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">whistleblower</span> in this case was, it seems, a support-worker from a central department outside of the Borough, who decided to tell their own boss about it, for either personal or professional reasons. </div><div><br /></div><div>This led to an investigation which found very little evidence of wrongdoing, and was petering out when it was decided to search the Crime Squad's base (as well as the homes of 14 officers). It was this search, in February 2009, which uncovered the now infamous 'hard-stop' video from some 8 months previously. An incident about which, I believe, no complaint of malpractice was made at the time by the young criminal who was the subject of the arrest. With renewed vigour the honorary Detectives of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Met's</span> Directorate of Professional Standards set about building a case, and went to interview a number of criminals who the Crime Squad had convicted. One of these alleged that his head had been held over a sink of water during his arrest, though video footage of the arrest seems to show him completely dry throughout. This allegation, somehow, was leaked to the media - possibly through somebody connected with the Metropolitan Police Authority - as '<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">waterboarding</span>' and the whole thing gained an unexpected and unwarranted momentum.</div><div><br /></div><div>Around this time also the Crime Squad received an anonymous tip-off that a lock-up garage had a stash of stolen goods. They rightly got a warrant and indeed discovered a veritable Aladdin's Cave. All the electrical gear was properly seized, and enquiries to trace its owners began. This proved pretty simple, as there were serial numbers and other markings which quickly led the officers to a hire company, who were as bemused by the enquiry as the officers were by their reply. The equipment wasn't stolen, indeed it was all being leased by the Metropolitan Police - from an address where many of the D.P.S. teams are based. Presumably this ham-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">fisted</span> attempt at a sting had been intended to prove the corruption of the Crime Squad officers. Instead, I am told, since they had properly recorded all the goods and then proceeded to try to trace their owners, it just proved their honesty.</div><div><br /></div><div>I have no idea how much the lease of this stash of electric gear cost, but it is presumably a drop in the ocean in the context of the overall cost of the investigation into the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Enfield</span> Crime Squad. Figures bandied in the press today range between £5 million to more then £12 million. And while we may not have heard the last of it, all it seems to have uncovered is a few officers whacking a car - which had been stolen in an aggravated (that is, with weapons and/or violence) burglary, in order to arrest the driver who had at least dishonestly handled the car, and was driving whilst disqualified. </div><div><br /></div><div>Which they shouldn't have done with baseball bats - though presumably if they had used officially-issued batons or asps would have been OK. I say that because one has only to watch one of the plethora of '<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">PoliceCameraActionTrafficCopsWithCameras</span>' programmes on any number of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Freeview</span> channels any evening of the week to understand that it is a common tactic used by officers at the end of pursuits. And perfectly lawful and justified, we are told, because of the need to shock the driver into instant submission before the car, or indeed any other object, can be used as a weapon. Which is presumably what one might expect an aggravated burglar to do, that being the sort of person the officers had every reason to suspect to be driving the car.</div><div><br /></div><div>So, a little 'over-aggressive' (the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Met's</span> own words) policing is discovered at this huge cost. I have enough family and friends, outside of the police, who still reside in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Enfield</span> to gauge the feeling there. They were mightily glad that such robust and decisive policing was going on in their community. I imagine the practices have been changed somewhat; I don't know how <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Enfield's</span> crime and detection figures are looking as a result. </div><div><br /></div><div>But what I do know is that we are staring, pan-London and indeed nationally, at a reduction in police numbers due to budgetary constraints. It is a reasonable approximation to call the annual cost of a new Constable £50,000 when one adds up salary, training and equipment. Which means we could get 100 PCs for £5 million or 240 PCs for £12 million. Makes you think, doesn't it? Allegedly.</div><div><br /></div>Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-36205382929022931332011-08-11T11:06:00.001-07:002011-08-11T11:38:42.915-07:00It's about more than just cutsThis post is too long for a tweet, but may be quite short for a blog. I just want to present an idea of a different perspective on the police cuts debate.<div>
<br /></div><div>Overall, I am a supporter of cutting public expenditure; there is no alternative given the horrible state <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Messrs</span></span>. Brown and Darling left us in. And I have some notion of equality which says that what needs to be done must be done without exception, the police included.</div><div>
<br /></div><div>That said, I do not want to see policing quality reduced - I am not sure how far it can fall anyway whilst still being worthy of the name. I quite understand the associations, commentators and Opposition <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">MPs</span></span> seizing the opportunity from the last week's events to make a case for stopping the cuts but I have little faith they will succeed. Or at least there is a distinct opportunity that they won't.</div><div>
<br /></div><div>Why not then also have a Plan B; using the same facts, the same public opinion and the same fear as to the future to campaign for something which might be much more achievable. That would be shifting the focus from palliatives to prosecutions, from counselling to conviction - indeed, using what became a dirty word in policing around 15 years ago, but one used in the House by David Cameron today, from Service back to Force.</div><div>
<br /></div><div>This, I think, would include, but not be limited to:</div><div>
<br /><ul><li>Restoring the right of a Custody Officer to authorise charges - saving thousands in CPS lawyers' wages and ensuring that many more of the guilty actually face a court</li></ul><ul><li>Strict <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">guidelines</span> on when a criminal can be cautioned - and how often</li></ul><ul><li>Repeal or wholesale modification of the our Human Rights Act - not, as promised by the Government, trying to get it changed at source by amending the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">ECHR</span> </span>- to prevent some of its perverse effects</li></ul><ul><li>Removing all targets for detections, which skew activity away from what might be needed</li></ul><ul><li>Exempting Police Forces from the provisions of the Health & Safety legislation, reversing the dreadfully paralysing effects of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Met's</span></span> corporate conviction</li></ul><div>I am sure there are many other measures which would help, these are rather off the cuff, but you get the idea.</div></div><div>
<br /></div><div>Essentially, the Government, Opposition and certainly the public as a whole are asking for more robust policing. Those in the fortunate position of being able to lobby at this time should not be blinkered by the cuts. Concentrating solely on them gives the Associations the appearance of a Trades Union, concerned with the well-being of their members above all else. <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Police</span> Officers are better than that; they should grab the chance to make a real difference to policing - and thus to the communities they serve - so that some lasting good can at least be born out of the terrible last few days.</div><div>
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<br /></div>Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-32723534301008577522011-08-08T14:13:00.000-07:002020-06-07T04:20:35.125-07:00Just like 1981? Yes a bit, but mostly No.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgY6RUOCNi6rL2W8TJpYX0S2A_CqIFrXxDjMJ9TVIMBTouxNZFlz7gQ5-QtTYbr_Il1w0PtvwpsThTH0NJF6D5gTDVMt19GeKon-DffPCe9yJdKH-Sm_le_Jm4FYyqM3z8dIVxKxx8hsk/s1600/b2944-1981sun.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="393" data-original-width="298" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgY6RUOCNi6rL2W8TJpYX0S2A_CqIFrXxDjMJ9TVIMBTouxNZFlz7gQ5-QtTYbr_Il1w0PtvwpsThTH0NJF6D5gTDVMt19GeKon-DffPCe9yJdKH-Sm_le_Jm4FYyqM3z8dIVxKxx8hsk/s320/b2944-1981sun.jpg" width="242" /></a></div>
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It was meant to be my long-weekend off as a young PC at Tottenham. It was July 1981. My leave was cancelled because the tough and unpopular measures necessary to correct the nation's financial plight caused by the previous Labour Government's mis-management had sparked riots. At least that was the official reason; to many it looked like opportunistic acquisitive crime. So perhaps there really is nothing new under the sun. But let's look back through my memories of that day in a little more detail.<br />
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At about 8pm, as the Grey-Green 52-seater - containing 20 or so coppers and an impressively gung-ho driver hired along with his vehicle - crossed the Seven Sisters Road by Finsbury Park Station we all heard the crash from our right. A set of step-ladders protruded from the smashed window of Unwin's off-licence in Station Place, and we could see at least half-a-dozen figures in the shop filling pockets and bags with spirits and cigarettes. But tonight was going to be different. The rioting which had continued across towns and cities for four or five days was about to stop. Whether it was pressure from their exhausted foot soldiers below, or their political masters (well, mistress ultimately) above, our leaders had instructed us to play harder, to meet force with force, to take any and every prisoner.</div>
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It wasn't pretty. Truncheons drawn, we entered and the resistance we encountered received some savage retaliation. Nine men were arrested; every stolen item - none of which had actually made it out of the store - was recovered and accompanied its thief. As the prisoners were loaded on to the coach they continued to struggle; officers continued to beat the futile resistance from them.</div>
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Shortly afterwards I sat in the charge room at Holloway Police station, taking personal details from my prisoner, a 30 year-old Jamaican whose name I remember to this day. He had lost his shoes, his shirt and the shape of his nose in the battle. He was bloody from head to toe, front and back. Though I knew I hadn't caused any of his numerous and very visible injuries, something in me wished I had. Despite having been enjoined never to tolerate any other officer touching my prisoner, I knew the situation - not just here, but across the country - needed extreme measures of such a nature that this young, inexperienced and essentially peaceable officer had neither the confidence nor the courage to effect. But I also knew how frightened I had been, for myself, for my colleagues and my city, and was intelligent enough to know that something had to be done.</div>
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Then every police officer in the crowded room stood up. I followed suit and saw a tall, impeccably smart man in the uniform of a Commander, cap on, swagger stick in hand. His gaze fell on my prisoner, I saw him take in every detail of the man's bloodied body. The Commander came over and asked, "Is this your prisoner, Son?" I almost simply nodded, but not wanting to add to my difficulties by being disrespectful, replied, "Yes, Sir" - as confidently as my sinking heart would let me. "Burglary, looting an off-licence" I added quickly, hoping rather than expecting that this would at least justify the arrest. He smiled just a little, placed his brown-gloved hand on my shoulder and said, "Well done, well done," with a warmth which was as welcome as it was unexpected.</div>
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The next morning it was a Saturday court at Highbury Corner. From the previous night's rioting there were 42 in-custody prisoners charged with burglary, theft, danage and assault. There was one Stipendary Magistrate, who cleared the whole list in slightly over 90 minutes. My man was typical in that he pleaded guilty and was immediately sentenced to a couple of months imprisonment. No social enquiry reports, no adjournment for the Probation Service to interview him, just go to jail. Get off our streets, all of you, if you cannot behave - that was the unmistakeable message. The tide had turned, the community was fighting back, through those appointed and paid to protect them, and protect them we did. Violence was met with violence and crimes, all crimes, were met with prosecution and swift justice. The belief was that the rioters, quite simply, didn't want a fight and didn't want to go to prison.</div>
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Sadly, it is evident that neither of these dissuading factors is easily available to our officers today. First, watch the helicopter footage on the TV. Watch how ponderous the police response seems to be, waiting until the the 'dynamic risk assessment' allows action. Wait for the shields, the crash hats, the Tasers. A much-respected Commander in the 1990s used to conclude briefings saying, "The Metropolitan Police is into participative management, but it has no place in a public order situation". Where we once had quick decisive and instinctive leadership we now have decision by committee, by numbers and manuals, slow, cautious decisions made by managers scared stiff of being second-guessed after the event. </div>
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Secondly, as we have seen in other public disorder situations, notwithstanding the seriousness of the circumstances, the Police cannot offer violence back now without an uproar, an IPCC inquiry, a trial even. CCTV, mobile phone videos and 24 hour news will all be available to those who have an agenda to prevent the police taking the necessary robust action. The masked men and women, and more especially those who support them as a matter of principle, insist anonymity cuts only one way, and they disseminate their knowledge so usefully as evidenced <a href="http://yfrog.com/kegke7j">by this London flyer</a>.</div>
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But most significantly perhaps, our over-sophisticated, defendant-biassed, lawyer-enriching and victim-neglecting Criminal Justice System just cannot move with the speed the situation demands. A CPS lawyer, cautious to adhere to the myriad rules and guidance - laid down by those who professed to be tough on crime - will need statements, forensics, further enquiries and a 'realistic prospect of conviction' . This will require our rioter to be released on bail pending further enquiries - provided of course that the lawmakers and law-interpreters have decided that Police can bail suspects after all - before any charge is laid. The rioter will of course have Legal Aid, and almost certainly be advised not to plead guilty at he first appearance. I doubt the court would deal with four cases in 90 minutes, let alone 40. </div>
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So, combine an over-stretched, under-funded and under-trained Police Service with politicised, partial scrutiny on an unprecedented scale, mix in an excessively bureaucratic and risk-averse CPS and put it all within the context of our 21st century risk-assessing, H&S worshipping, backside-covering police leadership and what do we get? 215 rioters arrested, almost 90% of them not charged. A teenage rampage with police powerless to prevent them, powerless to control them and clueless as to how to regain the streets for the communities they claim to serve.</div>
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Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-90599801404688737352011-07-20T12:05:00.000-07:002011-07-20T12:44:20.982-07:00Whence come you?<p class="MsoPlainText">'More resources' for the hacking enquiry were recommmended by the Select Committee, has this translated into 15 more detectives?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Probably not, it is much more likely this is a Met decision in light of the increased number of enquiries being made of the Weeting team, and would probably have happened whatever the committee report had said.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>So can we expect to see more?</p> <p class="MsoPlainText">To investigate the whole hacking business properly is an immense task; and properly is how it must now be done.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>That means exploring lines of enquiry which would not normally be followed.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The difficulty is that, in normal circumstances, large investigations will often be constrained by what is practicable.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Where many offences are disclosed a management decision will regularly be taken to restrict the enquiries (and hence the resources needed) to just enough necessary to prove the scope of offending, and to attract a suitable punishment.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>There is no other way, normally, to manage the investigation and also the ensuing trial.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>An indictment can become simply too large and complicated for a jury to consider.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Were it not for such sensible decisions serial offenders like Levi Bellfield and Delroy Grant would be on trial for most of the next ten years - assuming the investigations were completed in their lifetimes.</p> <p class="MsoPlainText">You notice, though, that I keep using the word 'normally'.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Very exceptionally the context of an investigation changes, and it becomes desirable not only to convict the guilty but also to prove publicly that enquiries have been thoroughly and completely carried out.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>While the original hacking enquiry might have started out as 'normal', the ever-increasing storm of the last two weeks means that Operation Weeting is now very firmly in the 'exceptional' category. It simply will not do for any stone to remain unturned, no possible offence to be missed. So every one of the 4000-odd names will be looked at to see if any attempt was made to hack their voicemail, and if so, each one will be investigated as a separate offence - undoubtedly many victims will have been hacked several times, each one a new offence. So the total number of crimes to investigate might well be into four figures, and it is hardly any wonder that 45 officers have so far managed only to speak to 170 or so victims. Franky that is quite good going . Never mind 8 hours, it will be amazing if this is wrapped up in 8 months.</p><p class="MsoPlainText">So how might more resources be found? The Government could throw some money the Met's way, and as welcome as it might be in these straitened times, it won't be the complete answer. There is a limit to how much overtime officers can perform before becoming tired, stale and less effective. The answer must be more officers, but not just any old (or more accurately, young) cop will do. The expectation ought to be that experienced detectives are used, and the only two areas of the Met with those officers with numbers sufficient to be able to stand significant abstractions are the Murder Squads and Counter-terrorism. Of course the Murder squads already have an entire team struck off for the Madeline McCann review, and who knows what work is ongoing within Counter- terrorism? While both Commands may be relatively under-stretched at the moment, as we know all too well that situation can change virtually overnight. I am sure there is no greater priority in the Met at the moment than hacking - nor should there be, as a complete, transparent and successful resolution of that investigation is crucial to the process of rebuilding trust and confidence in the Met; essential if that wonderful but all too-often flawed organisation is to recover from what must be its lowest point for 40 years.</p><p class="MsoPlainText">But in amongst all this, I wonder how fair it is on Londoners. The Met has traditionally taken on some national functions, notably protection of the Royal Family, as well as getting involved in other ad hoc issues in which it has no geographical interest - the McCann review, for example. Is the hacking investigation really a matter just for the Capital? Leaving aside the slightly esoteric and ultimately irrelevant debate as to where online or other telecoms-based offences actually take place, aren't the victims spread across the country and therefore several police boundaries? Isn't the whole thing anyway now one of national interest and importance? Perhaps the pain ought to be shared more widely, perhaps the additional resources the Select Committee called for should be drawn from other forces, so that other commitments in London are affected less and any that arise in future can be met without affecting the Weeting team. </p><p class="MsoPlainText">It is perhaps an attractive solution, but one which the Met I knew and loved would resist on the basis it wanted to sort out its own mess. That attitude might be laudable, were it based upon a genuine desire to make amends rather than a degree of arrogance. But I think the current state of its reputation demands a new, more open and more humble, approach.</p>Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-35470331635723012732011-07-12T10:03:00.000-07:002011-07-12T10:08:56.247-07:00Yes Sir, No Sir, Two bags full Sir.<style type="text/css">p { margin-bottom: 0.21cm; }</style> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">I know John Yates well enough to consider him shrewd, decent and honest. I would have thought him the last person to be unconvincing before a Select Committee, but for the first and quite probably last time in find myself in complete agreement with Keith Vaz. (Incidentally, do you agree that having Mr. Vaz in charge of an investigation into corruption is at the same time astounding and brilliant?)</p><br />I had expected AC Yates to have been firm, eloquent and impressive. What we saw and heard was none of these things, so I have tried to work out why. The alternatives posed by most as this incredible tale has unfolded have been the traditional choice of 'cock-up or conspiracy'. But finding the former out of the question and the latter very difficult to believe of him, I have looked for a third way, and it just might be - and I sincerely hope I am correct - that it is a combination of the man's decency and the current Met culture of apology without blame, to which I have alluded in past blog posts.<p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">To understand this possibility one must take a realistic view of how these investigations, even the most high-profile ones, are conducted. Very few of the operational decisions are made by the figurehead ACPO officer, even 'Yates of the Yard'. Instead they are reported to by junior officers on all but the highest-level strategic issues. They must trust their officers, of course, and will question and probe to ensure they are happy with progress, but they cannot and do not look at every document, every statement, themselves. If they did, why have the junior officers anyway? Given the back-covering environment in which police officers are forced these days to operate it is inconceivable that the decisions and their supporting reasons are not documented. Every investigation has a policy log, and when the officers who surely advised John Yates that there was no further mileage in the hacking inquiry did so, their reasoning would have been there in black and white, or at least an email or several. </p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">So when he said in his weekend interview that he shouldn't, as an Assistant Commissioner, be expected to sift through two binbags of evidence himself, he was quite correct. But somebody should have, and I suspect somebody else decided not to, or at least not to ask a few Detective Constables to do so.He or she then took a punt, and assured the Boss that there was nothing in there. If John Yates is to appear convincing - for his own sake and that of the Met he must – he will have to bite the bullet and explain, in detail, naming names and producing documents. However distasteful this may be to a man of integrity and who treats his juniors with the utmost respect, it is the only way forward; in such dirty fashion lies the only way properly to come clean.</p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">Because the blame cannot be pushed to News International, no matter how obstructive or uncooperative they might have been. John Yates is good enough a copper to know that, surprise surprise, criminals tend not to cooperate, not to confess and not to hand over evidence on a plate. And never two binbags full. They lie, cheat, hide and destroy their tracks and it is up to the investigators, despite all this, to find the proof and make sure justice is served. The notion that somehow News International ought to be above that, particularly in the context of this whole affair, is, I am afraid, as naïve as it is unconvincing.</p>Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-54064602473405370382011-07-06T06:56:00.000-07:002011-07-06T07:00:34.464-07:00Cash for answers?While I was a police officer I gave lots of information to journalists, throughout Fleet Street and the broadcast media. None of them gave me a penny in return; indeed there was never any suggestion that payment might be involved. I suspect that each of them knew me well enough to appreciate that the second payment was even mooted it would be the very last conversation I had with them.<br /><br />Since I retired I have been paid by a number of media organisations; in every case it has been in return for my commentary, my opinion or technical assistance. I have maintained a rigid stance that I will be paid only for what I create in my mind post-retirement, and that nothing else is on offer.<br /><br />I sincerely hope that both the serving officers who sold information and the journalists who sanctioned payment will be properly dealt with for the corruption in which they have been complicit. That is necessary if the reputations of these two sometimes competing, sometimes symbiotic, often infuriating but ultimately always essential institutions are to be in any way preserved.<br /><br />The baby and bath-water interface must be managed carefully. The release of information by officers, as I always did, could and should be encouraged for the sole purpose of furthering the interests of the Police - either to garner public support and confidence in investigations, or to protect, quite properly, the reputation of the service. Any other motivation, especially personal enrichment, must be jumped upon. But do not restrict the very necessary and very useful relationship which most journalists and most police officers employ to such good effect for the public good.Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-29504737710981865632011-05-19T00:34:00.000-07:002011-05-19T00:55:04.286-07:00Ken Clarke: An apologyI should declare at the outset that I like Ken Clarke. A genuine political heavyweight of the old school, his gravitas and class bring me a welcome sense of comfort whenever he appears on Question Time, always outshining the manufactured young Party people propped up against him.<div><br /></div><div>So I felt quite sad that, at his age and with his record, he was hounded yesterday into a very 21st century PC apology.</div><div><br /></div><div>What did he have to apologise for? He stated, publicly, that there are different degrees of crime - a concept which the learned judges have regard to every day when sentencing in the criminal courts. What is the difference between him saying in a radio interview that there are varying degrees of severity in offences of rape, and a judge explaining that he has based his sentencing decision on the very same principles?</div><div><br /></div><div>We are familiar with sliding scales of 'badness' in non-sexual assaults, where the law actually defines different offences dependent upon the outcome. There is a possibility of such a framework being introduced for murder offences, like the American degrees. Indeed, if one considers homicide then we already have this distinction with the offences of manslaughter and murder. So if we are happy with the principle for the most serious of all offences, and for numerous lesser crimes, why should rape be any different?</div><div><br /></div><div>Could the answer be that rape is still viewed as an offence victimising women only (which it isn't)? Is the knee-jerk, leftist, PC view that, therefore, we must somehow treat it differently? How indignant would yesterday's critics be if we decided that all assaults, or abuse, or criminal damage should be treated the same, and removed the rider that these offences can be 'racially aggravated'? The law ought, as far as is possible within our over-sophisticated, defendant-slanted system, be consistent. </div><div><br /></div><div>Please don't get me wrong, rape is a very serious offence, whatever the circumstances. It ruins lives, degrades, humiliates and scars minds as well as bodies. That is why we treat it so seriously, why the maximum sentence is life imprisonment. But remember that word maximum; the sentences available to judges effectively encompass the entire range. The final disposal will always depend on other factors, peculiar to the offence and the offender. We are, I think, happy to let the judges apply the sentencing rules in these cases; why are we so agitated by their boss talking about them on the radio?</div>Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-63342910640150947712011-05-05T09:32:00.000-07:002011-05-05T10:19:04.230-07:00I was dreamin' when I wrote this, forgive me if it goes astray<a href="http://www.musicroom.com/Images/Catalogue/productpage/HL00306892.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 286px;" src="http://www.musicroom.com/Images/Catalogue/productpage/HL00306892.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />Sean O'Neill of The Times has written an interesting piece today (which you can read <a href="http://thetim.es/iiZGjI">HERE </a>if you are a Times subscriber; if you are not then it is worth a Pound), having had exclusive access to a copy of the IPCC report into the Met failures in the Night Stalker case. Or, to be absolutely accurate, the IPCC's report into one failing which occurred in 1999 in the Night Stalker case.<div><br /></div><div>I am not going to rehearse my views on the other, later, Night Stalker failures in this post. If you wish to read them, simply click on the 'March' posts over on the right. But I am still mystified that no journalist, no MP, no Councillor or no victim has asked the question as to why the IPCC were so narrow in their approach. It is a question I asked last year both of my bosses in the Met and the IPCC investigator. I was not given any sort of answer, let alone a compelling one. My experience of IPCC investigations (in a completely different but equally flawed investigation which I took over in 2005) is that, notwithstanding their original terms of reference, they will allow a large degree of mission creep if they feel there are skeletons to be found. And so they should. But in the Night Stalker case 1999 was the beginning and the end; if it didn't happen that year then it might as well not have happened at all. </div><div><br /></div><div>The Met's line on this still seems to be that 1999 is all we need worry about. Perhaps they are all just avid Prince fans? They also replied to an enquiry to their Press Bureau about the 'learning' review that it was being conducted by NPIA. Which is interesting - I wasn't aware that the NPIA did reviews; their business plan, website and publicity material certainly make no mention of this function. Perhaps they are diversifying in light of the threat to their very existence? Or perhaps the Met meant there is a debrief planned which will be held or even facilitated by NPIA at their Bramshill site. I know that DSU Simon Morgan organised such a day some time ago, in his role of heading the learning exercise. I don't know when it will take place, or even if it already has, because I wasn't invited, even before I retired - though I would gladly contribute to such an event now, free of charge. Indeed, I'd probably even pay to be there. It feels somehow wrong, perhaps even (immodestly) a waste of what I can offer, that neither the Met nor the IPCC have asked for my input. I was asked, in May 2009, to look at the Night Stalker investigation and make suggestions to resolve it. I looked, reported, was given the authority to change and we were successful pretty quickly. I have therefore studied the case, its strategies and tactics, and its leadership very carefully. Understandably as a result I have many, many views on how it was led and progressed before May 2009, which I am sure would assist the 'learning', but nobody is asking for them.</div><div><br /></div><div>If things are still as I think they are, the Met's answer citing the NPIA was clever, was not untrue, but neatly sidestepped the issue of who exactly in the Met is leading the review. Which, I still maintain, is an area which needs to be explored alongside the question of the extent of the IPCC investigation. </div><div><br /></div><div>The difficulty I continue to encounter is that I want to answer questions which nobody seems prepared to ask.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div> </div>Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-62697751272258167292011-03-31T04:33:00.000-07:002011-03-31T05:42:49.302-07:00Will the Night Stalker lessons be taken seriously?<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><b>Outside Woolwich Crown Court last week Commander Simon Foy rightly apologised for the Met failing to catch Delroy Grant earlier, and promised the lessons from the case would be learnt. My knowledge of the case leads me to believe a new and independent inquiry into the failings over seventeen years must be launched.</b></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><o:p> A</o:p>s soon as Delroy Grant was arrested in November 2009 the bosses in SCD1, the Met’s Homicide and Serious Crime Command, which had been responsible for the investigation for the past eleven years, wanted to know if he could have been captured earlier. They acted quickly, and appointed a Detective Superintendent to oversee what they described as ‘a search for learning’. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify">This review began in November 2009 and very quickly uncovered what we are now calling the 1999 mistake – where false assumptions and slack work by a couple of junior officers led to the name Delroy Grant being shown as eliminated on the investigation’s database. The error was reported quickly, officers were spoken to and the matter promptly referred to the Independent Police Complaints Commission. The IPCC mounted an investigation, and as a result recommended ‘Words of Advice’ as the appropriate disciplinary punishment for the officers. This sorry episode featured highly in Commander Foy’s apology and the media coverage of the case after Grant’s conviction. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><o:p> </o:p>However, as we continued to prepare the case for trial, and were disclosing documents for the defence, another serious error came to light which began in March 2003 and was effectively repeated several times, even as late as February 2008. This related to a burglary on 8<sup>th</sup> March 2003 in Sydenham, when the 78 year-old lady victim bravely grappled with Grant as he burgled her home. After she told police what had happened, they called a doctor, and that evening he took scrapings from under her fingernails – a standard practice where there has been contact between victim and offender. For reasons I could not determine, the result of the analysis of these swabs was not acted upon by the team until more than 2½ years later, in October 2005. DNA matching the then-unknown profile of the Night Stalker had been found; the victim must have scratched him and unknowingly collected some of his skin cells. </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><o:p> </o:p>Now knowing that this was definitely a linked offence, the then-SIO, Detective Superintendent Simon Morgan, with the family liaison officer went to tell the victim in person. While they were there she commented that she didn’t know many black men, but that the only ones she could think of who might be worth looking at were those drivers at the local mini-cab firm, Palace Cars, who used to take her to hospital and the doctors. She gave the officers details of the firm, and her comments were paraphrased and recorded in the Family Liaison log book. Some 3½ months later, in January 2006, this comment was read in the incident room, and an action created to research all black men driving cabs for that firm in 2003. However this action was repeatedly put off as not being a priority – in April, July and December 2006, until in June 2007 it was again put off but some reasoning was given,</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left:36.0pt;text-align:justify"><i>“This action remains outside the current priority lines of enquiry as deemed by the SIO of (1) Motor-cyclists SE London, (2) Motor-cyclists Brighton, (3) Single Suggestions from media appeals and Crimewatch , and (4) Refusals.”</i> </p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify">So rather than look at 20 or so men who were all working at the same place the team continued to try to get DNA swabs from a list of thousands. And the suggestion of a victim who had actually seen and touched the suspect was not acted upon, while the word of one - possibly unknown - person who had phoned the Crimewatch studio or the incident room would have been.</p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify"><o:p> </o:p>We now know Delroy Grant did indeed drive for the mini-cab firm in 2003, and had the action been taken then he could and should have been identified. Of course, by the time the DNA result was actually acknowledged by the team 2½ years had passed, which might have made a difference, but the regulation of mini-cabs ought to mean that former drivers remained traceable. In 2003 a DNA result could be obtained in a matter of days; however the practice on the team of putting all forensic result reports into a cardboard box without typing or indexing them on to the database may have had an effect on this and caused the delay – another lesson to be learnt? However there has been no apology, no referral to the IPCC. Nothing, almost as if it never happened.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify">Delroy Grant of course has now been convicted, and there is still time for this and other errors to be reported and acted upon. We can be happy of course that a Detective Superintendent in the Metropolitan Police will be a man of integrity, and will do his duty diligently. But I maintain - as I did back in Novemeber 2009 - that it is daft that the Detective Superintendent in question is Simon Morgan. He is responsible for reporting the learning from the whole SCD1 investigation, for which he alone was responsible for eight of its eleven years. How difficult must it be for a person objectively and critically to review his own decisions, and for such a public and important purpose? It is not fair to him personally, and neither in the interests of the Met nor the Police Service generally, for any ‘learning’ report to have even a suggestion of bias or lack of openness. Irrespective of the thoroughness of his work, it probably means any report will always be so tainted, and it really is crucial for the Met to get it done properly – independently - if they are to start to rebuild the public trust and confidence that the Night Stalker case has so badly damaged.</p>Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-89875719891850016702011-03-24T14:48:00.000-07:002011-03-25T08:52:33.666-07:00Sorry, again? For what, exactly?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://images.mirror.co.uk/upl/m4/mar2011/6/9/delroy-grant-pic-daily-mirror-662181846.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 450px; height: 282px;" src="http://images.mirror.co.uk/upl/m4/mar2011/6/9/delroy-grant-pic-daily-mirror-662181846.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br /><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span">[Pic: mirror.co.uk]</span><br /><br /><br /><span class="Apple-style-span">The two presumably deluded jurors who thought Delroy Grant had a point have made their stand; fortunately they served just to delay his conviction by 24 hours.<br /><br />Tomorrow one hopes he will be weighed off with more porridge than even a City wholefood eaterie can sell in one breakfast, and we will never see him again. Which is, obviously, a good thing.<br /><br />It meant though that, once more we have a Met Commander apologising live on all news channels, repeated in case you missed it at 6, 6.30 and 10. At least Simon Foy ventured away from the revolving sign and down to Woolwich to meet real people, real victims, and say sorry in person. But I imagine I am not alone in asking, in these circumstances - "What for? What went wrong? Who messed up?"<br /><br />For possibly the last time, I am on this occasion in an excellent position to answer those questions for you, to expand on the Commander's words and explain what I think the Met, absolutely correctly in my view, might have apologised for.<br /><br />The second Minstead offence, in 1998, was linked to one six years earlier by DNA left at both scenes by the suspect. The investigation was then given to what was probably then called the Area Crime OCU and is now known as the Homicide & Serious Crime Command, but which for simplicity we will call HSCC. HSCC deals almost exclusively in murder; the occasional serial rape or similar might be taken on but murders are their staple diet. And very good at investigating murder they are too - detection rates are invariably above 90%, often higher. Having led a murder team in London for 8 years, I think I know why this is. I had a skilled, experienced team of around 30 people to throw at each new offence, backed up by as much expert and scientific help as I wanted. Since most murders were unplanned, even spontaneous, the killer had given no thought to DNA, to fingerprints, to fibres and trace evidence, to CCTV or to telecoms data. So, in most cases it was simply a matter of turning up, doing our usual stuff and arresting the murderer a few days or weeks later. This was the principle which was applied to Minstead, for 11 years from 1998 to 2009. We had a DNA profile, and although we didn't know who it belonged to if we threw enough experience, enough detective savvy and enough science at it we would catch him.<br /><br />Well we didn't did we. And in May 2009 when I first went across to Lewisham to 'have a look, see if there is a way of solving it' (as was my brief) it was pretty obvious that we never would. As I later learned from the decision logs, virtually everything for the past 11 years had been based on DNA. Even when on occasion some creativity or lateral-thinking was employed, it was getting scientists to try to discern ancestry or physical characteristics from the DNA profile. It was all about the DNA.<br /><br />Essentially, the theory was that we knew some things about our man - gender, race, approximate age - and some other facts might be assumed from witness testimony - rides a motor bike (which Grant didn't), has a connection with Brighton (which Grant did), had his mother die in 2000 (which Grant didn't). Add to that detective nous - he must be able to be 'unseen' in the street, must do reconnaissance during the day, and a little behavioural psychologist profiling - will have previous convictions for burglary (Grant didn't), won't be married (he was, 3 times), will be a loner with few friends (he certainly wasn't) and it would be easy. From the overall pool of suspects, all the black men in south-east London born between 1945 and 1976, apply the above criteria and then you'll have a list of people you need to get DNA from, one of whom will be your suspect.<br /><br />But the practice was very different. First, the unfiltered pool was populated by many whose experience of contact with the Met Police was less than satisfactory. That is just a fact of history - they were not treated very well by the Police in the 60s, 70s & early 80s. [Perhaps the Met shpould apologise for that?] Which meant that many refused as a matter of principle, or out of mistrust. Every time this happened a decision had to be made - arrest or not? On the basis the real suspect might well also have declined, this was a tricky choice which had to be justified in every case, but also one which sapped the energy and time of the team.<br /><br />The task of getting a DNA sample from each of more than 20,000 men was made more difficult, more hopeless, by two other crucial factors. First, the prioritisation of who to swab first was, it seemed, ever-changing. Imagine a deck of cards, dealt out one by one until the King of Hearts was turned up. Only this deck had 21,000 cards, and the King of Hearts was missing, I don't know, perhaps lost down the back of the sofa. Every few months whoever was in charge at that time would see a new possibility - perhaps from a recent offence, perhaps from some other wise old Detective's suggestion - and call all the cards back, shuffle them again and begin once more to deal. In my first week 'looking at' Minstead all the supervisors on the team were again led through this by the Senior Investigating Officer. Except all the time Delroy Grant wasn't just hiding down the back of the sofa, he was burgling, raping, assaulting and robbing the elderly.<br /><br />The second thing which appalled me in May 2009 was the size of the team. Or, more precisely, the lack of size of the team. MInstead had been culled in 2004 when officers had to be plundered from HSCC to bolster Safer Neighbourhood Teams. Having already cut 3 murder teams, when Sir Ian came calling again Minstead felt the knife and was halved in size. Effectively in May 2009 there were 8 people trying to get all these DNA swabs. In my first week they returned with one solitary swab. As we then had 5,200 men on the priority list the arithmetic was striking - at that rate it was 100 years of work.<br /><br />Added to this, every time there was a new offence the same handful of officers had to respond, to do the initial enquiries, the house to house, the CCTV retrieval - everything that a murder team would do, with not even a third of the staff. And a murder team would usually take one investigation at a time and then not be given another for 6 weeks or so; Minstead sometimes had 3 a night, often 2 and once even 5. They simply could not cope, and thus a fiction had evolved, whereby offences which were plainly part of the series were discounted on pernickety and often spurious grounds, left to be investigated by the Borough. Which also meant they were not part of the official Minstead statistics, not part of the crime pattern analysis and most crucially not available to be cited as a reason for increasing resources. So the circle continued.<br /><br />I reported these things upwards pretty quickly; why it took so long for them to be changed is another question and one I cannot answer. It was not, though, through lack of trying on my part. (The same goes for some individual instances of malpractice and inappropriate behaviour I found and reported - that is a related but different story.) What is undeniable though is that once we acted less like a murder squad and more like a burglary squad, once we forgot DNA and remembered observations, once we were looking for the Nightstalker on the streets at night and not in a database during the day time, we got him. The tragedy is that it took so long.<br /><br />I haven't yet mentioned the missed opportunities being spoken of all over the media, so I must do briefly. The 1999 event is headlining because it was referred to the IPCC, and it is shocking because not only did a Minstead officer fail to do his job correctly but so did the Borough. Minstead or not there was a burglary with a registration number and a therefore a named suspect which was never properly investigated. Am I alone in thinking that a mistake which has the wholly unforeseen but wholly unacceptable consequences of letting Delroy Grant escape and offend for a further decade is deserving of a sanction more serious than 'Words of advice'? Unless those words advise the location of the local Jobcentre perhaps.<br /><br />The 2001 opportunity is discounted by some, but for the wrong reasons. It may well be that the suspect suggested by a member of the public in 2001 was not the Nightstalker Delroy Grant, nor the 'wrong' one concerned in the 1999 error, but a third man of that name. It really doesn't matter. The point is that the research on that occasion was conducted by the ever-reliable PC Tony Briggs, whom I name because he did the right thing, as usual. He reported that he could not be certain that the Delroy Grant named in the phone call was the same man as the one in the 1999 incident. I should have thought that sufficient to alert the decision-makers to the need for a review of the 1999 action, and that is the missed opportunity.<br /><br />In 2003, quite simply, a victim of Delroy Grant told officers that she thought her assailant might be a mini-cab driver from the local office she used. At that time Delroy Grant did indeed work at that firm. This was written up for action, to research the drivers at the firm, but a decision made not to proceed with the line of enquiry because officers were, and I paraphrase, too busy trying to get DNA swabs from black men with licences to ride motor cycles. This is not 20:20 hindsight, but a simple matter of investigative acumen. What was more likely to return a result, and quickly - looking to swab many hundreds if not thousands of men, one of which may or may not be the suspect, or looking at 20 or 30 men who work at a firm, where a victim who has actually seen the suspect at close quarters, thinks he might work? I believe it was a missed opportunity every bit as shameful as the 1999 episode.<br /><br />Where do we go from here? What is important is that this is all never to happen again. For me, top of the list is that those who are the decision-makers in major investigations realise that an unknown DNA profile is conclusive evidence of presence, and so often of guilt, but that it is a very blunt, unsophisticated and ultimately unsuccessful means of identifying a suspect from a large population. Mass screenings seldom work, often deflect focus and always cost the earth.<br /><br />I hope the Met learns other lessons, there are many, many things within Operation Minstead to consider, and which would make this already lengthy blog post intolerably hard work for all of us. However, I worry that the credibility of their internal search for enlightenment will be hard-won. Unless they have changed things since I left in November 2010, the officer in charge of reporting on the learning from Minstead is the officer who was its Senior Investigating officer from 2001 until I took over in October 2009. I don't think that is healthy either for him or the Met, but my observations fell on deaf ears. I really don't want to see them apologising again.</span></span>Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-66195931096560052882011-03-07T10:03:00.000-08:002011-03-07T10:43:26.748-08:00Police don't criminalise people, people doMany years, indeed a whole career ago, I made an important decision. Despite my choice of A-levels, university and degree all being aimed at a career in the law, I chose instead to join the Police. Instrumental in this decision was my experience in working for a firm of solicitors, and the strange, illogical and almost perverse pleasure I encountered in some lawyers when they used their undoubted skill, training and experience to engineer acquittals when even an 18 year-old view of the world thought it obvious that the community would be far better off with someone locked away. It was a side of the line where I knew I could not in all conscience have been happy.<br /><br />Every now and then a member of the Bar or a solicitor does me the favour of reminding me how that decision was so correct. The latest, according to the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/mar/06/met-police-criminalising-generation-students">Guardian website</a>, is Ruth Hamann of Hodge,Jones & Allen - a firm which evidently specialises in the law of protest. Essentially, the firm are claiming that the Metropolitan Police are criminalising students by issuing an 'excessive number' of cautions for aggravated trespass, arising from the recent tuition fee protests. It has always been my perhaps simplistic view that Police don't criminalise people, people do (with apologies to Goldie Lookin Chain). The law is there, you choose to break it, you're a criminal. The police just clear up the mess - or at least a percentage of the mess, I suppose.<br /><br />But more than this, I am shocked and a little disappointed that Ms. Hamann is quoted thus: <br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">"This may dissuade some young people from attending subsequent protests for fear that they might be charged with an offence and required to attend court".</span><br /><br />Now, if we start on the premise that cautions can only be administered where the cautionee admits the offence, then we must presume mustn't we that each caution results from a committed offence. In which case the excessive number of cautions might be two or more per offence, but just the one would seem to me to be about right - and certainly not excessive.<br /><br />Adult cautions for offences were introduced in the 1980s not only to take cases out of the over-burdened courts system, but also to give first-time offenders the chance to appreciate the advantages of mending their ways without going to court and getting a proper conviction. If, as Ms. Hamann observes, students who find themselves cautioned then refrain from committing further offences, or indeed find themselves dissuaded from attending events such as these marches where the likelihood of offending seems to be increased, then is this a Bad Thing? Or is it just the cautioning system working as it was designed to? And therefore a reason for a solictor - 'An Officer of the Court' - to celebrate a feature of our creaky, over-sophisticated, under-resourced criminal justice system that actually works as it was meant to, rather than carp about it.Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-80037468362626844032011-02-10T01:40:00.000-08:002011-02-10T02:28:32.104-08:00"Congratulations! You win the keys to an Austin Allegro."<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBSXf2rt9Evn9zX4gMbFA4-KqIPjcBjRwA7KcvfBlc8Ie1CiSK4L60JssL4_nq-UzQI0Ab3xxKH8kMM48wEyvqKKRY6uoIthqk6g5i9kw0GTGScEIWRJL9FrdQyrOi1KJX038F6IUjRng/s1600/allegrosmall.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBSXf2rt9Evn9zX4gMbFA4-KqIPjcBjRwA7KcvfBlc8Ie1CiSK4L60JssL4_nq-UzQI0Ab3xxKH8kMM48wEyvqKKRY6uoIthqk6g5i9kw0GTGScEIWRJL9FrdQyrOi1KJX038F6IUjRng/s200/allegrosmall.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5572002850883717026" /></a><br />A very unusual title, but let me explain. In the early 1980s there was a very large, very loud and very brusque DCI. And that was the phrase he uttered when a detective had messed up, though I don't think he actually said 'messed'. He was true to his word; within days if not hours the unfortunate officer would don a dusted-off uniform and be patrolling the (then not so mean) streets of north London in one of British Leyland's finest Panda cars.<br /><br />Somehow over the last 30 years the Police Service lost that ability, that preparedness to judge and then to act upon it. Following the thinking that saw competitive sport replaced by trampolining in our schools and our educational qualifications being watered down so as to be almost meaningless, nobody could be labelled a loser. Blame became a dirty word, followed quickly by responsibility. While Police Officers would rightly be sacked for corruption, dishonesty or criminal acts, making mistakes was forgivable, almost acceptable.<br /><br />However, lest we appeared arrogant, a way had to be invented to show our acceptance of failings but without picking on the individuals and their errors which had caused them. A lead was given by the Macpherson report, with its now almost infamous construction of the concept of 'institutional racism'. Here was the answer - the organisation can blame itself, take the criticism, promise to change and to do better, but leave the individuals alone, irrespective of what they had done. This was obviously the correct stance where some feature of the organisation's methods were to blame, but it was realised it could also be used even in those cases where the organisation wasn't really at fault - where the processes and protocols were sound, it was just that they weren't followed.<br /><br />The Met, or at least certain sections of it, have invented a buzz-phrase for this - 'organisational contrition'. And in most cases now, that is as far as it will go. We have seen it already in relation to demonstrations and some investigations - the ACPO officer saying sorry in front of the revolving sign is now a common sight. <br /><br />There is a high-profile case currently sub-judice where I am pretty certain these issues will become very public, but that of course must wait. However, as the resurrected phone-hacking investigations gets underway, the line is that there will be a new strategy, new tactics - but woe betide anyone who concludes from this that the original investigation was flawed. The new one is different, that's all, not better. <br /><br />DAC Sue Akers who is heading it is an experienced, smart and practical officer, whom I admire and respect. We can have every confidence that the investigation will now be progressed thoroughly. But although there might appear to have been a reluctance to act in the past, a lack of progress despite information being available and so the possibility of errors having been made, we shouldn't expect finger-pointing. I doubt any detective will have won the keys to a Vauxhall Astra.Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-980731634863813648.post-55461343338902475272011-02-10T01:04:00.001-08:002011-02-10T02:42:40.318-08:00Blair was right shock!No of course not Tony, but Lord, formerly Sir Ian, of that ilk. Of the seven Commissioners I served he was my least favourite, since I believe he caused damage to the structure, the culture, the aims and the reputation of the Force. But when he drew attention to how the media treated murder victims differently according to their background, I felt at the time he was probably correct - even if he expressed it a little too controversially.<br /><br />In the last eight weeks we have witnessed what he meant. Two tragic murders - those of Joanna Yeates in Bristol and Nikitta Grender in Newport have it seems been separated by much more than the Bristol Channel, and illustrated his point perfectly.<br /><br />If one were to compare the basic facts of these two murders there are certain similarities. Two young women, attractive, unmarried, murdered in their own homes. If anything, Nikitta being about to bear a child (which, of course, was also a victim of the murder) and the callousness of the attempt to burn her and her home after the murder ought, one might think, to make her crime slightly the more outrageous, the more newsworthy.<br /><br />But while Joanna's murder was at the top of the news for many days, coverage of Nikitta has been very low key. So what are the differences in their cases which might have influenced this? Yes, the Christmas period during which the investigation into Joanna's disappearance and death was largely played out might have been quieter for other news; the very fact that such a tragedy occurred over the most important Christian religious period may have added a poignancy to the tragedy too. But isn't the real difference exactly what Lord Blair was alluding to? Put simply, using a perhaps old-fashioned concept, it was their class.<br /><br />Joanna was 25, had studied, got qualifications - she was an Architect, so we were repeatedly told. (In fact she was a landscape architect, a very different occupation and one which wouldn't perhaps have had the same cachet and therefore impact?) She came from a middle-class family, rented in a nice part of town, had a middle-class boyfriend and eloquent friends and family willing to speak to the media.<br /><br />Nikitta was 19, eight months pregnant (though unmarried, as we were reminded on a few occasions) and lived on a council estate. Her mother spoke via a statement read by police; her friend was interviewed on national news wearing a dressing gown. In daytime. The coverage was scant given the gravity of the crime; what there was did everything to promote an image of a typical (?) sink-estate unmarried teenage mother-to-be. A stark contrast to the features of Joanna's life and background which had been accentuated.<br /><br />Murder detectives, to a man and woman, strive to solve their cases completely irrespective of the nature of the victim. It would be impossible to do otherwise - the reality of murders, especially in London, is that victims are all too often involved in drugs, gangs, prostitution or other lawful but 'alternative' lifestyles. Were value judgments made on the victim's worthiness then very little would get done. I find it a pity that the media are not as inclusive in the way they deal with these tragedies. I am genuinely interested - is it merely a commercial thing? Do murders of middle-class women sell more papers?Colin Suttonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12443653685492440766noreply@blogger.com0