On Apr 18, 11:40*am, Mr Thant
wrote:
On Apr 18, 10:55*am, Mizter T wrote:

I don't actually think that basing a critique of the Met on that event
- the killing of de Menezes - is particularly effective at all. Be in
no doubt, it was an abhorrent screw up of the first order, but to
extrapolate from this one very unusual event ideas about how other
more regular day-to-day policing happens in the capital is not a
strong argument at all.

Well no, because the worst part of that event was the reaction of Ian
Blair - the bull**** spewing on the first day and then the complete
lack of acknowledgement that there'd been any sort of **** up or that
the **** up was anything at all to do with him. It was just absolutely
astonishing, as was Ken's support of him*. One of the few good things
about Boris is the acknowledgement from day one that Blair is a
complete ****ing buffoon.

I've no idea if the new guy is any better, though the Met seems to at
least acknowledge they were in the wrong about the G20 stuff and the
image deleting story, which probably still isn't worth anything but is
a million times better than what happened with De Menezes.

Surely they've just been caught out more quickly, after saying that
they'd had no contact with Ian Tomlinson, there was no CCTV etc etc.
They began with the routine lies and coverups.

Now look out for stories that Ian Tomlinson was a paedophile or once
got caught for fare evasion, as if smears (as were made against de
Menezes) justify killing someone.

Mizter T wrote:
That's not to say that I endorse how more regular day-to-day policing
happens, but the notion that the Met are out there shooting innocent
people all the time is just plain daft and does nothing to help the
credibility of any argument - yet it is a point people make over and
over again. The Met's armed response units are out on the street 24/7,
they are unfortunately called out to particular incidents far too
often, and yet I understand it's far from common for them to pull a
weapon on anyone, and they hardly ever actually fire a shot.

Indeed. I forget exactly, but I recall reading that in the last 10
years or so they've (the Met) only shot 10 innocent people (or was it
20?). I never recall hearing, however, how many gun waving criminals they
managed to shoot in the same timespan. It'd be an interesting
comparison -- anyone got any accurate data?

#Paul

Mr Thant wrote:

Blair - the bull**** spewing on the first day and then the complete
lack of acknowledgement that there'd been any sort of **** up or that
the **** up was anything at all to do with him. It was just absolutely
astonishing, as was Ken's support of him*. One of the few good things
about Boris is the acknowledgement from day one that Blair is a
complete ****ing buffoon.

I've no idea if the new guy is any better, though the Met seems to at
least acknowledge they were in the wrong about the G20 stuff and the
image deleting story, which probably still isn't worth anything but is
a million times better than what happened with De Menezes.

(* can anyone explain what Ken's motive for this was?)


The reasons that Ken Livingstone supported Sir Ian Blair include:

(1) Blair did more than any previous Metropolitan Police Commissioner to
eradicate the institutional racism label that had dogged the force since
the Stephen Lawrence case;
(2) Blair did more than any of his predecessors to encourage the
recruitment of officers from ethnic minorities;
(3) Blair did more than any of his predecessors to encourage a paradigm
shift towards community policing (bobbies on the beat); and
(4) Blair encouraged the recruitment and retention of more capable
(better educated) senior officers rather than promoting the incompetent
on the basis of "Buggins' Turn".

Sadly, he proved to be a less than adept handler of the political side
of policing, ironically including his relationships with senior officers
from the ethnic minorities, and it was abundantly clear that his senior
staff had failed to keep him informed of the truth of the de Menezes
case, making him look a complete and utter fool.

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Fri, 17 Apr 2009, Mizter T wrote:

Whatever, the police really need to get their act in order.

Oh, you noticed that?

I am really utterly perplexed by how the police maange to get away
with being a bunch of incompetent thugs. Not that there aren't good
individual policemen, but there are certainly some very bad ones, and
the organisation as a whole is a disaster. It just seems that nobody
with the power to do anything about it gives a toss. Or has it just
not occurred to people that things could be any better?

The problem is that policemen who joined because they wish to uphold the law
feel outnumbered by policemen who joined because they wish to get away with
breaking the law - so outnumbered that they can't even enjoy mixing in the
staff canteen any more, and end up quitting the force.

Mizter T wrote:

I don't actually think that basing a critique of the Met on that event
- the killing of de Menezes - is particularly effective at all. Be in
no doubt, it was an abhorrent screw up of the first order, but to
extrapolate from this one very unusual event ideas about how other
more regular day-to-day policing happens in the capital is not a
strong argument at all.

I believe that was a significant event. In particular, since the Menezes
whitewash I have frequently seen police vehicles pull up at a red light,
wait for ten seconds, get bored, put on the flashing lights, drive through
the junction and then put the lights off again. I never saw this once in the
years before the Menezes whitewash. It might seem like a little thing, but
it's highly visible (unlike all the other things they might get up to) and
it suggests that the Menezes whitewash has changed the police's mentality
from "the law must be obeyed" to "*we* must be obeyed by *you*". Once a
police car even pulled up behind me in Greenwich town centre and put the
sirens on (at 3am!) causing me to drive through the red light out of their
way, and then they drove through the lights and put the sirens off. They
really couldn't care less, since Menezes.

On Apr 18, 12:08*pm, wrote:

Mizter T wrote:
That's not to say that I endorse how more regular day-to-day policing
happens, but the notion that the Met are out there shooting innocent
people all the time is just plain daft and does nothing to help the
credibility of any argument - yet it is a point people make over and
over again. The Met's armed response units are out on the street 24/7,
they are unfortunately called out to particular incidents far too
often, and yet I understand it's far from common for them to pull a
weapon on anyone, and they hardly ever actually fire a shot.

Indeed. *I forget exactly, but I recall reading that in the last 10
years or so they've (the Met) only shot 10 innocent people (or was it
20?). I never recall hearing, however, how many gun waving criminals they
managed to shoot in the same timespan. It'd be an interesting
comparison -- anyone got any accurate data?


Ten!? I don't think so. If we're going to have a discussion on this
topic then the least we could do is base it on accurate information.

Off the top of my head this is what I can think of - de Menezes of
course; Harry Stanley, the guy who had the table leg wrapped in a
plastic bag that police erroneously thought was a gun and who was shot
dead in Hackney; one of the men in the Forest Gate terror raid where
no terror was found who was shot in the arm and lived; the man who was
shot dead in Brixton because police mistook the gun-shaped cigarette
lighter he was holding for the real thing.

One could arguably look at the Stockwell and Forest Gate situations
somewhat separately from the others - that's absolutely not to excuse
them whatsoever, but they do not fall into the bracket of normal day-
to-day policing.

With regards to the incident in Brixton, I'm afraid to say that I can
see why it unfolded as it did.

The ten figure that you've come across might be some national figure
perhaps?

In message
"John Rowland" wrote:

Mizter T wrote:

I don't actually think that basing a critique of the Met on that event
- the killing of de Menezes - is particularly effective at all. Be in
no doubt, it was an abhorrent screw up of the first order, but to
extrapolate from this one very unusual event ideas about how other
more regular day-to-day policing happens in the capital is not a
strong argument at all.

I believe that was a significant event. In particular, since the Menezes
whitewash I have frequently seen police vehicles pull up at a red light,
wait for ten seconds, get bored, put on the flashing lights, drive through
the junction and then put the lights off again. I never saw this once in
the years before the Menezes whitewash. It might seem like a little thing,
but it's highly visible (unlike all the other things they might get up to)
and it suggests that the Menezes whitewash has changed the police's
mentality from "the law must be obeyed" to "*we* must be obeyed by *you*".
Once a police car even pulled up behind me in Greenwich town centre and
put the sirens on (at 3am!) causing me to drive through the red light out
of their way, and then they drove through the lights and put the sirens
off. They really couldn't care less, since Menezes.



Are you aware why they switch the sirens off once they have crossed the
junction?

--
Graeme Wall

This address not read, substitute trains for rail
Transport Miscellany at www.greywall.demon.co.uk/rail

In message , at 15:20:08 on Sat, 18
Apr 2009, John Rowland
remarked:
Once a police car even pulled up behind me in Greenwich town centre and
put the sirens on (at 3am!) causing me to drive through the red light
out of their way, and then they drove through the lights and put the
sirens off.

Sirens are not enough to allow someone to break the law by running a red
light. You need to be instructed to do so by a policeman in uniform,
which means you need to see that the people giving the instructions are
both police, and in uniform.
--
Roland Perry

On Sat, 18 Apr 2009, Tony Polson wrote:

Jeremy Double wrote:

Tony Polson wrote:
Tom Anderson wrote:

On Fri, 17 Apr 2009, Mizter T wrote:

Whatever, the police really need to get their act in order.

Oh, you noticed that?

The government is well aware of the problem. A couple of years ago it
tried to bounce police forces into merging into a much smaller number
of much larger forces. Unfortunately for the government, the police
rebelled, and so did the local councils whose ineffectual police
authorities may well be at the root of the problem.

I don't pretend to know whether bigger would be better, but the Home
Office seemed to be convinced that it was.

However, it's interesting that most of the complaints come from the
Metropolitan Police area, the same police force that shot an innocent
man on a tube train, and incidentally the biggest police force in the
UK.

True. It's also the force that leads nationally on anti-terror
operations. Worrying, isn't it?

I think the Bob Quick debacle, and the confusion over his accountability,
may be the final push that leads the government to set up a separate
police force to handle terrorism and so on. The foundation for it is
already there in the shape of the Serious Organised Crime Agency, and it
wouldn't be too hard to transfer over the Met's national
counter-terrorism, diplomatic protection, etc units. And then it could
absorb the MoD police, the security-related activities of the BTP, the
Civil Nuclear Constabulary, etc. And then hey presto, we have a British
FBI. Optimists would say that this would put these important operations
under the control of a more professional and specialised leadership, where
they can be properly run and supervised, but pessimists would say the
exact opposite - we'd have a runaway national police force which would
inevitably not have proper scrutiny.

tom

--
Teach us how to die well

On Sat, 18 Apr 2009, Mizter T wrote:

On Apr 18, 9:20*am, Jeremy Double wrote:

Tony Polson wrote:

Tom Anderson wrote:

[snip]

I am really utterly perplexed by how the police maange to get away with
being a bunch of incompetent thugs. Not that there aren't good individual
policemen, but there are certainly some very bad ones, and the
organisation as a whole is a disaster. It just seems that nobody with the
power to do anything about it gives a toss. Or has it just not occurred to
people that things could be any better?

The government is well aware of the problem. *A couple of years ago it
tried to bounce police forces into merging into a much smaller number of
much larger forces. *Unfortunately for the government, the police
rebelled, and so did the local councils whose ineffectual police
authorities may well be at the root of the problem.

I don't pretend to know whether bigger would be better, but the Home
Office seemed to be convinced that it was.

However, it's interesting that most of the complaints come from the
Metropolitan Police area, the same police force that shot an innocent
man on a tube train, and incidentally the biggest police force in the UK.

I don't actually think that basing a critique of the Met on that event
- the killing of de Menezes - is particularly effective at all. Be in
no doubt, it was an abhorrent screw up of the first order, but to
extrapolate from this one very unusual event ideas about how other
more regular day-to-day policing happens in the capital is not a
strong argument at all.

But we don't need to extrapolate to day-to-day policing. The activities of
the specialist central commands like the counter-terrorist guys and the
Territorial Support Group (ie riot police) can be criticised on their own.

Mind you, my experience of day-to-day policing in London is not great,
either. A while ago, i as approached by two guys in a car who asked me if
i wanted to buy a laptop, waving one at me, and who sped off when i said
no. I phoned the police to report the sale of stolen goods, giving the
plate number of the car, and the officer who took my call said he was
going to record it, but that basically, nothing would be done.

And yet they can still seem to find dozens of officers to police entirely
harmless Critical Mass rides (up until a few months ago, at least), and
enough to fill a quarter-mile line of vans for Arsenal matches. It's
almost as if the police saw public order as their job, with the prevention
and detection of crime as a sideline.

tom

--
There are lousy reviews, and then there's empirical ****ness. -- pikelet