Trying to get a member of one of the UK’s police forces to turn up to investigate a burglary, anti social behaviour, car theft, or some similar offence is often a difficult task. If you make a complaint about such crimes then more often than not you will be fobbed off by excuses from the police as to why they cannot investigate. The police will whine about ‘lack of resources’ or a lack of warranted officers or scene of crimes staff or make similar excuses in order to get the member of the public who has suffered from a real crime to just go away.
But, insult someone or ‘offend’ someone online during a political discussion and suddenly, as if by magic, policing resources seem to be found to visit the ‘offender’ and harass them and demand that they ‘voluntarily’ attend an interview at a police station. The video below appears to show officers from Kent Police visiting a man in order to talk to him about his non-approved opinions. This is probably the same police force that would fob off those with complaints about burglary or other real crimes with the excuse that they don’t have enough resources to investigate burglaries.
Now I’ve no idea what the original discussion that caused the police to become involved was all about and frankly I don’t care. As long as the alleged ‘offender’ had not made a credible, immediate and realistic threat to kill, then there should be no reason for any police involvement.
It is incidents like this that are causing members of the public to lose confidence in the police or to support them. It must be completely galling for those who have suffered real crime but who have been given excuses as to why this crime cannot be investigated to see two plain clothes police officers taking so much time and using so much effort over what is probably a complete ‘nothingburger’.
Most of the system is institutionally malignant. If the Met can be racist then any institution can be inherently anything.
“Attend voluntarily”. What usually happens, is that the person is then arrested at the Police station, “on suspicion” of committing the offence the Police want to talk about. This gives them the power, and opportunity, to obtain a search warrant for the property and to seize any device capable of internet communications, as well as keeping the “voluntarily attended” person in custody for quite a few hours.
In such a case, on the initial contact, ask if the person making the complaint has made a formal statement. If the answer is no, suggest that they come back when the statement, outlining the degree of maliciousness, has been made. From experience, people who complain about the content of open forums don’t want to make that final step, as they can be held legally liable for any falsehood in their complaint.
As an ex Police officer, I regret saying this, but, “the Police officer is not always your friend.”
Some very good points there Pansievat. I completely agree with you that attending a voluntary interview gives the police extra weapons that they can use against the person who attends. As a person who agrees with and supports the whole concept of the rule of law and a person who would rather have the rule of law than the rule of King Mob, it saddens me to have to treat the police with a degree of justifiable suspicion, but we live in a land where ‘hate speech’ laws require no solid or credible evidence in order to convict a person, only the nebulous ‘feelings’ and ‘perception’ by an individual that they have been ‘offended’ or ‘insulted’. We have clown world police officers enforcing clown world laws. I used to work closely with police officers when I was a court reporter and when I did freelance work for the Police Review and developed a respect for the police because of that work. Now, the police have fallen so far in my estimation through corruption, political correctness and shamefully biased and idle policing, that I’m not sure if I could be bothered to piss on them if they were on fire.
To add: Civilised societies need police forces in order to prevent and detect crime, but Britain deserves much better when it comes to policing than we are getting at the moment.
Thanks for the tip, Pensievat. And thanks for the post F411! Please let us know, if you are able, about any developments in this affair. I’m astonished this chap agreed to call voluntarily at the Nick. “The Process is the punishment,” and voluntary attendance is the first step.
I’ve been through this, and here are my tips. Arrive early, be polite and remember that the police are your enemy and will try to stitch you up. Demand to be interviewed in the presence of the duty solicitor and make sure that no doors are locked as you are there voluntarily and can leave at any time. The solicitor will be informed of the complaint against you. There are various options for how the interview will proceed, but with the help of the solicitor compose a brief written statement. In my case I was accused of harassment and possible racism. I wrote that I lampooned a local councillor, just as Private Eye would do, for trying to micro-manage taxpayers’ behaviour beyond the remit of the council, and photoshopped a picture of him to make him look like an ayatolla. I stated that it was satire and that I was not a racist.
In the recorded interview the statement was read out, and the police asked me about 30 questions to try to get me to incriminate myself. I answered “No comment” to every one. I then left the interview….and I never heard from them again!
Never talk to the Police!
Here’s a YouTube video of a Lawyer telling you why, and a Police Officer agreeing with him.