Mark's Blog

We brits are a funny lot about the police we are ever so quick to criticize them all just because of the actions of a few in high profile events, but the minute our car is broken into we or we are attacked we turn to the police for help and assistance. Now providing help and assistance is what the police are there for and whilst we might not be happy when they don’t turn up mob handed for with SOCOs and forensics when someone breaks your window they help when really needed or when they can. I believe that most police officers joined the police force for the right reasons to serve the community they patrol, to help others and if needs be to put themselves in harms way to protect us, and for the vast majority of officers that’s what they do day in day out, often with little thanks from those they help.

I would never support blind obedience or lack of critical oversight of the police, however I think by and large myself included many of us need to give them a break. They are out there day after day dealing with violent and downright nasty people keeping the rest of us safe, I think many do become quite jaded and I can well understand there lack of trust with people giving them all sorts of sob stories as they probably get them everyday.

That does bring us to the other problems of the police and policing. I am going to refer to events as its easier to demonstrate the point. The first incident of recent years which there was a lot of controversy surrounding was the killing of Jean Charles De Menezes. Just to recap for those that aren’t from the UK or those that have already forgotten the case, Jean was a Brazilian living in London on the days after the 07/07 public transport bombings in London who was mistaken for a terrorist and shot on the tube. The Metropolitan police commissioner at the time was Ian Blair who was on TV on the hours after the shooting saying how it was great we got a terrorist, as emerged less than 24 hours later they had gotten the wrong guy what compounds this error is that the commissioner was publically saying that we had got a nasty terrorist even after doubts had been raised as to the identity of the individual concerned. To compound these lies at the inquest into the death of Jean it emerged that there were serious errors in the operation to tail the original target who was someone else living in the same block of flats. The individual who gave the kill order was never disciplined and in fact was promoted. The officers that were in the team that killed Jean were later suspected of lying under oath at the inquest, but this was never investigated.

I really don’t want to delve too deeply into the death of Ian Tomlinson as its a fairly recent case, a brief description is that a man unconnected with a demonstration that was going on at the time came into contact with police who were policing that demonstration. One of the officers attacked Ian(I won’t say is alleged to have attacked as the video footage is very conclusive) and it is believed that the injuries that were sustained in that attack were a direct contributory factor into Ian’s death. However due to a series of screw ups with an incompetent pathologist and the CPS taking too long to charge the officer concerned he will face no criminal charges. This is two very serious incidents where officers were directly responsible or were most likely directly responsible for the death of two people going about their everyday lawful business. These were not criminals or protesters just your average Joe going in one case too work and in the other coming home from work. I appreciate that the circumstances around the death of Jean Charles De Menezes were extreme but I hardly think its appropriate to promote someone who was responsible for such a major screw up. I also don’t think its right that a commissioner who was briefing the press with facts he knew were probably inaccurate and besmirching the character of an innocent man killed by his force did not face some sort of censure, in fact this man is now in the House of Lords I noticed earlier.

The final point I wanted to make is that the police tactics around demonstrators including the student demonstrators in London are disgusting and I am not just talking about the kettling either. FIT teams regularly harass people who have committed no crime but who demonstrate their displeasure of government policy or whatever other cause they are supporting. On the whole these are good law abiding people going about their lawful right to protest, they are not violent and just want to demonstrate as they are legally entitled to do. Unfortunately some dubious people use these well intentioned people as a cover to misbehave and smash things up. The organisers and members of the protest by and large hate these people abusing their day of action to cause trouble, however they distrust the police even more because of the intimidation which can include following people to their homes, around shops and work places, and all the while trying to engage them in conversation in such a manner as to intimate, harass and humiliate. These are just ordinary people who believe in something who want to peacefully let their opinions be known, and these are exactly the people the police need to have onside if they want decent intelligence on the troublemakers that turn up only to cause mayhem.

To conclude the police do an amazing and absolutely necessary job dealing with the sorts of people and incidents most of us would never want to have to deal with, I can imagine officers who help victims and investigate rape, child abuse and serious violence could be traumatised by having to deal with it day in and day out and its not something I think I could do. I’d like to be able to help people but I don’t think this is a way that would be easy for anyone. However there are some issues that really need to dealt with otherwise people will continue to lose faith in the integrity and dedication of all police officers. The community as a whole has to trust the police and part of that means that police officers like the the officer who attacked Ian Tomlinson need to be properly investigated and charged like any other member of the public. I can understand that the police have a difficult and no doubt at times frustrating job but any incident of unnecessary violence should be dealt with quickly the people need to see justice being done. As for the case of Jean I am not suggesting that anyone should have been charged criminally over the death, there are a lot of pressures involved with going after terrorists and the immediate aftermath of the July 2005 bombings that pressure must have been extreme, but when an operation screws up as badly as that the person in charge should never have been promoted, in fact I don’t thing a resignation was out of order in that case. Police officers lying under oath is a serious matter however, most criminal charges will involve police officers testifying under oath, if the public gain the impression that lying under oath is a common thing it could seriously undermine the trials of criminal suspects.

But remember if the police stop you that ultimately for most they are just there to protect and serve the public and to keep everyone safe even those that do nothing but complain about them