Wasting Police Time

I really drew the short straw this Christmas, working a late shift on Christmas Day. In my Force if you work Christmas Day you don't work New Years Eve. Sounds great but I am on an early New Years Day which means a very subdued celebration tonight.

Christmas Day wasn't too bad this year, a bit like a Sunday. We only had three domestics to attend. These were all at, dare I say, social housing. Very sad really but a product of the society we live in. In every case we have a woman who is quite inadequate in many respects. There are children and there are the current 'partners.' In all three cases the current partner is not the father of all or any of the children in the house. The 'partners' have their own issues and inadequacies. Only one of them was working, for example. In every case there has been excessive alcohol consumption and petty arguments. The sort of arguments that only these children in adults bodies can have. In two cases there are allegations of assault and so off to the cells two of the 'partners' go.

The next few hours the children's Christmas is taken up with the police completing a 12 page risk assessment and the mother making a statement to police. A statement they will withdraw in the morning when they realise the inadequate waste of space they have given a roof in their taxpayer provided house, will not be coming back if charges are pressed. And after all, they do love them really.

I paid a visit to the control room. Thank heavens it is not too busy. The number of police officers working on a Bank Holiday has been cut to worrying levels. The control room has also been pared to the bone in an effort to save money. Trying to run more than one incident in the County would be quite difficult.

Of note is the calls coming into the control room. Christmas Day is one of the few days in the year now when everything is shut. So the calls for help come into the emergency services. Can we find a plumber for someone whose heating has broken down? Are there any trains running today? What time does the Next Sale start tomorrow morning?

I shall be at work at 5.30 a.m. tomorrow morning. There will be a skeleton staff on again as it is a Bank Holiday. The biggest concern will be do we have enough staff to deal with all the drunken idiots that will be arrested tonight.

Happy New Year!!

Merry Christmas 2

I thought I would share with you another festive video and my favourite joke of the year which also has a seasonal theme.

Some of us will be working over Christmas and sadly we know from experience that Christmas Day and Boxing Day will mean demands that are difficult for some to comprehend. Domestic violence calls will feature high on the list. Last year I had to take two kids into police protection on Christmas Day while their parents spent it in the cells. I hope all of you working over the Christmas festivities have a quiet and peaceful one.


My favourite joke of the year.

Police were called to a suspected massacre of snowmen in Lincolnshire. A pathologist attended the scene and there was relief all around after it turned out to be a field of carrots.

Merry Christmas!

Scotrail, No Ticket, No Charge

Many people have been outraged at the news that the yob, by the name of Sam Main from Falkirk, wants the person that threw him off a train prosecuted.

You can view the video of the incident above, but in summary, Main had no ticket. He was asked by the guard to leave the train. He insisted he had paid and refused to get off the train. He was rude and abusive. Eventually a big man by the name of Allan Pollock had had enough and asked the guard if he wanted Main removed from the train. The guard said yes and Pollock took hold of Main and took him to the doors. Main resisted and fell to the floor. He is picked up and pushed off the train. He immediately tries to run back on and is taken hold of and thrown away from the train. He ends up on the ground with a grazed cheek.

Main goes home and tells his mummy that he got assaulted and thrown off the train. Main's mummy is outraged that her darling son has got a graze on his cheek and wants revenge. An allegation of assault is made to the police. I take the view of the majority of people. Main is a foul mouthed yob who had every opportunity to leave the train and any injuries he received were as a result of his own stupid actions.

The press are reporting that Pollock has been charged with assault. This is NOT correct. The police have carried out an investigation and passed the file to the Procurator Fiscals office for a decision on prosecution. This is much the same as the police sending a file to the Crown Prosecution Service in England and Wales. The Procurator Fiscal will decide whether or not Pollock will be charged with assault and if Main will be charged with trespass or travelling without a ticket.

I sincerely hope that the Procurator Fiscal will take the view that Pollocks actions were perfectly lawful and he should be commended rather than prosecuted. I wouldn't have bothered charging Main had he accepted his just deserts, but as he and his mother have decided to make an issue of it, I hope they throw the book at him. If his mother had taught him how to behave in the first place he would not be in the position he is now.

Happy Christmas!

I bet we see this girl on the X Factor in a few years time!

Just Go Home!

                                  Another Arrest Caused by the Police

I was out on foot patrol in the town recently in company with a young PC. It was about 2.30 a.m. and we were standing minding our own business near one of the towns nightclubs. Club patrons often congregate here and it is not uncommon for arguments and fights to break out between those who have had too much to drink. A police presence usually provides a deterrent to this sort of behaviour.

As people walk past us I give some cheery 'Good Nights' and hope they all find a taxi and go home quietly. Two lads walk by and I bid them a good night. One says "It's the filth. I don't like you lot." The PC with me suggests he has a word with him. No, I say, just ignore him and hopefully he will go home. The two lads stop about 20 yards down the road. A minute later the one who spoke earlier comes back. He says. "Why are you hanging around here? Instead of picking on innocent people you should be catching murderers and rapists." Most police officers have heard this a dozen times. I politely tell him why we are there and wish him good night." He doesn't go. "I don't like you lot. In fact I hate pigs. You're all a bunch of arseholes." No one else has heard this comment and, of course, I am not at all offended by it as Justice Bean has decided such language should not offend me.

The lad has had a good drink and I could arrest him for being drunk and disorderly but I really just want him to go home, so I say. "Fair enough, we're all entitled to our opinion. Good night." We walk away towards the club hoping he will just go home. The lad follows us. "Yeah, go on. Fuck off! Fuck off and do something useful. Bunch of fucking arseholes." Now, I don't care what Justice Bean says, if you tell me to fuck off you are going to be arrested. I turn around and walk back to the lad. I arrest him for being drunk and disorderly. As soon as I take hold of him he resists. He tries to pull away, thrashes his arms around, then says he is going to knock me out. There is a torrent of abuse and threats while I subdue him. His friend decides he is going to intervene and the PC with me has to keep him away while I end up with the drunk lad on the floor.

He is eventually handcuffed and I await a vehicle to take him to the police station. He is continually being abusive and threatening. His friend is still hanging around nearby. A police car arrives and the arrested lad doesn't want to get in it so we have another scuffle and a little pain compliance until he gets in. I can then hear air escaping. His idiot friend is round the back of the police car letting one of the tyres down. He gets arrested too.

I wrote an article several months ago about working with probation officers and how they generally accepted that many public order incidents are caused by the police. This has become so commonplace that I believe magistrates almost accept there must be some truth in this. The penalties certainly reflect this.

The idiot who let the tyre down sobered up and was given a Fixed Penalty to pay. The idiot who got arrested in the first place has a history of violence and public order offences. He has eleven previous convictions. He was charged with being Drunk and Disorderly and Resisting Arrest. He pleaded guilty at Magistrates Court. In mitigation his solicitor stated on his behalf that the arresting officer had been rude to him and the cause of his poor behaviour. He was fined £50 with £30 costs.

I have little confidence that this penalty will deter this man from any similar behaviour in the future. So this man will become another crime statistic and it is the police, not the rest of the failing justice system, that will take the blame for not reducing crime.

Another Wasted Life

 

This is Danny O'Shea who died last Friday evening near his house in Canning Town. The story was reported but did not gain any significant publicity and you may well have missed it. Danny was chased by a group of black youths and stabbed in the neck. He was pronounced dead at the scene. A tragic waste of another life in some apparent gang related testosterone battle.

Reading the story it struck me that there is something missing here. The police officer investigating the case makes a plea for witnesses but there is no mention of the police dealing with this as a racial attack. There is no reassurance to the community that no stone will be left unturned to bring these offenders to justice; no press conference; no mention of a community reference group being set up to advise the police, monitor the investigation and feed back reassuring messages to the community.

I haven't read any reports of the community marching on the local police station demanding to know what they are doing about this murder. I haven't seen the family in the media suggesting that the police won't take the murder seriously, despite their apparent blase attitude to it all.

I haven't heard a peep from the MP for West Ham, Lyn Brown condemning this murder or offering her reassurance that she will do everything she can to ensure the police investigation is effective. I haven't seen her visit the scene or the family. The latest entry on her website is about her husbands birthday and scoring points regarding the Tory's pension changes.

It appears we have learnt nothing about dealing with race crimes or am I still missing something?

Smiley Culture - Police Innocent!

Back in March I covered the story of David Emmanuel's suicide whilst the Metropolitan Police were execting a search warrant at his house in Surrey. I made comment that there were undoubtedly flaws in the planning and execution of the warrant and the IPCC would no doubt highlight those to try and show the family their investigation was thorough and independent.

The IPCC have now completed their initial investigation but the full report will not be released until after the inquest, which will take place in front of a jury. You have to feel some sympathy with the IPCC. The family and some sections of the community will never be happy unless a police officer is convicted of stabbing him, no matter what the evidence might dictate.

The family have, of course, reacted angrily to the news that the IPCC have found no evidence to prosecute any officer for any crime, nor is there sufficient evidence to prosecute any officer under the Police (Conduct) Regulations. Merlin Emmanuel said "We firmly believe that Smiley was murdered and that the IPCC have let us down and treated us miserably." If only there were a shred of evidence to support that statement.

The family have stated they will now take out a private prosecution. I just hope that doesn't waste any more taxpayers money on legal fees. The family will have their day in Court when the officers involved will have to answer questions at the inquest.

We will have to wait for more detail to be made available after the inquest. This cannot take place until after the two drugs trials to which David Emanuel was connected. That should be interesting.

Parenting

I never forget about 25 years ago executing a drugs warrant at a Local Authority house occupied by two drug addicts who dealt drugs, got drunk, committed numerous public order offences and stole anything that wasn't bolted down.

Any police officer will know the couple. Let's call them Wayne and Waynetta. They don't like the police because the police regularly deprive them of their liberty. But Wayne and Waynetta had a baby. The baby was a dispensation from any effective punishment by the Courts. The magistrates were always told that Wayne was about to get a job having realised his responsibilities, and he would soon be a fine upstanding member of the community supporting his family. Waynetta was a devoted mother who was doing her best to tackle her drug habit.

When we executed the warrant their child was two and just starting to talk. The child was living in squalor with two drug addicts who could barely look after themselves never mind a child. While we were there, Wayne thought it was a great wheeze to point at one of us and tell the child to repeat his phrase 'fucking pig.' Oh how he laughed on hearing the young child repeat what he said.

At the time I was a naive young PC and I thought it was outrageous that anyone like this should be allowed to have responsibility for a child.  I wrote a long report detailing the living conditions and the behaviour of the parents during this search. The report was sent to Social Services. I didn't hear any more. Several weeks later I telephoned Social Services to ask what was happening about the family. I received a phone call later from their Social Worker assuring me that she was working hard with the family but there were no grounds to remove the child from the parents. Sixteen years later the child was sentenced to five years imprisonment for supplying drugs and GBH.

I have lost count now of the number of young people being arrested and brought into custody who are the offspring of the parents I was arresting a generation ago. Our social and justice systems are not effective in dealing with this never ending cycle.

Here is another woman who is unfit to be a parent. The poor toddler sat on her lap might be a future member of the National Front and what are the chances of him escaping a Court appearance at some time in the future?

Deterrent Sentencing

Junior Henry, the 17 year old youth, who stabbed a 20 year old man in the stomach at the Notting Hill Carnival in August was sentenced to four and a half years custody by Judge Peter Beaumont on the 24th November.

The public may at first be conned into believing that this is a half decent sentence for the crime but most of us now know, of course, that he will only serve half the sentence anyway. His estimated release date is shown on the court papers as 26/2/2014. Furthermore, because of pressures on the prison population, he will almost certainly be released after two years and be home for Christmas in 2013.

When you look further into the circumstances of Junior Henry's offending and refer to the sentencing guidelines it is difficult to see how such a lenient sentence was ever passed. In September 2007 aged just 12, Junior Henry was part of a gang known as MDP (Murder Dem Pussies.) About 15 youths from this gang went out looking for members of another gang. They came across two innocent young men and attacked them. One was stabbed to death and the other seriously injured. Henry was charged with Murder, Conspiracy to cause GBH and Violent Disorder. The jury acquitted him of Murder but he was convicted of  Conspiracy to cause GBH and Violent Disorder. Some of the gang were imprisoned but, because of his young age, Henry was sentenced, by Judge Peter Beaumont, to a Supervision Order!

Since that Supervision Order was imposed, Henry has been back in front of Judge Peter Beaumont three times for breaching it. On March 7th 2011 he appeared before the Judge and was told this was his last chance and if he breached the Order again he was going to feel his wrath. On 16th March, just nine days after this warning, Henry was arrested for an assault and charged. He was convicted on the 26th July and bailed back to the Crown Court to see Judge Beaumont and feel his wrath.

On the 29th August, Henry was at the Notting Hill Carnival when a fight broke out. A man tried to break up the fight and Henry pulled out a knife and plunged it into his abdomen/ribs. It is quite simply luck that the man did not die. A few inches in another direction and this could have been the result. The whole incident was caught on CCTV and there were good photographs of Henry running away clutching the bloody knife. He was arrested and charged with Causing Grievous Bodily Harm With Intent, an offence that carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment. He pleaded guilty in the face of overwhelming evidence and was sentenced to four and a half years.

I have referred to the sentencing guidelines for that offence and the recommended sentences are between 3 and 16 years. There are three categories of offence:

Category 1 - Serious Injury and Higher Culpability, starting point 12 years, 9 to 16 years depending upon aggravating and mitigating factors.
Category 2 - Serious Injury and Lower Culpability, or Less Serious Injury and Higher Culpability, starting point 6 years, 5 to 9 years depending upon aggravating and mitigating factors.
Category 3 - Less Serious Injury and less Culpability, starting point 4 years, 3 to five years depending upon aggravating and mitigating factors.

Higher culpability will include things such as use of a weapon.

Aggravating factors can include, previous convictions, on bail for other offences, location, ongoing effect on victim, failure to comply with current court orders.

Mitigating factors can include things like single blow, age/lack of maturity.

I cannot for the life of me see why this offence was not dealt with as Category 1, resulting in a sentence starting at 12 years and ranging between 9 and 16 years taking account of the aggravating and mitigating factors. The aggravating and mitigating factors above should have resulted in a sentence of at least 12 years, with a third off for a guilty plea, should have been at least 8 years.

Judge Beaumont has obviously placed this as a Category 2 offence under the guidelines. I cannot see where on earth he can show that either the injury or the culpability is not serious. He has then determined that following consideration of the aggravating and mitigating circumstances a sentence of 6 years and nine months is appropriate. He has then reduced this by a third to 4.5 years. The judiciary often defend their poor sentencing by claiming that their hands have been tied by the sentencing guidelines. I often point out that sentencing guidelines do not prevent sentencing outside of those guidelines in exceptional circumstances, such as where defendants have dozens of previous convictions. In this case the guidelines do not appear to have been followed, to the detriment of justice.

Some people felt the sentencing following the riots in August was harsh. Most people felt that, for once, the justice system was performing it's function and providing sentencing with a deterrent effect. Readers of this blog will know I am not someone who just wants people thrown in jail, but there must be deterrent sentencing combined with effective rehabilitation in our justice system. The sentence of  Junior Henry, a knife wielding gang member  involved in the murder of one young man and directly responsible for stabbing another, is an ineffective disgrace.

Mark Duggan Inquiry

Stafford Scott

We heard this week that two of the three members of the community reference group who are giving advice to the IPCC regarding the police shooting of Mark Duggan, have resigned. One of them, Stafford Scott, has stated that he no longer wishes to be associated with the investigation, which he describes as shoddy and flawed. It is true that he raised some concerns but also that he refused to attend a meeting with the IPCC where they wished to try and allay those concerns.

I have been involved in many incidents where the police have pulled together 'community consultants' to give advice and to try and ensure some transparency. On many occasions I have wondered who these representatives speak for and what their motives are. Stafford Scott works as a community and race relations consultant. He clearly has some passion regarding Tottenham but are his views really representative of the community? His idol is Bernie Grant, so I doubt it. And doesn't membership of these consultative groups give some credibility for the paid day job? Is there not a a conflict of interest here?

The other member of the group who resigned is John Noblemunn. He also declined to attend the meeting where the IPCC hoped to allay any concerns they had. Noblemunn is, among other things, Chair of Haringay Black Independent Advisory Group and Deputy Chair of Trident Independent Advisory Group.

Perhaps there are flaws in the IPCC investigation, they are by no means perfect. I really suspect that Mr Scott and Mr Noblemunn have seen the writing on the wall. They would like to be seen as the architects of an investigation that results in the conviction of police officers for the cold blooded murder of Mark Duggan. Perhaps the investigation just shows that the police lawfully shot an armed gangster. Time to bail out and distance yourself.

Thanks for Your Support

His Honour Justice Bean - Cretin

Other bloggers have covered this story but I am going to repeat it here as it is yet another symptom of where our society is going wrong. A yob is searched in the street. He uses foul language to the police officers searching him in front of a group of young people. He was charged and convicted by Thames Magistrates of disorderly conduct and fined £50.

The defendant Denzil Cassius Harvey appealed the decision to the High Court where His Honour Justice Bean decided that the police are used to foul language and therefore not offended by it and he was sure the youths nearby thought it all very amusing. He quashed the conviction. The message delivered to yobs of all descriptions on the street is appalling. Once again our justice system holds no consequences for poor behaviour. Ignorant morons who lack the education and upbringing to express themselves properly will simply be encouraged by this cretinous decision to treat the police with complete contempt. Thank you for your support Mr Bean.

 Denzil Cassius Harvey - It's all about respect, innit

Our justice system is not alone in making these crass decisions. A similar decision was made in the Courts in a case in Australia. And this is the level of support you can expect from some of our Magistracy and pompous arses that write and read that blog.

The public and judiciary need to wake up to the fact that the ONLY part of the justice system that is currently preventing more of the riots that occurred in August is the police. Deterrent sentences and effective rehabilitation are almost completely absent in out justice system.

The Government are currently shafting us from behind regarding pay and pensions and now the judiciary are shafting us and consigning us to a job where you are being constantly abused with impunity all day. The risk is that one day the police will stop giving a damn too and watch the anarchy that then follows. Sign the petition here.

Student Protest

                    7 minutes of tedium if you want to watch it.

I went to Dale Farm weeks ago now and was sent home as a learned judge decided that he wanted more time to consider the case of the travellers before he confirmed the eviction could go ahead. When the eviction eventually took place I was away on holiday. I saw on the news that the usual suspects or 'swampeys' as they are sometimes known, had taken over the protest on behalf of the travellers.

The police took it all slowly and steadily and dismantled the barriers and lock-ons etc. Some officers had buckets of urine and excrement thrown over them. There were some fires and a few scuffles. The media had some good pictures to show but overall the eviction went without any major problems or criticism of the police.

I was slightly surprised to be packed off to London last Wednesday for the student protest march. The Met have rarely asked for assistance and support from County Forces but the August riots seem to have changed this. In the short term at least, it appears the Met don't want to be criticised again for under-resourcing incidents such as this.

Fewer protesters than expected turned up at the event and the police were robust regarding setting up tents at Trafalgar Square and ensuring that the march followed it's prescribed route. Inevitably a few agitators tried to cause problems and there were around 20 arrests. In general, the protest march took place peacefully.

As no rioting took place, no premises were smashed up or invaded, no looting, coverage within the media was not significant. The march organisers criticised police for what they perceived as over policing of the event. They also suggested that protesters had stayed away because of the threat of the use of baton rounds. This is a shame because in reality this was democratic protest almost at its best. No 'kettling' took place. Students exercised their right to protest. The protest was largely peaceful and nearly everyone went home afterwards unhurt.

I don't believe that the policing of the event was overpowering or that the threat of baton rounds influenced attendance at the event. I believe the reasons for the reduced numbers and lack of violence at this protest are fourfold.

1. Some of the agitators who attend these events were unavailable having been imprisoned or placed on bail conditions following the riots in August and the Dale Farm eviction.
2. Robust sentencing has provided the much needed deterrent that has been missing in our justice system. On the day of the protest four thugs who took part in the previous student protest (riot) received sentences totalling six years.
3. The protest was midweek and many genuine students were not prepared to travel to London and miss their studies.
4. The police had sufficient numbers and their actions made it clear that the agreed terms of the march would be adhered to and those protesters who wished to commit criminal acts would be dealt with robustly.

Remembrance Day Message

This is especially for those that abuse our society. Those who take to a life of crime, abuse the benefits system, take drugs and generally waste their lives.  You get the picture.

Home Secretary Resigns!

"I knew nothing about it. Honestly. Well, I did authorise a trial but this was outside of its parameters."

She hasn't resigned yet, but we have had this one for 18 months now, it must be time for a change.

I posted recently about the complete ineptitude of the UK Border Agency and how people are coming to this country every day clearly intending to stay or work. The recent furore about immigration abandoning proper checks and just allowing people through is not surprising. On one occasion just three members of staff were on duty at Heathrow and could not cope with the thousands of passengers trying to come into the country. The floodgates were basically thrown open.

Some senior managers have been suspended and I have no doubt one or two will have to take their pensions early so that the Government can try and wash its hands of responsibility. Middle managers sent out an arse covering e-mail asking staff to use their discretion when conducting checks. Those of us experienced in the ways of management would ignore such an e-mail and continue carrying out proper checks. This is because what the e-mail is really saying is we haven't got enough staff to do the job properly so cut corners, but if you get caught or mess up we will wash our hands of you. Less experienced, or less cynical, staff will assume they can take shortcuts and that they will have the support of their management if something goes wrong. Poor naive people!

Cuts are being made to public services and the effects are starting to be felt. There will be more and more pressure from managers to make things work with less resources. If staff take shortcuts to try and make things work and it goes wrong you can be assured that the management, who implement the policies, and the Government, who are imposing the cuts, will try and wash their hands of all responsibility.

With regard to policing and the 20% cuts being imposed to budgets, the Government needs to accept that we cannot continue to do everything that we currently do. The Government and senior management need to decide what we are no longer going to do and give some clear directions to officers regarding this. Until then all officers should continue ticking all the boxes and not taking shortcuts and chances, no matter what pressure there is to do so. When it goes wrong, the officer on the ground just trying to do their best with what they have got will be hung out to dry.

Town Centre Violence

I have been away and visited a number of countries where the attitude to alcohol is far different from that at home. I have touched on this subject before and it seems obvious to me that this is one area where the police and local authorities are failing miserably in applying the law.

If you take my home town, during the week you will see fairly quiet town centre pubs. The punters are generally sitting at tables. Some are eating. They are all generally served at the bar. Come the weekend however, tables and chairs are removed and loud music is played. Service is still at the bar. There is almost no monitoring of who has had too much to drink. The most sober of a group of friends can go and buy a round of drinks and no one has a clue how drunk the others are. Packed pubs and loud music means conversation is impossible and so punters just sup their drinks. No one monitors consumption effectively. The whole philosophy is to sell as much cheap alcohol as possible.

The result of all this is that drunks pour out of the pubs, they are sick in the street, they threaten one another and fight, they need medical attention and get arrested and we just put up with this every week. The demands these pubs place on the police, ambulance, hospitals and other services is outrageous.

In many countries abroad you cannot buy alcohol at a bar. You go in and sit down and you are served. The premises are not packed, music is not deafening and the waiting staff can monitor carefully how much everyone has had to drink. Because it is not being thrown over the bar in huge quantities, alcohol is more expensive and so it is drunk more moderately.

It seems obvious to me that police and councils in any area where town centre violence is a problem, should be applying conditions to licenses that all alcohol is served to persons seated at tables. If grounds are needed all the police need to do is video the exit of patrons at weekends. The sight of drunken men and women falling out of pubs, vomiting and being violent and aggressive should be more than enough to justify the conditions being  imposed.

I suggested this some time ago to my superiors and my colleague in charge of town centre policing and it has been ignored. I need to pursue this and push it forward. I would be interested if anyone else has tried anything similar elsewhere in the country.

British Justice System Executes Criminal

Well I was anticipating my next post being a blow by blow account of the Dale Farm eviction. A judge has decided that they can have another few days respite while he considers their case in more detail. If he allows them to stay it is yet another blow for justice. Does the law apply equally to all or does the law not apply to minorities? That is the only decision he has to make. If he allows the eviction to go ahead, the blow by blow account will follow next week.

Raymond Jacob

You may have read about the case of  Raymond Jacob, 37, who was stabbed to death during a burglary at the Bramhall home of businessman Vincent Cooke. It turns out that Jacob has a long history of offending dating back 20 years. Mr. Cooke was arrested on suspicion of murder but now been released on bail.

Jacob has dozens of convictions and was first sent to prison in 1995 for theft of a car. Since then he has served seven other custodial sentences, in between community penalties and suspended sentences, for numerous offences of theft, burglary, assault and robbery.

Jacob was jailed for 18 months after beating up a stranger during a night out in 1999. He admitted grievous bodily harm when he appeared at Mold Crown Court following the incident in Handforth, near Wilmslow. He served 8 months.

His longest sentence was 30 months for a burglary. He was also separately given eight weeks in jail for theft, five months for robbery, five months for assault, four months for burglary and another four months for burglary. He served less than a year.

Yesterday Jacob's alleged accomplice, Michael Anthony Thorpe, 33, of Outwood Road, Heald Green, appeared before Stockport magistrates accused of aggravated burglary at Mr Cooke’s home on Saturday night. He was remanded in custody and the case was sent to Minshull Street Crown Court for trial on December 2.

The role of the police within the justice system is quite rightly scrutinised and investigated. If we make a mistake or do anything wrong the IPCC or CPS will direct charges or discipline. The multi agency 'lessons learned' committee will give us the benefit of their wisdom having stuffed itself from the trough of hindsight.

The judges who dealt with Jacob's, The Prison Service, The Probation Service, The Crime and Disorder Partnership, The Prolific and Priority Offender Team, those responsible for writing the farcical sentencing guidelines, the Parole Board and the Government who approved the ridiculous early release programs to reduce our prison population are all responsible for his death. If Jacobs had been given appropriate sentences for his previous offending; if any meaningful rehabilitation existed in our prisons, Jacob's would still be alive. There needs to be a Royal Commission regarding our joke of a justice system.

My congratulations to Mr Cooke for defending himself, his home and his family so robustly. I apologise on behalf of our pathetic justice system that you will have to live with this for the rest of your life.

Tough on Immigration?

I have had a couple of experiences recently with the UK Border Agency or Immigration Department as they used to be known. My experience confirms that our country's border controls are nothing short of a joke. There is little control over immigration and there is systematic abuse of our laws which we seem incapable of overcoming for fear of legal action and particularly the Human Rights Act.

One sunny morning this summer, some of my officers assisted the UK Border Agency executing a warrant at a local business premise. The result is that five Pakistani men were arrested. Each of the five had entered this country on six month visas allegedly to visit relatives whilst on holiday. All five had stayed in this country for between two and five years and were living and working here. They were brought to the local police station where they were interviewed . It was established that they had all overstayed their visas and were working in this country illegally. They were then removed to an immigration detention centre.

You may be forgiven for assuming that all five would be put on a plane back to Pakistan within days. I assumed that is what happened, but I bumped into one of the Border Agency officers and got an update. At the detention centre all five applied for leave to remain in the UK and appealed against their deportation. One was given leave to remain, the other four were released and told to report to their local police station daily until their appeal was heard. The four disappeared and have have not been seen nor heard of since.

More recently I spent two days at an international airport working with the UK Border Agency. I could not believe what I was seeing and hearing. We have people arriving in this country every day who are obviously intending to stay or work. We interview them. They lie. They are evasive. But nine times out of ten we let them in anyway as we cannot prove what we believe. Occasionally we refuse them entry and sometimes they demand asylum. Sometimes they appeal against refusal of entry and we just let them in anyway because the appeal process is expensive and loaded in favour of the immigrant.

I am not against all immigration. Our transport system, our health service and, more recently our service industry have been saved by immigration. It is just a shame that we have more than one million unemployed who do not have the social skills, or any other skills, to fill these gaps.

Currently, for every illegal immigrant the UK Border Force detain only one in three is actually deported. The rest are given asylum or permission to remain or just disappear into the black economy.

If we are going to get tough on immigration we need a very simple system. If we think you might be bogus you go back from whence you came. No appeal, and no asylum, unless you are from a country on a list with serious human rights issues. If you overstay your welcome, you are on the next flight home. No appeal, no discussion. The current system is a complete joke and is being abused and capitalized upon.

Elf and Safety

I have mentioned before that my job involves attending a lot of meetings. I came to realise that many of these meetings are a complete waste of time. I stopped attending many and nothing happened. I had more time to do my job and focus on policing. The service we provided did not suffer. I thought I was not missed.

My boss recently told me that I had not been attending the Town Centre Management Group meeting. I had been missed and they would like me to attend. So I attended. The agenda had nothing on it that I thought need my presence but clearly I was wanted. Item 7 on the agenda was the turning on of the Christmas lights in the High Street. I was excited to hear that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs will be the pantomime at the local theatre this year and the actors taking part will be invited to turn on the lights. The actors will stand on the first floor balcony of the town hall. Concern was expressed that people would not be able to see the dwarfs on the balcony. A suggestion was made that the dwarfs could stand on a bench so they could easily be seen. There was then concern that the dwarfs might get caught up in the excitement and fall off the balcony. The solution: We can stand the dwarfs on a bench but have them all wear harnesses and tie them to the building so they cannot fall.

So, nearly two hours into a meeting that has no relevance to the police at all, we have discussed for nearly half an hour whether some dwarfs from the local panto can stand on a bench and whether they should be harnessed and tied to the building to ensure they don't fall off the balcony. I kept having to remind myself, this was not a dream and this discussion was really taking place. You couldn't make it up!

Questions For the New Met Commissioner

Bernard Hogan-Who?

Well Bernard Hogan-Howe is the new Met Commissioner. What we know about Bernard is that he is pretty straight talking and doesn't mind ruffling feathers. We also know that he thinks he can run the Met despite the cuts that are coming. He is obviously not going to ruffle the Governments feathers regarding their proposed cuts to the police service. We also know that as the Chief Constable of Merseyside he cut back room functions and focused on the front line and reducing crime. Taking on criminals and gangs is his focus and we should applaud much of what he achieved in Liverpool.

The Guardian has spoken to a number of individuals and asked them what they want the new Commissioner to do. Her are a few of them.

Lee Jasper: ex-equalities adviser to London mayor
He should immediately request the prime minister to announce a royal commission into all suspicious deaths in police custody. I would also hope he would immediately seek to massively reduce the over-representation of young black people in stop-and-search figures. And finally they should abolish the 12th-century office of constable, which gives rise to so much discretionary policing that is not capable of judicial or professional challenge. We need a 21st-century conception of policing not one that relies on feudal law that is completely unsuited to modern times.

Pam Hothi: manager at Chaos Theory, the gang violence prevention charity

I'm a strong believer in building community relations and, given the recent riots, the Met have got a hard task in starting again. Without those relations, you're not going to have positive outcomes in getting people to engage … particularly gangs.
You need to work for and listen to your community that you serve. Zero tolerance policing won't work. Enforcement alone cannot solve the problem. You need a strong balance of enforcement and intensive welfare support. You can't lock everyone up. You'll only end up further marginalising that community.

Jody McIntyre: who was manhandled by police during student demonstrations last year (The Guardians words not mine)

The priorities for a new commissioner should be to end the complete culture of unaccountability that exists within the police and challenge the double standard that is clearly in effect. The police might be there to enforce the law but they are also subject to that law so, if a police officer is suspected of killing someone or mistreating someone in their custody, then they should face the punishment for that crime just like any other member of the public.


Well, Lee Jasper is going to be disappointed. Pam Hothi doesn't seem to understand what the function of the police is. Intensive welfare support is the function of other public services who are failing miserably. Jody McIntyre's comments just confirm what an ignorant bigoted cretin he is. The police have never been more accountable. And as far as I am aware if police officers kill people or mistreat them they are subject of the law. But unlike everyone else, police officers, as enforcers of the law, are subject to far more robust investigations than the public and far more serious sentences on the rare occasions they do break the law.

I have one question for the new Commissioner. At the peak of the riots in London, Jody McIntyre urged people everywhere to rise up and riot in their area. Specifically his post on Twitter said. 'Be inspired by the scenes in #tottenham, and rise up in your own neighbourhood. 100 people in every area = the way we can beat the feds.'

Since then he has tried to say that the tweet was made before the riots and he wasn't inciting people to riot. This is a lie. His tweet was made at 10.02 pm on Saturday 6th August. This was well after rioting started and had been posted all over Twitter and the television. We know that McIntyre will lie to try and substantiate complaints against police and now he is lying to try and escape justice.

I made a complaint to the Met police that McIntyre had committed the offence of incitement to riot. I know others did so too. I have contacted the Met and no one can tell me whether this crime has been recorded or whether any investigation has been carried out or completed. Can anyone in the Met tell me?

My question to the Commissioner is. "If you are going to be tough on criminals. If you are going to be brave and rise above the adverse media that will inevitably arise out of this case, when is McIntyre going to be arrested and charged with this offence?"

Mark Duggan Buried

I was dismayed to see the funeral of Mark Duggan today. His family insist he was no gangster but we had a funeral akin to one of the Krays.

I was pleased to hear some of the church leaders involved in the ceremony speaking out against violence and recriminations.

I am not surprised at all that David Lamentable, the disgraceful MP for Tottenham, is still blaming everyone else for the riots. His attention has turned to the IPCC. He now states that if the IPCC had dealt with the family and community differently all the rioting could have been avoided. If the IPCC had made clear to the family that they were independent of the police and if they had held a press conference assuring everyone that a thorough inquiry would be carried out none of the rioting need have happened. Isn't the clue in the name? This pathetic, apology for an MP will never ever suggest that some of the people of Tottenham were wrong to start rioting because the IPCC hadn't given them enough respect. Innit.

The IPCC do have some questions to answer. How did they manage to put out a press release stating that Duggan died in an exchange of fire with police? Why did the IPCC not tell the family that Duggan had been shot and killed? Calls for the disbandment of the IPCC are ridiculous. Whatever organisation or process is put in place to investigate police action will never appease some.

I am disappointed that the family, and some of those that latch themselves onto families in these circumstances, are still making ridiculous speculative comments regarding the circumstances of Duggan's death. According to some, the police now have a shoot to kill policy. Duggan's fingerprints are not on the gun found at the scene and so it must have been planted by the police. Duggan was an ordinary family man who was hoping to get a job with London Fire Brigade.

We should, of course, wait for the result of the inquiry but these ridiculous allegations deserve a response. For an unemployed man Duggan had a lifestyle way beyond a person in receipt of benefits. The gun found at the scene was loaded and capable of being fired. The gun was in a sock. This is a well known method for  criminals to avoid leaving fingerprints and other forensic evidence. The inquiry may reveal that the police had intelligence that Duggan intended to shoot the person who killed his cousin, Kelvin Easton. He had been stabbed during an argument about a woman and drugs. The police were following Duggan and made the decision to intercept him. What threat Duggan posed to justify being shot is the only real question. If the officer felt he was at threat from the weapon that should be the end of it.

The Trouble With Travellers

My Force has been asked to assist with the Dale Farm Traveller site eviction and I am getting briefed on the role of our PSU teams. I have read some of the recent rhetoric on the subject. From the right we have calls to bulldoze the site and throw them all off into the sunset and from the left we have calls for compassion, human rights and understanding of the honourable nomadic people. The cause is now being taken over by the usual anti establishment leftie brigade who are rushing to the scene. The proposition of a chance to bash a few coppers is too much to resist.

Dale Farm is green belt land which is occupied by Irish Travellers. The land was agricultural land which has been bought  by some of the travellers. All over the country the same thing is happening. There are three illegal encampments in the area I work. The Council are in the process of taking similar enforcement action against two of the sites. The third, they tried to take action but the Court decided that no eviction could take place as there is an elderly lady living there who is ill. When she finally pops off the Council can try again, but if history is anything to go by there will be a pregnant mother or sick child who cannot be moved for one reason or another.

What do I know about Irish travellers? Well when I attend diversity training a Christian traveller lady comes to talk to us. She tells us about the history, the culture and the morality of the traveller community. She talks about the work they do, the travelling and of her own Christian travelling community.


Like nearly all police officers I have had many dealings with travellers over the years. I remember the first non payment of fines warrant I ever tried to execute. It was at the home of a settled traveller family. I knocked on the door and an upstairs window was opened by the person named on the warrant. I explained why I was there and he shouted "Fuck off." No power of entry for a fines warrant, so I did.

Most traveller families keep themselves to themselves and are no different to any other community. A significant number however are criminal and antisocial and have also settled green belt and common land. The travellers sites in my area have never ending piles of tree cuttings and other rubbish dumped on the roads near the site. The Council spend a fortune cleaning up after the few who give the majority a bad name. If we attend the sites we always have to have extra officers to guard police vehicles or they will be damaged. Artifice burglaries are almost exclusively committed by Travellers.


The romantic notion of the community travelling on the open road is pure bunkum. Some Travellers attend the odd fair and visit family occasionally but the vast majority do not move from one year to the next.

I have also learnt that Traveller children generally attend junior school and then most drop out. The girls leave to help mothers look after younger siblings and the boys go to work with their father's. Very few traveller women work. Their role is to cook, clean, bear children and look after their men and children.

It is children that are the main issue with the Traveller community. Most of the girls are married before 18 and they have large families. The Traveller community is therefore growing at a significant rate. If we accept the male dominated, sexist culture that brings this about then we are either going to have to allocate more traveller sites or accept that more an more green belt land will be occupied by Travellers. If the latter happens then there may be more and more Dale Farms to deal with.

Bleating Magistrates

Some Magistrates seem to be miffed that they didn't get to hear some of the cases against the rioters. From the comments on their blog we should all be grateful that they did not or they would all have been bailed and given community sentences.

 The city riots were an extraordinary event and warranted extraordinary action by the police and judiciary. I have explained in my previous post why I do not believe that the sentences being given to those involved in the disturbances are excessive.

The concern now turns to bail. I think it is naive to simply say that now the police have put sufficient officers on the street the likelihood of re-offending has gone. The vast numbers of officers put on the street to quell the disturbances was a very short term solution and those numbers cannot be maintained for more than a few days. If suspects/offenders were not incarcerated there is still a significant risk of further disorder. District Judges made the right decisions regarding bail and set the right tone and example which helped abate the disturbances. Thank God for District Judges!

To suggest that swift justice cannot be fair indicates that the author has fallen for the spin of the lawyers that bleed our legal aid system and denies justice to victim’s day in and day out. I am not suggesting for a minute that defendants should not get proper legal advice and representation, but 25 years ago the vast majority of defendants pleaded guilty on their first appearance and were dealt with. Charge to sentence within 48 hours was not uncommon.

Even in straightforward cases, what we now see are adjournments for legal advice, adjournments for disclosure, more legal advice, interviewing witnesses, mitigation etc. Etc. Often, the defending solicitor has no interest in justice for the individual, simply of extracting as much as possible from the legal aid budget, which has tripled over the same period. (I know many solicitors will howl with rage at the suggestion, but I know some who boast that this is what they do. Others would never admit this but follow the same practices.)

What one Chief Constable was suggesting is that we revert to a system where if you are guilty, you plead guilty at the first appearance and mitigation and sentencing can follow and you are given credit for a very early guilty plea with a reduced sentence. If you want to look at how good the case against you is before you plead; if you want to give it a run and see if the witnesses turn up, or your mates can intimidate them in the Court: if you want to just mess everyone about, hope the CPS lose the file or just assist your solicitor bleed the legal aid system, fine, but if you are convicted, you should have a sentence that deters such behaviour.

Sentencing of Rioters

There has been some concern expressed from some quarters, including here, regarding the sentencing of those involved in the recent riots.

Personally, I feel the District Judges and Crown Court Judges have not been politically influenced. I rather suspect that, having been constrained for years by our ludicrous sentencing guidelines, the Judges have jumped at the opportunity to step outside of the constraints of those guidelines and give sentences that appear to actually reflect the offence and public demand.

Those who work outside of the failing justice system in this country need to be aware that the sentences given bear little resemblance to time actually served. For example, an offender looting a shop and pleading guilty to burglary has been attracting a tariff of around 3 years imprisonment. A third is taken off for a guilty plea, and so we are down to two years. The offender is eligible for Home Detention Curfew (introduced in 1999) after serving just one quarter of their sentence. So what may seem a harsh 2 years prison actually means 6 months prison followed by around 3 months on a curfew order at home. The home curfew usually applies from 8pm to 6 am but may be less or up to 12 hours maximum. (The maximum curfew may be increased to 16 hours in the near future.)

Shorter sentences are equally reduced. Magistrates currently are only allowed to impose a maximum sentence of 6 months imprisonment. A sentence of 6 months results in 3 months prison at the most and usually 2.

Recently we had a spate of burglaries. The suspect for these offences had been sentenced to 5 years in prison (he had convictions for more than 60 offences) in 2009. You may be forgiven for thinking he could not be responsible as he must be in prison. We have learnt this means nothing and always check. The prisoner may be on weekend release, work experience or even paroled. This man had been released on parole after 14 months in prison.

Successive Governments have conned the public regarding prison sentences and the lack of almost any rehabilitation for those serving less than three years. These policies are just parts of the significant failings of the justice system and one of the reasons the system fails to deal with offenders effectively either from a punitive or rehabilitative perspective.

Notting Hill 2

Well at least we got out and about tonight. Generally things were pretty good but there were some tensions.

The Carnival is being hailed as a huge success. One man has been seriously assaulted. At about 8pm some youths started throwing bottles at police lines. Couldn't be better could it? Well worth the estimated £4 million policing bill?

What I did see tonight was some much better tactics from the police. Snatch teams backed up by a number of officers resulted in a number of arrests that may not have happened in other circumstances. The yobs will get wise to this and we need to be careful how this develops.

Notting Hill

I have just got home from the Metropolis having spent almost ten hours sitting around waiting to see what happened at Notting Hill Carnival. The Met didn't seem to want the county Mountie's out on the streets, which was a shame.

I still haven't worked out who is actually in charge of the policing of the Carnival but we did get a few words from a youthful Commander, Steve Rodhouse, who gave us the Young Mr Grace speech. "You've all done really well!" (Sorry, that shows my age. Are You Being Served circa 1973.) The whole of the Met seemed to be crawling with scrambled egg on hats and shoulders.



Commander Steve Rodhouse aka Tin Tin?

The press have hailed the event a success so far and one of the most peaceful with fewer arrests than normal. Radio traffic suggested there were some serious issues. A female officer was slashed with a knife. This seems to have gone largely unreported. At one point youths were throwing missiles at officers and running amok, although that seemed to be sorted out quickly.

Let's see what tomorrow brings.

A Man With Some Balls at Last

My thanks to Zorro for this. Readers of this blog will know that I have been asking for someone from the black community in this country to stand up and speak out about the drug and gang culture in that community. David Lamentable, that pathetic, disgraceful apology for a leader and so called MP for Tottenham will never be that man.

This is quite a long video clip but listen to the Mayor of Philadelphia talking about similar issues in the USA. This man has got the balls that David Lamentable is missing.

More Unrealistic Expectations

I was going to write a few thoughts down regarding the aftermath of the riots. I am concerned that the Government seem to be happy to allow the Courts to wave the stick and there is a distinct lack of discussion on the policy changes required to reverse the mess we are in. I loathe the disgusting Daily Mail and I don't always agree with him, but Peter Hitchens has said it all for me here.

Ashleigh Hall - befriended a sex offender, Peter Chapman, on Facebook and was subsequently murdered by him.

On another note, this story caught my eye. It is a tragedy that 17 year old Ashleigh Hall was murdered by Peter Chapman a known sex offender. Ashleigh's mother has decided that she is going to sue four police forces who should have been monitoring Chapman. I don't know if these forces failed to carry out basic monitoring of Chapman but to suggest that supervising sex offenders in the community will stop then re offending is like suggesting that having a chat once a week with a drug addict will stop them taking drugs.

There are thousands of registered sex offenders and they are supposed to notify the police where they are living and meet with police supervisors regularly to discuss what they are doing and to try and establish if they are a risk to anyone. I am aware of one case where a sex offender has refused access to the police and the courts have agreed that it is an infringement of his human rights to have the police calling at his home. He refuses to go to a police station and so his supervising officer meets him once a week in his car in a street, 2 miles from his home. How this can have any influence on his offending I don't know.

If you want to eliminate the risk of sex offenders re offending keep them behind bars until you are sure and then we won't have to worry about ridiculous monitoring in the community, which is designed to empty the prisons and give the public confidence, but in reality achieves almost nothing.

PS. I see the former Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith has had the painters in again. Does this mean we can expect another invoice for her husbands porn?

David Lamentable MP

If you want to make yourself really angry, violently sick or even both, read this article by Tony Blair in The Observer today. Tony doesn't think the riots are anything to do with moral decline, it's all about Tony. He had a plan to solve the whole issue of the underclass. The blueprints were left with Gordon and apparently buried by him. If only Tony had been left in charge the whole issue would have been resolved. How can they print this crud?

All political parties share some of the blame for the policies and strategies that have led us where we are but none more so than the last Blair/Brown regime. While some are still trying to blame the greedy irresponsible bankers it is worth reminding ourselves that these two clowns put the country into £800 billion of debt before the banking crisis. The banking bail out cost us about £65 billion. An unwelcome additional burden on our already debt ridden country, but responsible for less than 10% of our total current debt. So politicians conveniently blaming the state of our economy on bankers are being disingenuous to say the least.

Blair and Brown threw money at the social ills of our society, wasting it in the most disgusting way. Encouraging irresponsible lifestyles, benefit culture and buying votes; discouraging responsibility, boundaries and consequences.  Even the wretched Milliband recognised that the Labour party has become the party of the scroungers rather than the working man/woman. For Blair to suggest he could have prevented and solved the problem is an insult to any person with a modicum of intelligence.

I see that David Lamentable, the disgraceful MP for Tottenham, is calling for more money to be thrown at the area. He doesn't seem to understand that just throwing money at poor areas doesn't solve the problem but I guess it is popular with the voters. Voters in Tottenham also seem to like the suggestion that the police are killing black people in custody rather than any suggestion that the black community needs to sort out it's criminal elements.

Incidentally, you may have missed in the news that yet another young black man, Leroy James, has been murdered. There haven't been any protests, demonstrations, riots or even demands for justice because he wasn't shot by the police or stabbed by racist thugs. His killers were members of another black gang. When his father, also called Leroy James, was asked if children should carry knives, he replied. "It is up to them." Mr James is clearly no Tariq Jahan or any kind of role model.

I refer back to my original post on the riots following the shooting of Mark Duggan. When is someone from the black community going to stand up and and actually speak out against the drugs and gang culture in that community?

Some Light Relief?

" I am pleased to say that the whole situation is now under full control."



THE LOOTERS PRAYER:

Our father, who art in prison,
Even my mum knows not his name,
Thy Chavdom come, 
Thy will be done in Manchester
As it is in London,
Give us this day our welfare bread,
And forgive us our ASBO's,
As we happy slap those who give evidence against us.
And lead us not to employment,
But deliver us free housing,
For thine is the Chavdom,
The Burberry & the Bacardi,
Forever and ever.

Innit

The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

The Good



You cannot help but admire the bravery and dignity of, Tariq Jahan, the father of one of the three young men killed in Birmingham on Tuesday night. How he managed to hold it together and speak to the media, I do not know. Rather than demanding justice he simply asked for restraint and an end to the disorder. The way that this community in Birmingham have behaved and the trust the community have placed in the justice system to deal with it is really humbling. Compare that with the behaviour of the animals in Tottenham.

The Bad

I am really worried that the Government just don't get it. It would appear that as the riots have abated for now already the seriousness of the situation is being downgraded. David Cameron talks tough about rioters going to prison while the Courts bail them. He also makes it clear that the reduction in the policing budget will go ahead. Kenneth Clarke has announced that the Government will increase the maximum curfew sentence from 12 hours a day for 6 months to 16 hours a day for 12 months. So already we can see that the focus will be on non custodial sentences.

It needs to be clearly understood that we have a growing underclass who are putting this country at risk of anarchy. We have to address this quickly. Investment in effective parenting, education, prison with real rehabilitation and a Probation and Youth Justice Service that actually sets boundaries and consequences are an absolute requirement for any sort of change. Curfewing these animals in their disfunctional homes and expecting the police to enforce the curfew and keep them under control is not the answer.

The Ugly



Here is Darcus Howe being interviewed by the BBC. With the benefit of hindsight he foresaw these riots coming and it is all because the police have been stopping and searching young black men like his 'angel' grandson for no reason at all.

I recall Mr Howe making a documentary in the West Midlands regarding relationships between the black and Asian communities. Asian youths told him to clear off or they were going to 'mash him up.' I would have thought that Mr Howe would have learnt  then and since that young people of all races in many communities are out of control for all the reasons previously outlined.

Shouting racist and blaming the police is the ugly face of commentators and community 'representatives.' It is irrelevant to this situation now and I suggest you are too Mr Howe.

It's Not Over Yet!

Well, last night London was at peace again, although elsewhere in the country the feral youths went on the rampage encouraged by the scenes in London over the last few days. ‘Free stuff’ is too much of an attraction for the underclass who waste their lives rather than even think about becoming useful members of society.

The best thing I saw last night were decent people out on the streets protecting their properties; some white faces, but largely Sikhs, other Asians and Turks. Earlier in the day, hundreds of people were on the streets clearing up the mess. This sends out a strong message to the yobs that decent people are standing side by side with the police to enforce law and order.

We must remember that it was well advertised that the capital would be crawling with police last night. This cannot be maintained for long and we need to take steps quickly to ensure that there are no serious repetitions over the forthcoming weeks. Offenders need to continue to get knocks on the door and the justice system has got to stop pussyfooting around and incarcerate them. We need to consider setting aside prisons for these yobs. The message should be that you stay in custody until you are fit to join society. Education and training should be provided and you stay there until you reach a level of achievement. The namby pamby nonsense I have to put up with all the time from the Youth Offending Team and Probation needs to stop. All I hear is that they are ‘working with’ someone. This means they have a nice chat with an offender for half an hour and arrange for them to go on a daytrip and have a McDonalds. This is achieving nothing. Goals, boundaries and consequences need to be set and enforced.

These riots are music to the ears of the academics who might now get funded for another ten years to give us their enlightened opinions on all the social causes. For nothing, courtesy of another contributor, I can tell you the issues are family breakdown; absent fathers; grossly inadequate parenting; failure of education; welfare dependency; political correctness; victim culture; the irresponsible toleration of soft drug-taking; the distaste of the notion of punishment and the consequent collapse of authority in the entire criminal justice system; the implosion of the policing ethic and the police retreat from the streets; the increasing organization and boldness of anarchist and left-wing subversive activity; and the growth of irrationality, narcissistic self-centeredness and mob rule and a fundamental breakdown of morality and order.

In the area of self centeredness I would highlight the morals of our politicians and the greed of the affluent and overpaid rich and lack of philanthropic attitude are also contributing factors. In Europe, salaries more than £100K are still quite unusual, unless you are an MEP. In this country we have followed the American model and pay senior executives disgusting amounts of money that cannot possibly be justified. Funnily enough we have the same issues with a disenfranchised underclass and the police are not going to just beat them into submission for you.

We need wholesale changes in policies and strategies to address these issues.

From a policing perspective, the current liberal policies have led to two generations of violent, thieving, drug infested, welfare dependents that breed the next generation with no thought of responsibility. We simply house them and offer more benefits, education, social services etc. They take what they want and discard anything that might show any responsibility. The police to these people are just an irritation or the enemy. We have been talking about rights and responsibilities for years. Let’s have some firm action!

In some communities we have so called community leaders whose only concerns are self interest and adulation. Multi-culturalism is their life blood. Integration would render them irrelevant. The police and politicians have been fawning all over these people for years. We have seen now that they have no control or influence over behaviour in their communities and it could be argued that they actually deter the police from taking action allowing the criminal elements to go about their business unimpeded. We need to maintain and build good relations with the law abiding section of these communities and tackle robustly the criminal underworld within. And when someone shouts racist, we need to reflect on that, but we must not let it deter us from doing the right thing.

I do not agree that events such as the Notting Hill Carnival should be cancelled. This event is a good example of what has gone wrong with policing and society. The Carnival itself is not a lawless event and to cancel it would punish the law abiding majority taking part in it. What I see every year is the unlawful element moving into the event after dusk. I see gangs ‘steaming,’ robbery, violence and drugs. The police play it very softly, softly, scared stiff of the R word and upsetting the criminal elements. We need to let the event go ahead and tackle the criminals head on and clean it up for the decent people. This is a time for action not falling on the back foot again.

PS: It doesn't look as if there is much hope. Just watching the news and looters are walking out of the Courts on bail. That will show them!