Plebgate

The former Chief Whip, Andrew Mitchell, has lost his libel action against the newspaper that claimed he called a police officer a pleb. It isn't obvious why he went ahead with the libel action after Michael Crick's documentary on the incident demonstrated beyond any reasonable doubt that corrupt police officers stitched him up. At that point he could have declared victory and gone ahead with his life, instead he put his reputation in the hands of Britain's libel courts.

The verdict seems perverse but by taking the matter to court he has empowered a judge make whatever flight of fancy he finds most agreeable the official version.

In all likelihood Andrew Mitchell did not call the policeman a pleb and the verdict is wrong but libel courts reward the likes of Jeffrey Archer, George Galloway and other chancers, putting your faith in such a court is a desperate and unwise move.

Rippers & Coppers

The Jack the Ripper murders seem to have been solved. The DNA evidence seems fairly conclusive and it fits in with what I said back in 2006:

I'm not sure why so many ridiculous notions about Jack the Ripper are given serious consideration, when the 'suspects' bear absolutely no relation to the sort of people who we know do commit serial killings. 

The idea that the Ripper would be a son of the Queen or a famous artist was always absurd. The killer was Aaron Kosminski- a Pole who came to Britain to escape anti-Jewish violence in his home country. One part of the story that amused me was how the crucial piece of evidence was still available in a relatively untainted state into the 21st century:

the shawl had been taken by a police officer for his wife, but she never wore it, and it was passed down through generations until it went up for sale. 

 So back in  the late 19th century there was a bobby whose first reaction upon finding a brutally murdered young woman was to steal the clothes that he thought his wife might like! Dodgy police officers aren't a new phenomenon, they were just less likely to get caught in the past.

Institutional Corruption.

The report also found that one of the detectives at the heart of the investigation into Stephen's murder was corrupt and had links with the gangster father of one of his killers.

The officer allegedly reported back to his superiors with "personal evidence" about the family and "tactical intelligence" to help brief senior figures in the Metropolitan Police. 

This revelation is  scandalous but it surely undermines the conclusion that William Macpherson's infamous report made- that the police were institutionally racist. If it is the case that one of the officers investigating the murder had links to a suspect's family then there is a more direct explanation for the failures of the initial investigation. One which has nothing to do with race.

Macpherson's methodology was shoddy- he arbitrarily attributed all failings to racism despite a lack of evidence. In doing this he made little or no effort to consider other reasons- like police corruption.

Given the numerous occasions on which police cover ups and crookedness have been uncovered over the last twenty years it seems like corruption is more of an institutional issue for the police than racism.

Tweet Cops

The police are investigating more tweet crimes, including those of a blogger and those of a former youth crime commissioner. Tweet crimes are like normal crimes except they occur on Twitter, don't cause any harm to anyone and the police don't need to get off their arses to investigate them.

The commissioner is Paris Brown who wrote some tweets that "could be considered offensive" when she was 14 or so. One would have thought if there were likely to be incite crime then that would be evident in the years since she wrote them. The blogger is "Old Holborn" who was trolling Liverpudlians with comments about the Hillsborough disaster. They took it very badly- no one thought to tell them to "calm down, calm down!". However no one was harmed by his tweets.

The police have no business regulating petty insults and drunken boasts and it is worrying that they are unable to realise this.

Priorities

Just listening to report on the merger of Scottish police forces into the awfully named "Police Scotland". The BBC reporter said "Priorities for the new force include promoting more women and reducing violent crime".

Well I'm glad that reducing crime is up there I suppose...

Plebgate

It looks like the evidence for Andrew Mitchell's supposed tirade against the police was made up. A major injustice has been done to him but there is another aspect to consider.

If the police are willing to frame a cabinet minister and make up witnesses, even when it is a 100% certainty that there will be CCTV footage that contradicts them then what do you think they do with people without the resources to fight back, who com into contact with the police in areas not covered with cameras?

You Should See How They Warn People About Rape And Murder

Sleeping householders are going to be woken up in the middle of the night to discover someone breaking into their house - only to discover it is the police.

Police in Shoebury, Essex, have been going round testing doors and windows of houses to check if they have been left unlocked - and if they find an easy way in they will wake up the household to warn them their house is insecure

Of course burglary is made even easier when the police are engaged in obnoxious gimmicks- that treat the public like lowlifes- like this.

Don't they need warrants to enter people's property anyway?

Told You So

Earlier this month I pointed and laughed at a ridiculous claim in a story from a local newspaper, which reported:

Police are warning that when cannabis plants reach the final stages of maturity the odour they release has carcinogenic properties.

Officers who deal with the plants use ventilation masks and protective suits and people who have plants in their home, especially anyone with young children, may be exposing their family to a health risk.

After my stirring post the police have now issued a retraction:

AN APOLOGY has been issued by police over an incorrect statement made following a drugs raid.

Northamptonshire Police have retracted a statement which suggested the odour from mature cannabis plants had carcinogenic properties.

A spokesman for the force said: “Northamptonshire Police would like to apologise for the incorrect information provided to the media which claimed that cannabis plants had potential carcinogenic properties.

“This information was provided in good faith. However, we accept the information was misleading and we will strive to ensure this does not happen again.”

The original incorrect statement was published in The Mail on March 1 in a report about cannabis plants being seized by police during a raid in Cottingham.

OK, I had nothing to do with getting them to retract, that appears to have been done as a result of someone bringing the newspaper article to the attention of Ben Goldacre who then started asking questions but I didn't want to say that because his self regard is already too vast.

My Favourite Story Of 2012 So Far.

An undercover policeman 'chased himself' around the streets for more than 20 minutes after a bungling CCTV operator mistook him for a suspect.

He later vowed to track himself down and bring himself to justice.

Police Baseball Team?

The case of the six police officers filmed smashing up a stolen car with baseball bats bothers me. The man who bought the stolen vehicle is a criminal who was trasnporting stolen goods at the time, so I don't feel sorry for him.

First of all they can clearly be seen smashing the car in places where it does not make it easier to open the door and remove the driver- who did not appear to be resisting in any case. Secondly why were the officers going round with baseball bats and pick axe handles anyway? Either they were part of the Met's baseball squad or they routinely go equipped to smash things up for no obvious reason.

Apparently the Enfield Crime Squad have been accused of corruption before, in light of the behaviour in the video it is difficult to believe that those accusations are untrue.

Because It Worked So Well Last Time

Ex music journo turned proper pundit and all round twat, John Harris, bemoans the lack of support by high profile artists for todays strikers. As obnoxious as the NUM was, there probably was more sympathy for people who do hard, heavy and dangerous work down t'pit and whose livelihoods were threatened that doesn't exist for the current strikers who do a gruelling 7.5 hour shift down t'diversityoutreach office whose right to retire at 55 with a final salary pension is under threat.

Of late we have heard from Judi Dench, Mike Leigh, Kathy Burke and good old Sting about the allegedly pressing need to liberalise the drug laws. The campaign to replace our miserable electoral system with a slightly less miserable alternative brought out Eddie Izzard, Colin Firth, Helena Bonham-Carter, and more

He makes a good point, without the involvement of celebrities we would probably still have first past the post and drugs would still be illegal and the Tories would still have been in power for years after formation of Red Wedge in the 1980s.... oh wait.

Colombo- Bent Cop

The death of Peter Falk, best known for playing Colombo, brings me on to something that I think needs saying- Colombo is the acceptable face of police corruption.

Just consider his methods of "solving" crimes:

1.  Get called out to murder.
2. Meet someone at the crime scene.
3. Decide they’re guilty.
4. Repeatedly harass them.
5. Ignore all other leads.
6. Harass the target some more.
7. Evidence against the supposed killer magically turns up.

 In fact his methods of constantly turning up to ask "just one more question" as his target tries to get on with life as normal can be considered a form of psychological torture.

Abandoning all other lines of inquiry is an act of gross negligence and must lead to many killers going free.

No you may argue that Colombo always gets the right person however we only have the confession (false confessions are a well known result of psychological torture) and the television's word that he did. What about all the investigations Colombo must have bungled but never made it to air?

Yes mourn the man who played Colombo but also mourn the hypothetical and fictional men and women who've hypothetically spent decades in an imaginary prison for crimes that they did not commit.

Bad Job Interview Techniques

A woman is released from jail after police officer is found to have planted evidence. So how did this fabrication come to light?

The fabrication emerged after Harding, seeking a job with the CIA, bragged that he had fabricated evidence, apparently to impress the interviewer. The CIA notified New York authorities, and the investigation began, eventually leading to several other investigators to plead guilty to evidence tampering or fabrication, and the re-opening of several criminal cases.

It does suggest that this sort of corruption wasn't seen as outlandish in his own police force, if he thought it was something that would impress other law enforcement agencies, which is slightly disturbing.

Via

Yaz Death Poll

In light of the police arresting someone for joking that Yasmin Alibhai Brown should be stoned to death the obvious question is- how should Yaz be executed?

How should Yasmin Alibhai Brown be executed?
	She should be stoned.
	Hang her!
	Hangings too good for her, burn her at the stake.
	Stake through the heart.
	Firing squad.
	Suffocated between a White Van Man's sweaty butt cheeks.
	She should ritually disemboweled along with the rest of the Independent editorial board.
	Crucify to satisfy her messiah complex.
	Bury her alive in a mound of unsold "Independent's".
	Taken apart slowly with a scapel
pollcode.com free polls

The Thin Blue Picket Line

The problem with electing a left wing extremist as leader of the party is that they will inevitably use their power to enable bolshie unions play havoc with the countr.

Which is why it is no surprise that David Cameron's government are considering whether to allow the police to go on strike.

How can that possibly work, the whole point about the emergency services is that they need to be available in an emergency- are we really going town centre's on Friday night to become free for all zones because the police aren't happy with their doughnut allowances? Who would police a picket line of striking police officers?

Shroud Waving

I hate in when trades union leaders disguise a clear attempt to serve their members interests as concern for the public. This is brazen:

THE leader of Scotland’s rank and file police officers has warned that UK ministers will have “blood on their hands” if they axe 2,800 jobs in forces across the country.

Les Gray, chairman of the Scottish Police Federation, said “the murder rate will go through the roof.”

He believes that plummeting police numbers will give rise to lawless “no-go areas” across towns and cities.

No it won't, but lets play along, I have a solution that will maintain police numbers and save money- pay the police less. We are in a recession so they won't quit, but we will be able to tackle the deficit at the same time as maintaining poloice numbers.

Policing The Police

Apparently the police are free to confiscate people's property and refuse to return even after they have been ordered to by a judge. After trying to prosecute somebody for possessing child pornography even though they knew that he was in possession of the material due to being an expert witness for the defence team of somebody who had been charged with possessing it, they then refused to return it after being ordered to by a court.

So what happened to the Chief Constable who had refused to obey the law? Nothing:

Mr Port put his 35-year career on the line by refusing to comply with a High Court order made in May to return 87 hard drives and 2,500 photographs of abuse.

However he handed over the seized items on Monday night.

Mr Bates's legal team pressed ahead with an application to have the chief constable fined or imprisoned for contempt over his delay in complying with the court order.

Lord Justice Stanley Burnton, sitting in London with Mr Justice Wilkie and Mr Justice Calvert Smith, ruled there was no contempt because the order did not specify a date by which compliance was required.

Oh I'll remember that the next time the police ask me to do something- "Yes officer I know you wanted me to pull over and I was going to do so next Friday."

Quote Of The Day

I'm rather fond of villains going to prison.

- Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson.

The Police- An Observation

There are some very cute PCSOs in Northampton.

Unfortunately Shooting Tony Blair Is Wrong

Much as I dislike Tony Blair this seems unwise:

The Foreign Secretary said the public must not be forced to pay more than is "absolutely necessary" for police protection, which Mr Blair is given during private holidays and international business trips.

His comments came after it was disclosed that Mr Blair’s Metropolitan Police protection squad ran up a £5,000-a-week expenses bill over the past year.

Making political capital out of the cost of protecting political rivals is incredibly stupid. there are undoubtedly people who would like to murder Tony Blair- Islamic radicals, Serbian nationalists, me- and if politicians don't get protection from potential assailants then in future our politicians will have to think of their personal safety when making decisions then they will inevitably have to pander to violent groups in order to ensure their own safety.