Today is Yesterday's Tomorrow

I was drinking with a good friend and colleague of mine recently, and ended up thinking back to my college days. My first kiss was from a girl a couple of years older than me, called Denise.
Her Dad ran the local scrapyard.
The song "Stuck on You" by Lionel Richie was playing and I was frankly terrified.
And slightly bemused, if I'm completely honest.

Anyway, shortly afterwards she broke up with me and went out with my mate Dale. Dale was shorter than most people of our age, but a great footballer. Fair's fair.

Fast forward a year or two (ok, maybe quite a lot more) and I've had my fair share of break ups and break downs.

The interesting thing is that I've managed to break up with and be broken up with, and on each occasion I've managed to do it without involving the Police.
Yet, I often feel I'm in a minority there. As any Police Officer knows, no matter how ridiculous you may think your 'issues' are, our informants from our calls can always beat them.

There is almost nothing that will not be sent down to a patrol unit to deal with. Unfortunately, if a call is a "type 29" - ie a domestic, then a unit will have to attend. Regardless of whether a crime has been committed or even alleged. In fact, regardless if a crime is even possible.
A domestic type call is anything that refers to a call between a husband and wife, boyfriend and girlfriend, exes of any description, siblings, parents, family members and any sexual partners past and present.

In the incestuous estates we inhabit on our day to day patrols, these are most of our suspects, victims and witnesses.

As soon as the domestic tag is applied to a call, then everything that follows is out of our hands. If we attend and there is no allegation at all, no injuries, no hint of violence, then we only have to do the following: Full statement from each party involved; A statement from the officer on scene; A twenty six page domestic violence book; A Full 'non-crime' Crime report on the computer (taking between forty five minutes and an hour and half dependant on typing skills); A seperate computer report on any children or vulnerable people in the premises or involved in any way. So you result the call, justifying your actions. Then complete all the above, justifying your actions. Then you bring all the above to your Sergeant, so he or she can then justify your actions.

Keep in mind that these are for NON crimes. When there has been a crime or an allegation made, then obviously you arrest and all the above is used as evidence.

Amongst the many, many calls I have been to needing all the above for a non-crime domestic are a psychic wife who had had visions that something bad was going to happen to her husband, a woman who had called police because her boyfriend wouldn't get off the computer (relatively common, that), a woman who had called police as her boyfriend had cheated on her and wanted him arrested for it, and many, many "threats" by text. Of the "u slag u shaged tracy an shes got hiv i hop u get cancr" type.

Examples from other officers are always welcome.

I'm in a stable relationship at the moment, but even in my worst relationships I have never felt the need to call my colleagues down to join in. In fact, I've always wanted to keep my private life... well, private.

Am I alone in this?

PR Procedure

Here in Metland.com, we used to have a control room per division.
It was only two years ago that the Met "upgraded" and got rid of all the local control rooms. Now we have a set of call centres where people, often with no local knowledge and no background to the area they are working on, try and despatch calls and keep a lid on the officers on the ground.
Most importantly, they're the ones that get help to me when I call for it.

As you can imagine, most of us hate the new system and long for the days of the CAD (Computer Aided Despatch) room back, so you could pop in at 0300hours and share a doughnut and a chat.
The advantages were huge - the local CAD room knew each officer, knew who was hard working and who needed a prod, who needed to be referred to the Sergeants and who could deal with what call well. They knew when someone was taking the mick, and also knew when to give an officer space - eg not sending an officer with a recent bereavement to report a sudden death.

They also had local knowledge, and so when a call came out even before any intel checks were done, often the controller would pipe up "Units running to this call, that's Danny Banksies address, be aware that last time we had to get the short shields out as he had a knife." Things that are done through intel checks now, but often too late. And intel checks can never replace the indepth personal knowledge most of our control room staff had.

However, what I miss most is something else completely. Before our transition away from local CAD rooms to our centralised 'Metcall,' our radio channels were not routinely recorded.
Add this to the many varied relationships that sprung up in the team, often between coppers and civvy staff in the control room.

That would mean you could sigh with joy at exchanges like the following near the end of a shift:
BX: "Any unit free to deal with an I grade call, a type 29 at Johnson Square House, male assaulting female now with sounds of disturbance?"
BX21: "Bravo X-ray, show Bravo X-ray two one to your last call."
BX: "Received."
Pause.
BX: "Bravo X-ray two one receiving Bravo X-ray?"
BX21: "Go ahead."
BX: "Steve, if you're home late then you can drive yourself to the bloody pub tonight. Bravo X-ray out."

Domestic harmony on the way to a domestic. Bliss.
Sorely missed in my opinion.

Patience = Low

"Bravo X-ray two-two, Bravo X-ray two-two, an 'I' grade call now, Brixley High Street, PI Accident. Car versus motorbike."
"Received, show X-ray two two D-delta to your last - but we're running from the opposite end of the divsion"
"Received"

A two minute pause

"Bravo X-ray, show Bravo 2 to your last as well. We're clearing the last call and not too far"
"Received. Bravo X-ray two-two, can you cancel to your last? We've got another immediate grade call, this time at 27 Letsby Avenue for a confirmed sequential alarm."
"Bravo X-ray, we can, but we've just made our way through traffic away from that last location."
"Received, there's no one else - I'll send it through."

Another two minute pause.

"Bravo X-ray from Bravo 2 - sorry, we've had to 54 the vehicle with a flat tyre. Can you cancel us from the last?"
"Received. Bravo X-ray two-two, can you re-attend the Brixley High Street call please to the Persons Injured accident?"
"X-ray, received. We are nearly TOA on the other call though."
"Received, sorry to do this to you but there's no one else shown."

Three minutes pass.

"Bravo X-ray two-two, you can cancel to your last. LAS on scene and stating no injuries, drivers exchanging details and no obstruction."
"Received Bravo X-ray. We're going to stop for a break, my operator's started to feel sea sick with all this too-ing and fro-ing, and we're due refs."
"Um, X-ray two-two - can you just quickly deal with the other outstanding immediate call on your way back...?"

Yes. This is how I often spend my day. Although I dealt with quite a bit of self created incidents I came across direct, after twelve hours of rushing about today I actually resulted the grand total of one call.
A threats by text domestic from an ex-boyfriend's new partner.

Knife Crime

This post will probably make me unpopular with the public and the Police equally, but knife crime is in the news so much at the moment it seems daft to leave it alone.

There has recently been a 75 strong anti-knife crime unit set up by the Met to help out, and good luck to them. I do have to wonder where the seventy five officers came from though, and whether another desperately short team is now even more desperate.

On our response teams, we can also prevent knife crime. Until our numbers were so sorely depleted, we used to put out Q-cars, a plainclothes unmarked car, every night duty and some day shifts. I haven't seen one put out by our team in months.
CID and the Robbery Squad also used to go out hunting, but their hours and staff have been reduced to the point where CID especially are struggling to keep up with their workload that is already on their plate when they come in. Sometimes our night duty CID cover is one lone officer, and I don't expect him to start scouring the street for knife carrying feral gangs alone.

We struggle on our response team to put out the numbers and get to the calls, as I have talked about recently. This means that proactive patrolling, although the most enjoyable part of policing, is rarely if ever done.

But we know where the knives are. Any street copper who has worked years in the same area knows where the gangs hang out, where the knives are carried, and who regularly carries them.

Although this is unfashionable, some officers are scared. Not all of us, all the time - but scared we sometimes are.
When we approach these groups, there can be more of them in one place than every single officer in the division. And some, if not most of those officers will of course be dealing with other things. So we know that if it comes down to a real violent situation, in the short term we will lose.
We still approach them, and still get assaulted of course, but it does put you in a thoughtful mind sometimes. Sometimes the control room will not even let you approach groups if you put up you're going to go after them.
We're scared of complaints - we're told we're harassing people. This we are, but that is because, as I said, we know where these knives are - but turn up in a marked Police vehicle with officers in uniform, and most people will have plenty of time to ditch or hide their weapons before our approach.
Often we use stop search as a deterrent, as a nuisance rather than a finding exercise.

When we get lucky, and get someone who is armed and arrest them, we hit the next problem. There will be no handover team if it is weekend, evening, or night (and the handover teams are so busy that often they can't take the jobs on during the day).
So that is probably you and another officer off the road for the rest of the shift. Plus any further enquiries you many need to make before the court case. I am assuming they are charged.

This means that whilst you are sat inside dealing with your body, you cannot deal with the constant, frantic calls that are being put out. Knife fights, serious assaults, domestics, serious car accidents, pub fights, sudden deaths... all are coming out over the radio and you can not assist with any of them.
Neither can your colleagues. They are either tucked up with arrests of their own, or already at or on the way to calls. There are ALWAYs calls outstanding, some hours old.

Don't misunderstand me - my colleagues and I want to arrest people carrying weapons. We want to drag self created arrests in, and do more than just respond to calls. But we don't have the time and resources, and until a more efficient way of dealing with arrests is put into place, this is not going to change.

Like most Police bloggers, I don't think we need more police officers per se. What we need is those officers out on the streets, providing a visible presence, and getting in the way of the persistant criminals. And we need to be helped to do our jobs, rather than constantly hindered in the execution of our duty.

If that happens, then simple - knife crime, and many other types of crime, will fall.


EDIT - the link to the news story where the photo above came from is here. It is a scary set of photos, showing incredibly brave, unarmed officers dealing with an armed, angry, dangerous individual with mental health problems.

Beach

For the past two weeks I have been hundreds of miles away from the Big Smoke, sunning myself on the beach and topping up my sunburn.

During this time I have acheived zero detections, I have dealt with no domestics, arrested no one, put on no crime reports and managed not to get sworn at, spat at or assaulted.


Of course I am looking forward to going back to work...

Fin.

Kitchen Nightmare

As we meandered our way through the streets, enjoying the lull between the pub kick outs and the night club kick outs, the radio crackled into life, shattering the fragile peace.

"Bravo Xray 21 or any other Bravo Xray unit now, units to attend Johnson House, Hackett Street, abandoned phone call with sounds of a disturbance, on an 'I' grade."

An 'I' grade call is the top priority for calls in The Met.

I called up: "BX23 to your last," and two other units (amazingly) were also free and answered up for the shout.

I arrived on scene at the same time as one of the other units, and called our TOA (time of arrival) on the radio. As I climbed out I saw that the other unit was being driven by a good friend of mine, Sam. I winked at him as we parked up by his car, close enough to make him have to get out of the passenger door. All four of us walked to the block, a new build that I'd never been to in a nice part of the division, with controlled electronic access.

There was no answer to the door buzzer, but a neighbour let us in after we had hammered on her downstairs window for a while. As we entered the block, sounds of shouting drifted down the stairwell and I started to run, as did the boys with me.

What we should have done was got the lift.

As we wheezed up to the address on the fifth floor, a woman was standing outside. She seemed worried but not frantic, and the shouting had stopped. "Thanks for coming so quickly officers, Joe is inside and he's gone a bit funny again, I just need him out before he breaks something else. Or starts playing with the kitchen knives again."
We paused. Sam and I swapped a look. I decided to try what we like to call "investigating."
Area: "You say Joe has gone funny... What exactly does 'funny' mean?"
Strangely Calm Woman: "He sometimes gets little bad patches. That's all."
Area: "You said 'again.' What happened last time?"
SCW: "Well, the police were very understanding really, no one really got badly hurt."

There was a sound as Gary, twenty years old and with a hand on the door knob about to go in to the address let go of the handle as though it was hot, took a step back and buried his chin into his protective vest thoughtfully.

And then the shouting started again, punctuated with crashes from the house. It sounded like there were two very pissed off people having a major argument.

Area: (slowly) "Who else is in there?"
SCW: "No one. Just Joe."

Deep breath. Sam gripped the handle and opened the door to the address. "Brave man," I thought. Sam looked at me, and beckoned me forwards.
Sam: "After you."

Oh. Bugger.

Joe was naked. Bleeding from a scratch on his neck. Six foot two in height, slim build, bulging darting eyes. And stationary in the middle of the kitchen.

I thought back to the comment about kitchen knives. We fanned out around our side of the room, and I attempted some light conversation.
Area: "Er, Joe I presume? Watched the football today?"
Joe: (Breathing heavily) "No."
Area: "Ah, right, me too. Um, having a bad day today Joe? Would you like to see a doctor or talk to someone about it?"
Joe: "No."
Area: "Ok, fine, good." I searched the room frantically with my eyes for inspiration, and noticed a crucifix on the wall with a plaque beneath it.
Area: "You a church goer Joe?"
Joe: "Yes. Jesus talks to me. So does God."
Area: "That's nice..."
Joe: "He's talking to me now. That's why I'm being nice to you."

Oh Hell's bells.

The problem in this situation is that we have the power to section people under the mental health act, but not inside their own homes. And he wasn't committing any offences by smashing up his own flat. We continued to chat, in broken fractured syntax as calmly as possible, trying to keep Joe from hearing any bad messages from God.

Gary was pushed out of the way, and two Ambo staff strolled in. Joe shifted slightly and I heard rather than saw Sam draw his asp and hold it by his leg.
Ambo 1: "Evening Joe. Have you been causing trouble again?"
Joe: "Sorry."
Ambo 2: "Haven't been here for a while Joe. You coming down to the Hospital now Joe?"
Joe: "OK."
Ambo 2: "Come on then mate."

We stared in silence, feeling more than slightly inadequate as the LAS crew led Joe out to the Ambulance. We followed the Ambulance up to the hospital, and whilst Joe was talking happily to a Nurse, I asked the crew how they had managed it.
They laughed.
Ambo 1: "Well, we've been there before. He decided to kick off one time, and so we kicked him out of the ambulance until he behaved."
Area: "And that worked!?"
Ambo 2: "Well, it was 2am in the middle of January."

I love the LAS so much.

Jack's Back!

An add on to my post, Domestic 21.

Two days ago I had come back from a training day, got off the train and climbed on to a bus, when who should I see but Jack.

With ANOTHER WOMAN!

They were holding hands.

He didn't recognise me, and I sat behind him as they chatted on the bus. I kept thinking - Will Kate find out? What will happen if she does?

It's just like Eastenders.

Scrambled Egg

In Custody. Dealing with an arrest too boring to give the details of.

It was office hours, so there was a chance I may be able to hand over the arrest to a specialist investigation team - or failing that, a poor frustrated probationer who has been ordered to work on the Prisoner Processing Team.

It also meant that there were members of the Senior Management Team on duty. This means they can walk up to you whilst you are trying to negotiate with a drunken prisoner for his draw strings from his tracksuit bottoms, and ask you what you think of the current "divisional priorities." Or even ask you what they are.

I was attempting to write my notes, when an officer with silver and gold spread liberally on his shoulders approached me. A space cleared around me, as other coppers made good their escape. The custody sergeant started to type frantically and buried his head towards the computer screen.

I was on my own.

Senior Officer: "Hello there, er... what have you got in today?"
Area: "An arrest sir."
SO: "Ah good, with a detection I hope?"
Area: "No sir, I'm afraid not."
SO: "Ok, well there is a push on them at the moment, we are all being measured on our personal performance when it comes to getting arrests and detections."
(WE are not being measured on our personal performance for that. I am being measured on my personal performance.)
SO: "What's that on your shirt, on the radio loop?"
Area: "A tie pin sir, a charity one."
SO: "Well, that may be so, but you shouldn't wear it - any personal statement like that can cause offence to other groups."
Area: "It's an NSPCC tie pin sir - who will it cause offence to? Paedophiles? I thought we wanted to make their lives uncomfortable?"
Custody Sergeant (in emergency live saving mode): "Er, Area, can you get your prisoner out of the cell, I need to talk to him urgently. Now, Area."

The tie pin has gone now, but not for the guvnor - I broke it in a fight with a drunken wife of a man we'd arrested for beating her up, a week later.

Domestic 21

There are certain customers that all coppers know well, people that for some reason or another you have ended up dealing with more than anyone else on your relief. After a while, however reluctantly you end up taking a sort of ownership over them.

Kate is one of those people. I have been to my fair share of domestics at her address, rumbled in the streets with her drunken husband, dragged her out of bars and been to her "suicide attempts" that are nothing of the sort.

The flip side is that Kate, and her husband Jack both recognise me. On and off duty. I bumped into them in the supermarket a while back, which was unnerving.

I don't live in the manor I work in, and they had no reason to be there, but they were in my local supermarket. Both smiled and nodded, and stupidly I nodded back. Even more stupidly, on a reflex, I said "alright?"

So she told me. In great depth. Her relationship problems in full, with Jack besides her, grinning inanely.

Kate leant towards me, slyly. "I'm going to court against him next week."
I glanced at Jack, who smiled and nodded again. "Will you give evidence against him this time?"
Kate straightened up, with a satisfied look on her face: "Probably not."


Last week I was at Kate's house again. Jack had a large knife, and had decided to redecorate the living room with it.

Kate was chatting happily to another officer, whilst three of us stood outside the living room where Jack waited with his commando knife.

I edged the door open slightly. "Evening Jack."
I tried to take in as much as possible. Jack was sitting in the far corner, in an armchair with a large bowie knife on his lap, surrounded by beer cans. I figured with his semi prone position and the alcohol he had obviously consumed, I would have time to get the door shut if he went for me.

I opened the door wider.

"Hello offisher." Jack didn't look at me.
"How did court go, Jack?"
"Can't remember."
"Things not going well with you and Kate at the moment, Jack?"
My eyes took in the smashed mirror, the slashed curtains, the ripped sofas, the broken pictures and glasses on the floor.

Of course, this meant nothing. Any of those things could have been damaged at any point in the last seix months.

But.

"Jack, how about you put down the knife mate, it'll make this whole evening a lot simpler."
Jack looked at me for the first time, and he blearily tried to focus on me. I tried again: "Jack, put the knife down now!"
Jack looked hurt, and put the knife on the floor, then kicked it over to my feet. "You didn't have to shout."

As a calm and downcast Jack was led down the stairs of the block, I went to speak to Kate. She smiled tiredly at me. "Hello love. What's he been nicked for now?"
I stared at her. "You called us, Kate."
Kate paused, then shrugged. "Oh."
I attempted to gain a foothold of reality in the sheer cliff face of insanity that we were climbing together.
"Kate, do you want to make any allegations against Jack?"
Kate giggled, then burped. "No. Why would I?"
I paused, knowing that introducing any complex ideas at this stage would not be of any help. Sarcasm control to 'off.' "Kate, you called the Police. Jack had a knife, he was smashing up your flat. He's in handcuffs now in the meat wagon. What do you want to happen?"
"I'd like another drink."

Breach of The Peace it is then.

Zrobic Loda

Last night, I was at a call to a private premises. Without giving too much away, there was alcohol involved. And although there was one mother, there were as many dads as there were kids - and most called the dad/husband figures by their first name.

I had kindly left my partner to talk to the very drunk, half dressed behemoth that was supposedly the female victim of this call. She reminded me very much of one of Terry Pratchett's female trolls.

I was outside the flat, letting the wind play with the collar of my gortex jacket and idly wondering how long I would wait outside before the cold drove me back to the flat with the abusive drunken female troll.

Approximately until Hell froze over, if you were wondering.


As any member of any uniformed service will testify, if you stand still long enough you will get a crowd. For some reason, the less interesting the activity you are doing, the more likely it is you will get a large and dedicated following. In my case, it was of a group of young lads.

Area: "What's happening, lads?"
Lad 1: "Have you got a light, mate?"
Area: "No."
Lad 2: "Has someone been killed?"
Area: (sotto voice) "Not yet."
Lad 2: "Huh?"
Area: "Nothing".
Lad 3: "Have you ever shot anyone?"
Area: "Only for asking stupid questions."

This went on for a while - The boys were happy whilst distracted, and I realised that I could use as much sarcasm as I liked without causing offence.
However, something inside of me felt I should take the initiative.

Area: "So what do you want Father Christmas to bring you this year?"
Lad 1: "A Blowjob."
Area: "Ah... right..."

You and me both mate, you and me both...