Police brutality

It's always tricky to make a judgement when all you have to go on is a newspaper report. However I believe that the woman who was arrested was a violent drug addict who bit the PO on the finger and then said that she had AIDS. Her previous ran to several pages.

The sentence hit the former officer (he has lost his job) in the pocket, he has to complete 150 hours of unpaid work and has a criminal record. As a first time offender a custodial sentence was always unlikely, as it would be for any first time offender.

There will always be different views about the appropriateness of sentencing decisions, but this one seems in line with current practice for any offender.

A couple of years ago my son left our house one Sunday evening to drive home to Exeter, arriving back just after midnight. Just inside the city he noticed a police car following him. They followed all the way to his house where they got out and asked him why he had been driving in bus lanes. He pointed out that after a certain time in the evening you are allowed to do so. They kept him there outside the house for a good fifteen minutes asking things like, is this your car and do you live here. All he wanted to do was go indoors and get his head down as he had an early start for work the next day. They apparently "did n't like his attitude". He was polite, did n't get angry but was firm as he knew he had done nothing wrong. They even took the car number and phoned in to check on the ownership etc.

To this day we don't know why they did this. They gave no reason. We think they were just bored.

I felt really angry when I heard about this. Did rather put me off the police tbh.

When D2 was thirteen I walked her friend home as it was starting to get dark. Both children rode their bikes across five neighbour's driveways but were not on the footpath. As we turned to go home a young man sitting with his friend in a parked car called out to us. There were about a dozen teenagers on bmx bikes not far from this car. Most of the boys weren't wearing their helmets and nor was my daughter.

My daughter and I felt uneasy about these men in the car and quickly went inside our gate and inside the house. The next minute there was a loud banging on the door and a man saying "open up it's the police." I really wasn't sure what to do and felt anxious. Both these men who had been previously sitting in the car were standing at my door and one showed me his badge and proceeded to tell me off about my daughter not wearing her helmet. I phoned the police station when they had left and made a complaint and spoke to a female police officer. She agreed with me that it was unnecessary for them to act in this way. About an hour later I received a phone call from one of these plain clothed policemen who had hammered on my door and he apologized.

I have seen police do some stupid things but have at other times found them really helpful, such as I have in the past phoned them a couple of times and asked for some advice. One being my daughter being harassed when she had walked home from school, the policeman said they would be happy to go and speak to these kids.

I believe we need to speak up when necessary and also know there will always be undesirables who are in the police force who shouldn't be and others who are very good at their job.

We need to remember that the police

A) don't make the decision to prosecute - that is down to the CPS
B) don't sentence - that is down to the judges - who are renowned for stupid sentencing decisions
and while every actions of the police is surveyed to death for satisfaction( we have 6 surveys in Dorset police ) the rest of the judicial system isn't!!

I think standards of policing have improved a lot in the past 40 years. However the Met is huge and those running it have a more complicated job than running police authorities outside the capital. Probably a long way to go to meet the highest standards.

The Met has been a law unto itself for decades and has been allowed to get away with it.

During the riots in London- a group of policemen stopped a couple of kids riding bicycles, well away from trouble, and with no evidence that the kids were involved. One escaped, the other stopped as requested and got off his bike, without making any threats, just gave himself up. The policemen then knocked him to the ground, and began to beat him up, punching and kicking him all the way down the road. It was all filmed- and nothing was done at all, nothing. Carol and I complained on another French Forum about it, and several ex policemen said he deserved what he got.

We cannot walk around Streets hitting people because we have lost our temper.

I think the police have a very difficult job. In South Africa we barely have a police force so I would give my eye teeth to have a force like the one you have in England. It must be so hard not to loose your temper when dealing with shop lifters. It would make me loose my temper too. And from the video the other two staff members didn't seem that bothered. Perhaps they also get sick and tired of shop lifters.

Like Mishap I think we shouldn't generalise. We all know of the bad apples - you get them in all walks of life - and I have always found certain sections of the police incredibly respectful and committed to doing a good job. I've been shouted at by traffic police, I've seen boot prints on the rib cage of offenders and I've known police officers to bend the truth - none of it justified. I've known far more police officers who have been caring and supportive, determined to help people, and ashamed and critical of those officers who let the force down.

I'm used to seeing police officers being made an example of, in circumstances like this. I'm surprised about the sentence.

Apart from the incident I mentioned above, which was a long time ago, I have always found the police, when I have had any dealings with them (we have been burgled a couple of times) to be helpful and polite. They patrol around here on foot day and night and are always very friendly.

I find this thread very difficult. I know several policemen/women and would hazard a guess that there are several grans on here whose sons/daughters have chosen that profession and of whom they are very proud.

I think that we are in a far better position than many other countries where the police forces are seriously corrupt and where gratuitous violence is the order of the day and goes unremarked.

I am not naive and I do not doubt for one moment that there is corruption in our police system - the whole masonic thing gives me the nadgers - but I have the conviction that the majority of police officers are trying to do a good and honest job, and that it is unhealthy to be completely cynical about them.

A community order does seem lenient to me, but, to be fair, I often feel that about sentencing, whether police or public.

The use of restraint, which is part of both the police and the armed forces training, is open to abuse by both those forces. I think we have to ask ourselves what that training does to young minds, and how we weed out those who might be vulnerable to being unable to resist abusing this knowledge and power.

I am really just trying to say it is not simple; and that a blanket condemnation of the police, on whom we rely for stability in our society, does not feel helpful to me.

He might of course have also lost his job...

A close relative of mine (age 17) was arrested for a very minor offence in the 1970s. He was badly beaten by the police. No CCTV then and nowhere to turn. Who was going to believe him? That treatment along with other events in his life contributed to him committing suicide a few years later. I wish they would think of the consequences of their actions.

I think you are probably right Anniebach .

Because they can do what they want, only rule is don't get caught, if they are caught out the top brass are on telly telling us how they put their lives on the line for us every day and there are only a few bad apples , as they are telling us this they are busy rewriting their little note books so they all sing the same song

Thank goodness for CCTV and this incident was recorded to show what had happened and for this "bully" to be reported by a collegue.

A thug, is a thug, is a thug, no matter what walk of life he comes from.

Same type of bully that thumped Ian Tomlinson and almost got away with it. Had the incident not been filmed on a mobile phone by a member of the public I doubt any of the others on duty would have 'grassed him up'.

Because jingle there appears to be one set of rules for the "boys in blue" and another for everyone else.