Any police here?Couple q,s on average police shift
Discussion
This is a follow up to my last post about having to call my local police station only 2 miles 12 times about a really drunk driver and they done nothing,then eventually they do something on the 13th occasion i called them,this is my main question.If i was a police officer on an average night shift i couldn't see anything more important coming in on an average than a potential killer on the streets,or am i wrong?,especially in the small town i stay in.Do things work on a priority order or if a youth steals a twix from a petrol station at 10 pm then at 10.02pm someone calls about a drink driver,who gets priority?Considering this prick done this so many times,delivering his drugs drunk all night,waking us up constantly between 11pm right through to 8 am for about two years i found it unforgivable of the police to do nothing for so long!My partners health suffered so badly due to months without sleep,this should have been ended so much sooner,the level of frustration i felt when he kept coming home,parking his car at a 45 degree angle,and leaving his lights on all night can't be described,i could have killed this man,and that's no exaggeration,i was right at breaking point,and why?The police two miles away just weren't interested!Well thats my opinion,then,i kept seeing police vans driving about boasting about how many drunk people had been stopped in that month?I actually stopped a van and asked them how they came about a figure of 45 for that month when i had called 12 times in the last month about one person and nothing happened?Believe it or not the 13 times i called the police doesn't include the dozens of times i called Crimestoppers and the drink driving hotline!A guy i got to know in the CID actually told me the main time i was calling(1am)there was a change of shift and they're probably sitting having their tea and cakes and not bothering about the call?Oh,and the fact this drunk driver had a good idea i was the one getting him into bother for the drug side of things,i also had the fact the police done nothing about the fact i overheard this person on the phone arranging to have my legs broken for three hundred pounds hanging over my head.Trying to sleep with this in my mind and being woken up all the time has left me very bitter and frustrated with the police yet again!
Can't talk for other officers in other stations but i cover over 120 square miles for my patch and on my squad there are 2 people. 2. And on nights we double crew which means there is only one car.
Also the radios are awful quality so even if we weren't busy (yeah right) then we probably wont hear the broadcast.
Oh and just because a job happens near a police station doesn't mean the police are in the station. Some of our stations are empty from lack of staff and if, like on my squad, there is only one car, then that car could be the other side of the patch or in custody with a prisoner.
Also on nights it is quite common for us only to have one traffic car covering the whole county so that could be miles and miles away.
Also the radios are awful quality so even if we weren't busy (yeah right) then we probably wont hear the broadcast.
Oh and just because a job happens near a police station doesn't mean the police are in the station. Some of our stations are empty from lack of staff and if, like on my squad, there is only one car, then that car could be the other side of the patch or in custody with a prisoner.
Also on nights it is quite common for us only to have one traffic car covering the whole county so that could be miles and miles away.
I don't know where people get the impression that there are hundreds of officers just waiting to spring into action at a seconds notice but fail to do so becausethey are ensconsed in 'tea and buns'
Rumplestiltskin.
In a rural area, there are likely to be only a couple of Police officers on duty who can respond to this type of call. They could be many miles away from the call you put in. They could also be committed with other enquiries that cannot be left at a seconds notice.
Uniform patrol Police deal with a lot of incidents in a shift. These range from arresting people for crimes that have been investigated by those officers and been successfully located. Even an arrest for a minor offence such as Section 5 Public order Act 1986 or Drunk and Disorderly can see a patrol crew off the road for a minimum of 4 hours. It could be for the whole of a shift.
Then there are the prolific numbers of hormonal 15 year old children
that decide that they can no longer bear to live at home because of the dreadful regime they have to contend with and go walkabout all night, not to mention the numbers that escape from the local psychiatric wards 
that require Police searches to make sure they are not in danger and returned safely to the sanctuary of the caring establishment from whence they came! Lock up your grannies 
Drunken shinanigans in the street are now an all week concept as young people blow away their earnings on alcohol and good times because they have no hope in saving a deposit for a house of their own.
Attempts at suicide, Some sucessful.
Road traffic collisions (which can sometimes take hours to clear up) and then the subsequent enquiries at hospitals.
Domestic disputes which happen at all times of the day and night, even into the small hours.
Falsely activated burglar alarms,
Real burglarys in progress, and the subsequent waiting for boarding up service when there is no keyholder available
Reports of stolen or damaged cars
Reports of thefts from cars
Dangerous dogs, (usually when they have bitten someone)
Collecting lost property that people cannot be bothered to bring into the nick.
Parking complaints,
reports of sexual assault including rapes (which are a lot more common than you would think).
Firearms enquiries.
Firearms incidents (usually relating to domestic disputes)
Robbery and street robbery with weapons.
Warrants to arrest people that have not turned up for court.
Warrants to arrest for people who have not paid their fines,
Warrants to bash your door down for 1/8th Oz cannabis
Stop checks under PACE to keep the Inspector happy and to satisfy the urge of Blunket and the Home Office with Key performance indicators.
PDR (personal development review) which is an evidence based record of personal work carried out during the year in line with Govt and force targtets from which an annual appraisal is written, has to be typed out on the specific forms.
Court files which have strict deadlines and enormous amounts of forms to fill in, usually with the same information on each and every sheet.
Stray dogs,
Stray sheep,
Stray horse,
Stray cattle,
NOISE COMPLAINTS
Raves ( unauthorised gatherings of party goers with loud boom boxes)
Assylum seekers escaping from trucks which stop for drivers refreshment hours (tachograph regs)
Gypsy problems when they invade your local park to stay for a few days, 
Then there is general patrol to attend to (PDR objectives)
Waiting for hours at court to be told that you are not needed as the defendant has changed his plea now he/she has seen all the witnesses have arrived
Self updates on latest law changes and force policies that descend from the puzzle palaces called HQ!
These examples above are just some of the types of incidents that are attended by all officers including rural officers and I know from experience that ususually, even into the small hours of the night.
Information is constantly phoned in from witnesses reporting offences such as you have done. If there are only 4 officers on duty and patrolling, then how can they respond when they already have many other tasks to attend to and probably when they already have a list of half a dozen that have not been attended before they came on duty?
I am based in and around two large towns, combined population of about 60,000 people and not including the outlying rural areas and villages that come within the divisional command area of those towns. On a typical weekday, there are only a maximum of 10 officers patrolling that area from the shifts at the 2 main stations. With Home beat officers and other support departments, that may creep up to 16 uniformed officers on any one shift.
You can see from the individual head of population to each officer that there are not many to go around and in the evenings, there is usually a need to put at least 2 out on foot in the town centres to cope with the alcoholic yoof of today.
If another 4 have prisoners to attend to, that leaves only 8 officers available to attend all the rest of the reports and jobs that come into the control room. These 8 will be already playing catch up and if they happen to be 20 miles away from your drink driver when you phone in and fighting with a pair of matrimonial gladiators, then it isn't any wonder it has taken them 16 calls to catch your DD.
Maybe they stumbled across him on their way to another tedious job which could have been sorted with a little ingenuity from the caller or their neighbours together!
If you go to your local main town Police Station at around 1900 hours, just ask how many they have got on patrol at that time, you may be very shocked to find the truth.
And by the way, most 'tea and buns' are now consumed on the hoof between the jobs done and the jobs to do whilst in the patrol car.
Rumplestiltskin.
In a rural area, there are likely to be only a couple of Police officers on duty who can respond to this type of call. They could be many miles away from the call you put in. They could also be committed with other enquiries that cannot be left at a seconds notice.
Uniform patrol Police deal with a lot of incidents in a shift. These range from arresting people for crimes that have been investigated by those officers and been successfully located. Even an arrest for a minor offence such as Section 5 Public order Act 1986 or Drunk and Disorderly can see a patrol crew off the road for a minimum of 4 hours. It could be for the whole of a shift.
Then there are the prolific numbers of hormonal 15 year old children
that decide that they can no longer bear to live at home because of the dreadful regime they have to contend with and go walkabout all night, not to mention the numbers that escape from the local psychiatric wards that require Police searches to make sure they are not in danger and returned safely to the sanctuary of the caring establishment from whence they came! Lock up your grannies Drunken shinanigans in the street are now an all week concept as young people blow away their earnings on alcohol and good times because they have no hope in saving a deposit for a house of their own.
Attempts at suicide, Some sucessful.
Road traffic collisions (which can sometimes take hours to clear up) and then the subsequent enquiries at hospitals.
Domestic disputes which happen at all times of the day and night, even into the small hours.
Falsely activated burglar alarms,
Real burglarys in progress, and the subsequent waiting for boarding up service when there is no keyholder available
Reports of stolen or damaged cars
Reports of thefts from cars
Dangerous dogs, (usually when they have bitten someone)
Collecting lost property that people cannot be bothered to bring into the nick.
Parking complaints,
reports of sexual assault including rapes (which are a lot more common than you would think).
Firearms enquiries.
Firearms incidents (usually relating to domestic disputes)
Robbery and street robbery with weapons.
Warrants to arrest people that have not turned up for court.
Warrants to arrest for people who have not paid their fines,
Warrants to bash your door down for 1/8th Oz cannabis
Stop checks under PACE to keep the Inspector happy and to satisfy the urge of Blunket and the Home Office with Key performance indicators.
PDR (personal development review) which is an evidence based record of personal work carried out during the year in line with Govt and force targtets from which an annual appraisal is written, has to be typed out on the specific forms.
Court files which have strict deadlines and enormous amounts of forms to fill in, usually with the same information on each and every sheet.
Stray dogs,
Stray sheep,
Stray horse,
Stray cattle,
NOISE COMPLAINTS Raves ( unauthorised gatherings of party goers with loud boom boxes)
Assylum seekers escaping from trucks which stop for drivers refreshment hours (tachograph regs)
Gypsy problems when they invade your local park to stay for a few days,
Then there is general patrol to attend to (PDR objectives)
Waiting for hours at court to be told that you are not needed as the defendant has changed his plea now he/she has seen all the witnesses have arrived
Self updates on latest law changes and force policies that descend from the puzzle palaces called HQ!
These examples above are just some of the types of incidents that are attended by all officers including rural officers and I know from experience that ususually, even into the small hours of the night.
Information is constantly phoned in from witnesses reporting offences such as you have done. If there are only 4 officers on duty and patrolling, then how can they respond when they already have many other tasks to attend to and probably when they already have a list of half a dozen that have not been attended before they came on duty? I am based in and around two large towns, combined population of about 60,000 people and not including the outlying rural areas and villages that come within the divisional command area of those towns. On a typical weekday, there are only a maximum of 10 officers patrolling that area from the shifts at the 2 main stations. With Home beat officers and other support departments, that may creep up to 16 uniformed officers on any one shift.
You can see from the individual head of population to each officer that there are not many to go around and in the evenings, there is usually a need to put at least 2 out on foot in the town centres to cope with the alcoholic yoof of today.
If another 4 have prisoners to attend to, that leaves only 8 officers available to attend all the rest of the reports and jobs that come into the control room. These 8 will be already playing catch up and if they happen to be 20 miles away from your drink driver when you phone in and fighting with a pair of matrimonial gladiators, then it isn't any wonder it has taken them 16 calls to catch your DD.
Maybe they stumbled across him on their way to another tedious job which could have been sorted with a little ingenuity from the caller or their neighbours together!
If you go to your local main town Police Station at around 1900 hours, just ask how many they have got on patrol at that time, you may be very shocked to find the truth.
And by the way, most 'tea and buns' are now consumed on the hoof between the jobs done and the jobs to do whilst in the patrol car.
MadCop what do you do after 10am then 
Sorry couldn't resist
A recent event says to me some jobs get dropped in favour of more serious crtimes
My father was recently subjected to an armed robbery,a neighbour was suspiscious as soon as they turned up,phoned in and within 15 mins we had 4 armed responce vechiles turn up and within half an hour every copper in kent seemed to be there.
The place is 7 miles (mainly b roads) from the nearest station
P.S when do you write your risk assessments
Sorry couldn't resist
A recent event says to me some jobs get dropped in favour of more serious crtimes
My father was recently subjected to an armed robbery,a neighbour was suspiscious as soon as they turned up,phoned in and within 15 mins we had 4 armed responce vechiles turn up and within half an hour every copper in kent seemed to be there.
The place is 7 miles (mainly b roads) from the nearest station
P.S when do you write your risk assessments
Why couldn't the guy from the CID have given me that answer?A good reply and one a lot of people like myself should read,i fully understand everything police have on their plate(apart from the cakes)but it was just taking sooooo long,your answer kinda puts me off calling the police ever again:-),i'm surprised i don't get a loud,"YEAH,WHAT,WE'RE BUSY!" on the phone when i call them,thanks for the replies.
Well in a long post Madcop summed up the role of a police officer, and the vast range of jobs they do.
The bit which probably irritates most people was buried deep in the post when he mentioned taking 4 hours or more to complete paperwork.
I suspect that most people believe there should be a minimum of paperworks and its a waste of valuable resources having police officers completing paperwork.
The bit which probably irritates most people was buried deep in the post when he mentioned taking 4 hours or more to complete paperwork.
I suspect that most people believe there should be a minimum of paperworks and its a waste of valuable resources having police officers completing paperwork.
Talking of paperwork, Blunkett wants all crimes recorded now.
If they went to a job in which someone was hit, and this hit person told the police to F**K OFF as he was pi55ed and didn't want to know anyway, The police are still expected to take a crime report and fill in as much as possible. If the victim walked off and didn't give details then the boxes would still have to be filled in but with the word "UNKNOWN". The crime would then have to be written up and put through supervision and blah blah blah.
This is one example of how Blunkett is taking police of the street. They're are many more examples. Just look at my in tray. Don't have time to be pro-active anymore.
If they went to a job in which someone was hit, and this hit person told the police to F**K OFF as he was pi55ed and didn't want to know anyway, The police are still expected to take a crime report and fill in as much as possible. If the victim walked off and didn't give details then the boxes would still have to be filled in but with the word "UNKNOWN". The crime would then have to be written up and put through supervision and blah blah blah.
This is one example of how Blunkett is taking police of the street. They're are many more examples. Just look at my in tray. Don't have time to be pro-active anymore.
318ti said:
Talking of paperwork, Blunkett wants all crimes recorded now.
If they went to a job in which someone was hit, and this hit person told the police to F**K OFF as he was pi55ed and didn't want to know anyway, The police are still expected to take a crime report and fill in as much as possible. If the victim walked off and didn't give details then the boxes would still have to be filled in but with the word "UNKNOWN". The crime would then have to be written up and put through supervision and blah blah blah.
This is one example of how Blunkett is taking police of the street. They're are many more examples. Just look at my in tray. Don't have time to be pro-active anymore.
We have just been instructed to deal with a section 5 Public Order offence as two crimes.
The first instance of bad behaviour, language etc is the offence itself complete so when the second offence triggers the power of arrest after a warning, the managers have realised that there are in fact 2 offences to be crimed and not just 1.
So when back at custody, the Sgt issues 2 crime reports which have to be filled in completely with exactly the same details for the same incident and only 1 charge
in there somewhere 
It appears to be a problem here in the southern Black Forest as well. A freiend of mine has a daughter in the local police and she explained what they have to cover on the night shift as well. Area 35 (58km) miles long and 25 (40km)wide, 2 (two) local cars each with, if they're lucky 2 BiB or GiGs.... so if they're at the other end of the patch dealing with a swiss gas ballooner who'd crashed as was the case recently.... they couldn't go down to the junky who was raving in the town 25 miles away......... or the madman with the axe...
So understand your very cogent posting Madcop....
So understand your very cogent posting Madcop....
I thought this lovely Labour party got to power by promising (amongst 3,567 other things) that they would cut police red tape? Sounds like it's going the other way.
What's that the Tory's say? If Labour win an election all the Torys have to do is sit and wait for Labour to f*** it up...
What's that the Tory's say? If Labour win an election all the Torys have to do is sit and wait for Labour to f*** it up...
I joined in 1975 when all that was required after an arrest was the crime report and descriptive forms. I used to be able to arrest, document, interview and charge a chap within the hour and go to court the following day for trial (police used to be able to prosecute their own offences - The police are asking for summary trial today, your worship. No CPS laywer suggesting the job should be pulled as the offender wanted to plead not guilty). On the first day of the football season in 1978 I had 13 arrests in five separate incidents. My shift went from midday to 2 am, but it was still good going. Today, with all the extra work put on PCs by Government and CPS, 13 prisoners is more than a week's work.
It is exasperating. I used to run an identification unit and I was required to spend hours proving how efficient I was. If I hadn't had the paperwork I could have run another three or four parades.
In two years I was called to crown court 147 times because CPS demanded that I attend. I gave evidence on 13 occasions, less than 10%. It was not that bad for me in reality as I got paid for my time and I could catch up on my reading. For the victims and public spirited witnesses it is dreadful.
A woman who was attacked by a yob and then threatened by his family when she reported the incident was forced to wait in the same area as the offender, and his family, while there was a pre-trial discussion. When I asked witness liaison if the victim could be allowed a room to herself it was as if I'd asked if I could go into court naked (not a pretty sight, believe me). There were discussions and rules quoted. In the end I purloined the CPS interview room and then got told off by a lawyer who couldn't have scared a nervous robin.
My advice to everyone is; don't become a victim. No-one seems to give a damn.
Derek
It is exasperating. I used to run an identification unit and I was required to spend hours proving how efficient I was. If I hadn't had the paperwork I could have run another three or four parades.
In two years I was called to crown court 147 times because CPS demanded that I attend. I gave evidence on 13 occasions, less than 10%. It was not that bad for me in reality as I got paid for my time and I could catch up on my reading. For the victims and public spirited witnesses it is dreadful.
A woman who was attacked by a yob and then threatened by his family when she reported the incident was forced to wait in the same area as the offender, and his family, while there was a pre-trial discussion. When I asked witness liaison if the victim could be allowed a room to herself it was as if I'd asked if I could go into court naked (not a pretty sight, believe me). There were discussions and rules quoted. In the end I purloined the CPS interview room and then got told off by a lawyer who couldn't have scared a nervous robin.
My advice to everyone is; don't become a victim. No-one seems to give a damn.
Derek
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