In message , Palindrome
writes
MM wrote:
On Wed, 23 Jul 2008 19:34:57 +0100, Alang
wrote:

On 23 Jul 2008 18:03:56 GMT, "joe"
wrote:

Alang wrote:

On Wed, 23 Jul 2008 17:32:06 +0100, MM wrote:

On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 22:11:38 +0100, "mert1639"
wrote:

"Mike Ross" wrote in message
news:5aic84hdno0eihmbh57a203vjtkulfa7ol@4ax .com...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/kent/7520598.stm

Quoted in full no apologies. First and foremost, how did this get
from a ludicrous suspicion of child trafficking, to an even more
ludicrous arrest under
the *Terrorism Act*?!

Beacuse most police are stupid. It's ludicrous that idiots with
half and O-level can arrest and detain people based on their
rather limited ability to have 'hunches'.
And there was a similar story in the Guardian on Monday:
"Did they think I had kidnapped him?"
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/ju...drelationships

MM
Another reason to despise the police
Not really, the higher ups actually did something which is quite
refreshing.
LIke what?
I was referring to the arrest of a family undert the terrorism act.

"Insp Helen Shaw, from Kent Police's Frontier Operations, apologised
to the family in a letter.

In another letter she wrote: "Your complaint and my subsequent
enquiries allowed me to identify that her (the officer's) manner had
been insensitive, lacking in tact and that her conduct overall lacked
the professionalism I expect.

"I wish to reassure you that your highly unsatisfactory experience was
a very isolated incident." "

It was an illegal arrest and unlawful detention FFS! They were
arrested under the terrorism act. A child was put into a stressful
situation that under any other criteria would be regarded as child
abuse.

The plods concerned should have been at the very least disciplined
with loss of salary. So should their superior officer

One of the problems, is that many of our 'top grade' detective movies
and tv series, have central characters such as Frost, who is surly and
the majority fly against the concrete evidence to use their 'gut
feeling'.
Our police are not really very bright in the main, and are influenced
by all these tv detectives.
All my opinion of course.
Too many of them are arrogant thugs. Not very bright either.
Which is why they join the police. I reckon ALL police recruits
should
have a degree as a basic requirement.

Take a walk on the wild side and visit a poly, sorry "University",
"common" room*.

Talk to a few lecturers about the pressure they are on to take anyone,
anything, that walks (talking optional). Ask them about the pressure
they are under to turn anyone, anything, that actually turns up once in
a while into an "Honours Graduate".

One head of department, that I know pretty well, eventually resigned
because this pressure. But many lecturers are there because they could
never hold down a real job, so go along with anything that is shovelled
onto them.


*If you find more than a handful that you would be happy to see as
police officers, your standards are a little different to those of the
police.

It would indeed be nice if police recruits all had a university degree,
but I don't think that it's an essential qualification. [You could say
the same for the armed forces.] Police need to be sufficiently large and
aggressive so that they can assert their authority. However, they also
need the intelligence and training to be able to know what the law is,
and when and how to use their authority to enforce it. Unfortunately,
while I'm sure that the majority of police do their job very well, there
are an increasing number of occasions when a handful seem to be
demonstrating that they are simply not up to the job.
--
Ian

"Ian Jackson" wrote in message
...

the same for the armed forces.] Police need to be sufficiently large and
aggressive so that they can assert their authority. However, they also
need the intelligence and training to be able to know what the law is, and
when and how to use their authority to enforce it. Unfortunately,

So honours graduates that are also 6 foot tall wrestlers.
Our police force would be scary but only constitute about 20 people :-)

Andy

MM wrote:

Too many of them are arrogant thugs. Not very bright either.

Which is why they join the police. I reckon ALL police recruits should
have a degree as a basic requirement.

Funny you think having a degree is some indication of being 'bright'.

--

On Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:45:08 +0100, nospam
wrote:

MM wrote:

Too many of them are arrogant thugs. Not very bright either.

Which is why they join the police. I reckon ALL police recruits should
have a degree as a basic requirement.

Funny you think having a degree is some indication of being 'bright'.

Yes, so funny that universities the world over have cottoned on, too.

MM

On Thu, 24 Jul 2008 18:19:10 +0100, MM wrote:

On Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:45:08 +0100, nospam
wrote:

MM wrote:

Too many of them are arrogant thugs. Not very bright either.

Which is why they join the police. I reckon ALL police recruits should
have a degree as a basic requirement.

Funny you think having a degree is some indication of being 'bright'.

Yes, so funny that universities the world over have cottoned on, too.

ISTR the majority of MPs have a higher education qualification

Alang wrote:

Not really, the higher ups actually did something which is quite
refreshing.

LIke what?
I was referring to the arrest of a family undert the terrorism act.


Like actually admitting they were in the wrong and apologising. I think
it is refreshing.


"Insp Helen Shaw, from Kent Police's Frontier Operations, apologised
to the family in a letter.

In another letter she wrote: "Your complaint and my subsequent
enquiries allowed me to identify that her (the officer's) manner had
been insensitive, lacking in tact and that her conduct overall lacked
the professionalism I expect.

"I wish to reassure you that your highly unsatisfactory experience was
a very isolated incident." "

It was an illegal arrest and unlawful detention FFS! They were
arrested under the terrorism act. A child was put into a stressful
situation that under any other criteria would be regarded as child
abuse.

The plods concerned should have been at the very least disciplined
with loss of salary. So should their superior officer

Yep, agreed.


One of the problems, is that many of our 'top grade' detective
movies and tv series, have central characters such as Frost, who is
surly and the majority fly against the concrete evidence to use
their 'gut feeling'.
Our police are not really very bright in the main, and are
influenced by all these tv detectives.
All my opinion of course.

Too many of them are arrogant thugs. Not very bright either.



--

Alex Heney wrote:

On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:00:24 -0400, Mike Ross
wrote:

snip


Quoted in full no apologies. First and foremost, how did this get
from a ludicrous suspicion of child trafficking, to an even more
ludicrous arrest under the *Terrorism Act*?!


One police officer acting stupidly.

I don't see this as a "reason to hate the police at all".

The officer concerned has been transferred to different duties
(probably considered to be a punishment), and the police have
apologised profusely and paid compensation.

This was certainly completely unacceptable behaviour by that police
officer, but it appears to have been dealt with about as well as
possible afterwards.

Apparently, there are now numerous accounts so best to keep schumm
until the truth comes out. I see a long pedantic thread starting:-(

--

On 24 Jul 2008 19:36:00 GMT, "joe"
wrote:

Alang wrote:

Not really, the higher ups actually did something which is quite
refreshing.

LIke what?
I was referring to the arrest of a family undert the terrorism act.


Like actually admitting they were in the wrong and apologising. I think
it is refreshing.

Except they didn't admit the arrest was wrong only the way it was
handled



"Insp Helen Shaw, from Kent Police's Frontier Operations, apologised
to the family in a letter.

In another letter she wrote: "Your complaint and my subsequent
enquiries allowed me to identify that her (the officer's) manner had
been insensitive, lacking in tact and that her conduct overall lacked
the professionalism I expect.

"I wish to reassure you that your highly unsatisfactory experience was
a very isolated incident." "

It was an illegal arrest and unlawful detention FFS! They were
arrested under the terrorism act. A child was put into a stressful
situation that under any other criteria would be regarded as child
abuse.

The plods concerned should have been at the very least disciplined
with loss of salary. So should their superior officer

Yep, agreed.

not going to happen though


One of the problems, is that many of our 'top grade' detective
movies and tv series, have central characters such as Frost, who is
surly and the majority fly against the concrete evidence to use
their 'gut feeling'.
Our police are not really very bright in the main, and are
influenced by all these tv detectives.
All my opinion of course.

Too many of them are arrogant thugs. Not very bright either.

On Wed, 23 Jul 2008 21:22:32 -0400, Mike Ross
wrote:

On Thu, 24 Jul 2008 01:13:28 +0100, Alex Heney wrote:

On Wed, 23 Jul 2008 19:34:57 +0100, Alang
wrote:

On 23 Jul 2008 18:03:56 GMT, "joe"
wrote:
snip

Not really, the higher ups actually did something which is quite
refreshing.

LIke what?

Like disciplining the officer concerned, apologising, paying
compensation (including a "substantial sum" to the boys school).

snip

The plod concerned has been transferred out to "other duties". I don't
know about loss of pay, but I am sure she regards that transfer as
punishment.

An interesting point. In the original story, at the time I first posted it, the
story read:


"A police officer has been transferred from duties at a Channel crossing after a
disabled child and his parents were detained under the Terrorism Act."


Which made it sound as if the transfer was a punishment for, or at least a
consequence of, the incident. The story has now been substantially changed:

That is what I read too.




"A police force has apologised after a disabled child and his parents CLAIMED
[my caps] they were detained at a Channel crossing point under the Terrorism
Act."

"Kent Police said neither the couple nor the boy were placed under arrest or
detained under the Terrorism Act.

The force said in a statement: "Our officer spoke to a white couple with a child
of mixed race.

"There were three names on the passport and the officer made inquiries to check
the child was leaving the country legally.

"The parents made a complaint for which we have apologised."

The force added that the officer in question no longer works at the Channel
crossing and was in another post but the move was not connected to the
incident."

That is a hugely changed story, I agree.




So now we have a somewhat half-hearted apology, accompanied by attempted
justification, and emphasis on the fact that the officer has NOT been punished.

If you do a google news search, you will find several others incarnations of
this story, including ones in which the police claim the 2 hours interview was
'voluntary' - indeed, I wonder how free she felt to leave, and what would have
happened to her had she tried to do so?

I'm unable to decide if the parents are exaggerating, or the police are
wiggling. Frankly, given the (undisputed) attitude of the officer, I'd fire them
- they've shown themselves unfit to serve in any capacity whatever.


It is very difficult when there are so many different versions of the
story around.


--
Alex Heney, Global Villager
Status Symbol: n. Something that you don't want, that you buy with money that you don't have, to impress people that you don't know
To reply by email, my address is alexATheneyDOTplusDOTcom

On Wed, 23 Jul 2008 23:59:08 +0100, "mert1639"
wrote:


"Alex Heney" wrote in message
.. .
On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 22:11:38 +0100, "mert1639"
wrote:


"Mike Ross" wrote in message
...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/kent/7520598.stm

Quoted in full no apologies. First and foremost, how did this get from a
ludicrous suspicion of child trafficking, to an even more ludicrous
arrest
under
the *Terrorism Act*?!

Beacuse most police are stupid.

No they aren't.

I beg to differ. I believe you need 5 GCSEs to enter the police force.

Not any more.

You used to.


There are very few people who'd considder that as any hallmark of intelect.

I have never heard what I would expect to be 99% of the population
described as "very few people" before :-)

It certainly was never a hallmark of *high* intelligence. But it was a
generally good indicator of being of at least average intelligence -
i.e. not "stupid".

In my conversations with police officers, I've never found them to be all
that bright either. The ones that have been are those of senior rank, above
superintendant. I did once meet a Chief Constable. He was bright, but
you'd expect that.

There is a huge difference between "not all that bright" (which I
would take to mean of roughly average "brightness") and the "stupid"
you previously described them as.


It's ludicrous that idiots with half and
O-level can arrest and detain people based on their rather limited ability
to have 'hunches'.


When O levels still existed, you needed five of them to be able to
apply to join the police.

Although this has now gone, they still have to pass entry tests which
show at last a reasonable level of intelligence.
See above. If you think that a PC is 'reasonably intelligent' you must be
mixing with some very dumb people indeed.


Nope.

I generally mix almost exclusively with people *well* above average
intelligence.

And while I certainly would not say that the average police officer I
have met and talked with is of that level, I would also say they have
never seemed actively stupid.
--
Alex Heney, Global Villager
Programming is an art form that fights back.
To reply by email, my address is alexATheneyDOTplusDOTcom