Article in Mail about a bus driver who stopped outside a police
station to report two passengers smoking crack cocaine on the bus -
police didn't have anyone available, told to ring 999!
Full story:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...s.html?in_arti...

Still, there is always the CCTV - they can catch them later...


Perhaps not, East London Bus Group refused to release CCTV of the men
smoking on board, citing data protection laws.


Well if CCTV is not there to protect us from crime on public
transport, WHAT IS IT FOR?

On 11 Sep, 11:08, Jim Gemineye
wrote:
Article in Mail about a bus driver who stopped outside a police
station to report two passengers smoking crack cocaine on the bus -
police didn't have anyone available, told to ring 999!
Full story:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...s.html?in_arti...

Still, there is always the CCTV - they can catch them later...

Perhaps not, East London Bus Group refused to release CCTV of the men
smoking on board, citing data protection laws.

Well if CCTV is not there to protect us from crime on public
transport, WHAT IS IT FOR?

Your link's munged. However, there's nothing in the DPA to stop East
London releasing the pics to the rozzers (indeed, they're obliged to)
- presumably they actually refused to release them to the Daily
Wail...

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org

"Jim Gemineye" wrote in message
ups.com...
Article in Mail about a bus driver who stopped outside a police
station to report two passengers smoking crack cocaine on the bus -
police didn't have anyone available, told to ring 999!
Full story:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...s.html?in_arti...

Still, there is always the CCTV - they can catch them later...


Perhaps not, East London Bus Group refused to release CCTV of the men
smoking on board, citing data protection laws.

It wouldn't be evidence of this crime anyway they
could claim that they were smoking something
else and there is (now) no proof otherwise.

tim

On 11 Sep, 12:40, "tim....." wrote:
"Jim Gemineye" wrote in message

ups.com...

Article in Mail about a bus driver who stopped outside a police
station to report two passengers smoking crack cocaine on the bus -
police didn't have anyone available, told to ring 999!
Full story:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...s.html?in_arti...

Still, there is always the CCTV - they can catch them later...

Perhaps not, East London Bus Group refused to release CCTV of the men
smoking on board, citing data protection laws.

It wouldn't be evidence of this crime anyway they
could claim that they were smoking something
else and there is (now) no proof otherwise.

tim

Apart from a bus full of witnesses, no

That link should have been...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1770

It is possible the Mail is referring to release of images to the
newspaper and not the police - they've not made it clear.
However they have previously published CCTV images, so possibly these
have been supplied by the police.
In which case... ooops!

On 11 Sep, 14:26, Jim Gemineye
wrote:
On 11 Sep, 12:40, "tim....." wrote:





"Jim Gemineye" wrote in message

oups.com...

Article in Mail about a bus driver who stopped outside a police
station to report two passengers smoking crack cocaine on the bus -
police didn't have anyone available, told to ring 999!
Full story:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...s.html?in_arti...

Still, there is always the CCTV - they can catch them later...

Perhaps not, East London Bus Group refused to release CCTV of the men
smoking on board, citing data protection laws.

It wouldn't be evidence of this crime anyway they
could claim that they were smoking something
else and there is (now) no proof otherwise.

tim

Apart from a bus full of witnesses, no

That link should have been...http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...s.html?in_arti...

It is possible the Mail is referring to release of images to the
newspaper and not the police - they've not made it clear.
However they have previously published CCTV images, so possibly these
have been supplied by the police.
In which case... ooops!- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

It's not my imagination then - did paste all of it, must be line
length...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/
live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=481016&in_page_id=1770

On Tue, 11 Sep 2007 06:26:15 -0700, Jim Gemineye
wrote:


That link should have been...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1770

It's no wonder they copuldn't get any help from that police station!

"Jim Gemineye" wrote in message
oups.com...
On 11 Sep, 12:40, "tim....." wrote:
"Jim Gemineye" wrote in message

ups.com...

Article in Mail about a bus driver who stopped outside a police
station to report two passengers smoking crack cocaine on the bus -
police didn't have anyone available, told to ring 999!
Full story:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...s.html?in_arti...

Still, there is always the CCTV - they can catch them later...

Perhaps not, East London Bus Group refused to release CCTV of the men
smoking on board, citing data protection laws.

It wouldn't be evidence of this crime anyway they
could claim that they were smoking something
else and there is (now) no proof otherwise.

tim

Apart from a bus full of witnesses, no

Who are all fully in trained in knowing what crack
is?

They can get them for smoking on the bus sure,
but there is no allowable evidence that what they
were smoking is also illegal.

tim

James Farrar wrote:
On Tue, 11 Sep 2007 06:26:15 -0700, Jim Gemineye
wrote:


That link should have been...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...n_page_id=1770

It's no wonder they copuldn't get any help from that police station!

Of course if there had been some police officers doing nothing at the
station, the Mail would moan that they should have been out on the
streets and not waiting for buses...

--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK

On 11 Sep, 18:49, James Farrar wrote:
On Tue, 11 Sep 2007 06:26:15 -0700, Jim Gemineye

wrote:
That link should have been...
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...s.html?in_arti...

It's no wonder they couldn't get any help from that police station!

I shall explain James' comment for those who (scandalously!) might not
be up to date with the policing situation in Lewisham.

That is Ladywell police station - and it is now closed, replaced by
the vast new Lewisham Police station in Lewisham town centre, opened
as part of a rationalisation of policing in the borough of Lewisham.

I am a bit surprised that no coppers could be rustled out from within
the big new police station to help out. That said, perhaps those
allocated to being on patrol on the streets were in fact doing just
that - nonetheless you'd hope that a few officers sat round their
desks might relish the opportunity to go out and nick someone right
outside their front door.

The bit about the data protection laws preventing the release of the
CCTV is obviously about the bus company not releasing it to the
newspaper - of course the police would have (unrestricted) access to
it.

I know the Daily Mail's raison d'etre is to get people steamed up
about things, so I'm always cautious when confronting a story such as
this. Nonetheless the whole situation does all sound a bit of a
shambles - a bus driver who did the right thing and was keen to deal
with the crack-smokers on his bus didn't get the assistance he needed
from the police despite pulling up outside a large police station.

On 11 Sep, 19:56, "tim....." wrote:
"Jim Gemineye" wrote:

On 11 Sep, 12:40, "tim....." wrote:
"Jim Gemineye" wrote in message

Article in Mail about a bus driver who stopped outside a police
station to report two passengers smoking crack cocaine on the bus -
police didn't have anyone available, told to ring 999!
Full story:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/liv...s.html?in_arti...

Still, there is always the CCTV - they can catch them later...

Perhaps not, East London Bus Group refused to release CCTV of the men
smoking on board, citing data protection laws.

It wouldn't be evidence of this crime anyway they
could claim that they were smoking something
else and there is (now) no proof otherwise.

tim

Apart from a bus full of witnesses, no

Who are all fully in trained in knowing what crack
is?

They can get them for smoking on the bus sure,
but there is no allowable evidence that what they
were smoking is also illegal.

tim


I don't know what the legal situation is... however I'm in no doubt
that at least some of the other passengers and the driver knew it was
crack (and if not that knew it was an illegal drug). It's not hard to
spot - a basic crack pipe is a glass pipe with a bowl at one end, and
when burnt (i.e. smoked) it has a distinctive musty smell, although
it's subtle unlike weed.

Anyway I doubt that the police will be chasing these guys from having
viewed the CCTV images of them. The images might conceivably be kept
on file for intelligence purposes, perhaps this is more likely if the
coppers know who they are or at least know their faces.