The Policeman's Blog

Buy my e-book and save the police (again!)

2010-12-06T10:31:00.001Z

Wasting Police Time* is now available on Kindle.

You don't need a Kindle itself to read it - you can download an 'app' onto your iPad/laptop/whatever.

UK readers should click on http://www.amazon.co.uk/Wasting-Police-Time-Crazy-World/dp/B004EHZXFM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&m=A3TVV12T0I6NSM&qid=1291282918&sr=1-1

Readers from the States, Canada, Australia and everywhere else in the world should click on http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=node%3D1286228011&field-keywords=wasting+police+time&x=0&y=0

* as endorsed by 'MTG'

JUST BACK

2010-09-18T18:22:00.005+01:00

Here are some photos from my hiking trip in Jasper:

We went at the end of August and according to park rangers were only the fifth party up into the area that year. Unfortunately our route changed a little because some of the trail was blocked with deadfall from old forest fires. The guidebook said that the area was 'impassable' but we made some progress. It says something about the size of the country that one of its largest and most popular national parks has areas that are so remote.

Here's the nearest we got to a Grizzly:

Just finished reading See No Evil by Robert Baer about the CIA. Very good, but you get the feeling that he's ranting about his old bosses refusing to take the terrorist threat seriously, by relying too much on satellite photos and not on old fashioned agents.

Just started A Shadow In the Cty by Charles Bowden which, so far, is utter crap.

ALBERTA OILFIELD TERRORISTS

2010-08-20T20:09:00.008+01:00

These pictures were taken in northern Alberta when some oilfield workers showed up one morning. It's not unusual to see elk, moose or deer, but bears are a little uncommon. Apparently these guys were in and around the jobsite for an hour before they finally wandered off into the bush.

THE BANK JOB

2010-08-19T15:53:00.003+01:00

Just finished reading Heist by Howard Sounes. In February 2006, a bunch of villains stole 53 million quid from a cash warehouse in Tonbridge, Kent by kidnapping the boss and his family and threatening to kill them unless he helped them steal the money. They also had an inside man.

Kent police were on to them pretty quickly, but not quick enough to let Paul Allen and the ringleader, Lee Murray escape to Morocco. About half the money was found, but the rest is spread between Northern Cyprus, Dubai and somewhere in the Carribean.

The book deals with the actual robbery, the police investigation and the court case. Despite what was printed in the press at the time, the villains weren't criminal masterminds but local buffoons who were incredibly lucky to get away with it (one of the robbers, Lea Rusha, actually had plans to the depot in his house when police raided it). In the end, 'Lightning' Lee Murray was sentenced in Morocco for his part in the heist and Paul Allen pleaded guilty back in the UK.

It's a cracking read (although probably not the best police book you'll ever read) and although it goes into some depth doesn't get bogged down the the details. While most police work in the UK involves petty stuff, it's interesting to see how a major investigation works and the amount of resources that can be devoted to it.

I had a minor role taking statements in the Great Kestrel House Heist of 2006, in the absence of anyone else to deal.

One of the few things I miss are the few remaining traditions of UK policing, like the suit wearing CID, the arcane language ('stolen by means of keys???') and the decent blaggings. We don't get much of that round here, mainly I suspect because all the CIT (Cash in Transit) drivers are armed. Also it's not as if you can do one bank in Calgary, then drive over to say, Winnipeg, and do one the following day because it's just too far.

MAPPED OUT

2010-08-10T20:56:00.003+01:00

I'm planning to walk 300 kilometres through the Rocky Mountains from Jasper to Kakwa Lake Provincial Park in a couple of weeks.

Just before I left the UK, I did the Pennine Way, which is just over 400 kilometres but there are some important differences. When I did the Pennine Way, although I took my own tent I could re-stock every couple of days as I went through villages along the way. I could also stop by a pub and have a pint if I felt like it. I stayed in campsites most nights and could have a hot shower.

On this walk, there are two of us going and there's absolutely nothing between where we start and where we finish so we've got to be self-sufficient for the whole journey. The trails aren't especially good either, so there might be a bit of bushwacking. On the upside, the scenery is amazing with big lakes, mountains, glaciers and the like.

The wildlife is pretty scary though, in the sense that on the Pennine Way the biggest aminal you're likely to meet is a deer that will run away as soon as it sees you. Over here, there's every chance you'll see a Grizzly which might not run off. To this end, I'm getting some bear spray and hoping for the best. A firearm is out of the question because part of the route goes through National Parks where they are banned.

Apart from the bear deterrent, I'm not taking much else that I didn't take on the Pennine Way. I'm bringing a length of rope for the river crossings, renting a satellite phone and investing in a Clark Jungle Hammock.

I'm looking forward to it and I'm right in the middle of getting the maps ready. Below you can see all my maps on the floor of the basement (which I spent the winter renovating). Looks quite a long way now!

BUSY WEEKEND.

2010-08-01T22:34:00.007+01:00

Here are some pictures I took at the flag football game between the EPS and EFD, in aid of the Stollery Children's Hospital.

Here's a picture of Barney, the EPS mascot:

Just to Barney's left is his bodyguard, an EPS cadet, who makes sure that Barney doesn't trip over his own feet. The lion is the mascot for D.A.R.E. , the popular North American anti-drug education program.

The game was on Saturday, and the police beat the firefighters as normal.

Today, I've been canoeing down the North Saskatchewan river, which runs through Edmonton. Here's a view...

We started at Devon and paddled all the way down to the Valley Zoo in just over four hours. This was taken inside the Edmonton city limits.

MOZZIES

2010-07-29T00:31:00.003+01:00

A combination of a wet July and now sunshine has brought out a plague of mosquitos. They all seem to have hatched yesterday on the same day.

It's like Hitchcock's 'The Birds' outside the car as we try to keep the windows closed to prevent the blighters from getting in.

Apparently this kind of thing is quite common, but because of the previous two dry years we haven't seen the mosquitos is such numbers.

A thorough application of mosquito repellant is essential and seems to work for the most part.

It's no good complaining though because in a few months the temperature will be below zero.

CAMPING

2010-07-26T01:39:00.003+01:00

Just back from camping for the weekend near Boyle, Alberta.

Went for a 8km run, before going for a swim in the lake (pictured below)

I'm getting ready for a 300km hike through the Rockies to the north of Jasper, sometime at the end of August/ beginning of September.

A WARM WELCOME

2010-07-25T10:21:00.000+01:00

...to readers of the Sunday Telegraph.

This blog has been resting for a while, but feel free to scroll back through previous posts.

If you want, you can read a free extract from Wasting Police Time here.

You can buy the book here (or at amazon.co.uk, or - in the UK - from most decent bookstores).

INAPPROPRIATE VIDEO ALERT

2010-03-25T15:25:00.001Z

They won't be showing this on any domestic violence course any time soon. It's still funny though....

FAREWELL THEN DIXON

2010-03-23T14:42:00.002Z

Interesting article from the BBC about changes in policing in the UK, especially the interview with ACPO President Sir Hugh Orde.

Having worked in the UK at the front line and now working in Canada, I can't believe how complicated things were when I was in the UK. Over the years you get used to the complexity and become an expert in your field; so whether you need a Somali interpreter at ten o'clock on a Saturday night in Kent, or the correct form for a racially motivated domestic assault in Leeds or you need to write off a bit of argy-bargy between two vulnerable adults outside a kebab shop in Cheam, you learn how to get round the problems while keeping just within the rules. When you suddenly find out that it could all be a lot simpler and all the skills that you thought you needed are now redundant, it can come as a bit of a shock. My magic book full of 'police only' phone numbers, obscure forms and logon instructions for rarely used computer applications was suddenly useless.

The other thing Sir Hugh was talking about was how police officers, with all their kit, look a bit like stormtroopers and are less approachable. I'm not sure the kit has got much to do with it really. I carry a gun, a couple of sets of handcuffs, spare ammunition, spray and a knife with a locking blade and people are always coming up to me to say hello, mainly because I've actually got the time to stop and chat

GAS GAS GAS

2010-03-22T15:02:00.002Z

Just filled the car up at 58 pence per litre.

At that price you'd have to mad to walk anywhere.

Doughnuts all round.

PHRASES YOU OFTEN HEAR

2010-03-20T21:39:00.002Z

The current fashion for letting people off as long as they promise not to do it again means that one is forever hearing the phrase, "But I've been doing really well.'

When I was young this meant that you were getting good grades, handing your work in on time, getting into a sports team or whatever. Nowadays it means that you've managed to not get caught committing crime for a while.

TOUGH TIMES

2010-03-17T14:03:00.003Z

Interesting story here in the Daily Mail about how 4,000,000 expats want to come home because life is now too expensive. It's mainly about how people with incomes in sterling are adversely affected by its decline, particularly pensioners.

When we came over a pound bought you about $2.00, but now, a little over 2 years later, a pound will get you only about $1.50. We obviously receive our income in local currency which is good for us when we visit the UK, but means that for family and friends in the UK, holidays in Canada are no longer the bargain they once were.

NEW ARRIVAL

2010-03-16T18:36:00.003Z

I'm told that my Norinco AR15 should be arriving soon. It's being sold to me on the basis that it's built to military specifications apart from the finish (which can flake off a bit) so it's considerably cheaper than, say, a Bushmaster AR15. I imagine that you can probably spend a lot more money and get a bit better gun, but at some point you have to be sensible and think what else could you spend the money on. Hopefully, with the saving on the gun, I'll be able to buy an Eotech sight as well.

PS Sorry for deleting your comments to the last post, my finger slipped...

MORE POWERS

2010-03-15T18:06:00.002Z

Imagine if you didn't have to arrest people on the mere suspicion of having committed a criminal offence. OK, so you don't have to arrest people on suspicion but where you've got a named suspect, it's difficult to get the file past the various levels of supervision and audit without interviewing them under caution.

Imagine that rather than arresting them, you could write up a report and say, 'Look there's little or no evidence against person x, there are no independent witnesses and no physical evidence that really corroborates person x's story over person y. I've got no idea where person x lives so I'm saying that he's a suspect and leaving it at that.'

Imagine also that your workload was sufficiently manageable that you could decide for yourself, on the basis of your knowledge and experience as an invesitgator, which suspects were worth interviewing and which were not.

What would happen if you didn't have to interview suspects and they didn't have a right to speak to a solicitor in person? What if you could simply charge them when you thought you had enough evidence and didn't have to refer to anyone else for advice? And what if you could hand out all the paperwork and do all the typing in the car?

How much time would you save? How much less time would you spend in the station? Would this be a charter for lazy coppers or an opportunity to use professional judgement?

CANADA WINS GOLD

2010-03-02T21:17:00.004Z

Obviously you all know that Canada won gold in the mens hockey in Vancouver on Sunday. I was working and as it was quiet (yes I know, weird eh?) I took some paperwork and polished off a few outstanding reports all while listening to the game on the radio.

By coincidence, one of our local radio stations had a phone-in that morning all about who was the most canadian Canadian, so I took this photo because I thought it all looked rather Canadian: the snow, the gravel road stretching over the horizon, the coffee cup....

THE FRONT FELL OFF

2010-03-02T02:53:00.003Z

Classic....

but fake.

HOCKEY FOR DUMMIES

2010-02-26T02:18:00.002Z

For reasons I can't really explain, I think that (ice) hockey means much more to Canadians than soccer (or football if you'd prefer) does to Brits. It might be because there are so many more options open to youngsters than soccer: rugby and cricket to name but two. But it also might be because Britian is much more divided than Canada, and I'm thinking particularly of class. Hockey is an experience shared by almost everyone here and there's a healthy, some might say frantic, extra-curricular tradition of hockey for children of both sexes and almost all ages, where mothers transport their children vast distances, bake huge quantities of cookies and raise enormous sums of money for hockey tournaments.

Anyway, don't take my word for it, have a look at this commercial for Tim Hortons, the popular chain of coffee shops which features the (not exactly world) famous Sidney Crosby.

CANADA FOR DUMMIES

2010-02-23T19:51:00.001Z

So we may not be doing so well in the Olympics, but it's still not a bad place to live.

POLICING IS ROCKET SCIENCE

2010-01-13T11:03:00.003Z

Professor Lawrence Sherman, the Wolfson Professor of Criminology at Cambridge University's Institute of Criminology no less, says that having bobbies stand in the same place for 12.5 minutes will crack street crime.

He's staging a year-long experiment in Madchester to prove it.

He says: 'We are trying to treat policing like rocket science, because that's exactly what it is. This is dealing with crime on an incredibly microscopic level.For the first time we are saying go to this street corner and stay there for 12 and a half minutes. It has never been obvious that policing needs to be that local.'

Never?

There's been a terrible mistake, Dixon. Abandon those case files and get yourself down to stand outside the Red Lion.

Having cops on the streets is better than having them inside the nick filling in forms, but does the Prof really think that the standard modern British moron will worry too much about this?

Coppersblog prediction: They'll either move two streets down or just take their chances, on the basis that absolutely sweet f*** all will happen to them if they are nicked anyway, but that the Cambridge Experiment will be written us as an enormous triumph all the same.

Interestingly, the yob who threw bleach into the face of the mother, in front of her family, after she asked him to be quiet in the cinema (repeat that sentence slowly to yourself) received a 12 month detention and training order (he'll do six months inside, playing Grand Theft Auto, posting pictures of himself grinning on facebook and learning lots of exotic new tricks).

This despite this being an appalling and potentially very serious offence AND the fact that he had numerous previous convictions including smashing someone over the head with half a brick.

Forget policing time and motion studies: just lock up serious, nasty recidivists for proper sentences.

Anyhoo, on a lighter note:

GRASS GREENER / SNOW WHITER

2010-01-06T21:50:00.003Z

Living in the 9th best place to live on the planet, it now seems strange that I used to live on what is now the 25th best place to live. Given that the best place to live in the whole wide world is apparently France, this must be a deeply flawed survey.

I look back fondly to when I lived in the UK. All the bigger issues that one reads about in the papers never seem to make much difference at home: anti-social behaviour, immigration, black-on-black gun crime, knife crime, urban sprawl, poor roads and coastal erosion have very little impact if you ride a bike and live in a small town in the midlands. Perhaps that's the reason why people who are 'fed up with this country' are never really happy anywhere.

One of the nicer aspects of life here (and something that makes life unbearable for some in Britain) is the attitude and demeanour of youngsters. I often get asked why it is that British children are so well behaved. After speaking to them, it's clear that their only experience of Britain is watching Mary Poppins, so I tell them that Canadian children (even the really naughty ones) are mostly better behaved than British specimens. It's not their fault of course, in Britain it's too often the drink that's to blame.

Being a police officer on Britain, 'nuisance youths' and the consequent vandalism, public drunkeness and general screaming and shouting, was a kind of background music to the business of policing, so that wherever one went one met children swaying in the street shouting, 'Pigs innit!' Nowadays, I deal with very few children and the drunk, loud and abusive ones are so rare I'm momentarily shocked.

Even the older ones are reasonable. I once went to break up a party with about 150 teenage guests that had got slightly out of control. Naturally enough I anticipated the worst, but within 10 minutes, everyone had quietly dispersed and the music was turned off. People in nightclubs seem to drink a fraction of what they do in British ones, and afterwards... they get into taxis and go. Of course, at -20 deg C, you don't want to hang around for too long in the open, but even in high summer on a Saturday night, the worst you get is a bit of pushing and shoving.

There must be statistics out there that prove me wrong, that show Canadians to be a nation of violent drunks and their children even worse. If there are, I'm sure you'll let me know.

IF YOU DELIBERATELY BURN A TEENAGE GIRL TO DEATH...

2010-01-06T10:42:00.002Z

...by throwing petrol on her and then setting it alight, and then you shut her in her bedroom so she has no chance of escaping or calling for help, should you ever be allowed to walk the streets again?

Mad Judge Lord Bracadale thinks you should.

Well, it's a point of view!

He's given Stewart Blackburn 21 years for that. Assuming he keeps his nose clean, he'll be under 40 when he is let back out, doubtless with a taxpayer-funded change of identity to assist his reintegration into society.

Jessica McCagh was 17 years old when she died in agony.

We recently discussed the case of Craig Hodson Walker, who was shot dead. His killers will serve a minimum of 34 years.

In the comments, one John B pointed out that 'There's a lot of rot been talked on this (blog) about sentencing and arbitraryness'.

I don't know about John, but on a purely qualitative basis I think most people - if forced to choose - would prefer to be shot than burned alive. There seems to be at least some arbitrariness at work here*.

But that's not the point.

Set someone on fire and let them burn to death: Never See Daylight Again.

Shoot a young man dead during the commission of a robbery: Never See Daylight Again.
Cricket bat and stab your boyfriend to death as he lies in bed: Never See Daylight Again.

*Yes it's Scotland, so what?

FOXY LOXY

ANOTHER YEAR OVER...

2009-12-31T10:53:00.000Z

The 'Voice of the Resistance' explains why people hate the police: it's because the police don't like them blowing up speed cameras, apparently.

At least in the old days it was because everyone was being fitted up!

A few of the things police did this year, apart from trying to catch libertarian pyrotechnician speed freaks:

They were shot dead, stabbed to death, drowned when bridges collapsed, were killed as they put out 'diversion' signs at accident scenes.

Those who weren't killed were routinely spat at in the face, threatened with guns and attacked by mobs for asking teenagers to pick up litter.

They were 'hailed a hero' as they rugby tackled muggers while on holiday in New York, saved the lives of unconscious babies in Northumbria, jumped into rivers to save drowning men and kung fu kicked armed robbers after stumbling across post office raids while off duty, having only popped out for a pint of milk.

They recovered the bodies of suicides, old people who'd been lying dead in a pool of their own goo for a month or two, carried the bodies of toddlers from smashed up cars and kicked down the doors of houses where fathers had shot their four-year-old daughters, their ex-girlfriends and themselves. Nice.

All that, plus telling you the time of day and where the nearest Argos is.

Here's to a better 2010.

Colman Treacy and Peter Fahey: Two Sides Of The Sanity Coin

2009-12-18T14:09:00.000Z

Many years ago, I had the pleasure of seeing Colman Treacy QC in action prosecuting an attempt murder in Birmingham. All I can say is you wouldn't have wanted to come up against him.

Today - now a judge - he has weighed off the killers of Craig Hodson-Walker for 34 years apiece.

It's not enough, but it's a damn sight better than most murderers get.

Of course, it will be appealed and reduced.

Meanwhile, the other big murder story of the day was the unspeakably tragic case of Katie Summers.

Miss Summers was stabbed to death by her ex-boyfriend Brian Taylor a while back. Taylor's Mad Judge®-imposed minimum recommendation was only 17.5 years - it sounds a lot, but for knifing to death a mother of four young children? Go figure.

The IPCC investigated the case after it was revealed that Miss Summers had called the cops loads of times but nothing much had happened to Taylor. This may not have been unrelated to the fact that she repeatedly refused to give evidence against him.

Victoria Derbyshire of BBC 5 Live had GMP Chief Constable Peter Fahey on this morning. She seemed to be suggesting that the police can prevent people from stabbing each other to death if only they do enough 'risk assessments'.

This seems unlikely.

Mr Fahey's favoured approach did include new, improved (ie longer) risk assessments, but also a new police injunction, whereby a superintendent could, on the basis of intelligence, ban a person from a given area. 'If he breached that injunction, he could be arrested and put in jail,' said Mr Fahey.

It's a genius idea - leaving aside the tricky question of which jail cells will be used to house these unconvicted men (and what the human rights lawyers will have to say about it).

But it seems to me that the Chief missed a trick. If you can prevent murders by creating injunctions which ban people from certain addresses, why not create injunctions which ban them from stabbing people?

FOXTROT OSCAR