Prisoners, Property and Prostitutes (6 page)

So impressed were the tourists with this spontaneous and humorous display that they wrote to the Divisional Superintendent expressing their thanks. Unfortunately they also included copies of the pictures.

That was a bit of a ‘closed door’ session with advice given.

One morning two colleagues found themselves standing on a corner a short way from an old flat-topped stone pillar which marked some significant location in the town’s history. It was a quiet day and they were at something of a loose end, when an American lady came up to them. She made the usual assumption that the Police would know everything, and asked what the pillar was for. Ian, the more senior of the two, explained that the pillar marked the spot where public executions used to take place, and the flat top was where the severed heads of wrongdoers were placed as a warning to others tempted towards a life of crime. Shocked but intrigued, she continued her questioning –

‘When did they stop doing public executions?’

‘The last one was about ten years ago,’ was the poker-faced reply.

‘Really! How barbaric!’

‘Actually’ Ian went on, realising it was approaching midday, ‘that’s why we’re here. We have to salute the monument every hour on the hour as an acknowledgement of its contribution to preserving law and order in the town. Stand back please.’

The lady stood aside, and a few moments later the town hall clock struck the hour. Ian and his colleague (who followed the lead like a professional actor) snapped to attention, marched in step to the column, halted, saluted, performed an immaculate about-turn, and marched back to their starting point. The lady’s camera clicked furiously as she captured this quaint English ritual.

‘Thank you Madam,’ said Ian. ‘Back in an hour.’

They walked off, their duty done.

A few minutes later they were back in the station eating their lunch when the Superintendent walked in, red-faced.

‘I don’t know what the hell you two were playing at in town this morning, but if I ever see you saluting public monuments again I’ll have you locked up!’

By a majority verdict the incident was deemed a success.

My academic background had endowed me with an ability to consider a problem from many angles, but the key to success as a foot officer was usually to make a quick decision and stick to it without considering too many variables. But not always. John Morgan, one of the stalwarts of my block, told me of an incident early in his service which showed the perils of making too hasty a decision, but more than that the benefits of a quick mind to rectify a bad situation.

When John had been at about my level of service, he was on foot patrol in the town when a voice hailed him by first name. He looked and saw his old French teacher from school.

‘Good grief – John Morgan joined the Police. I can’t believe it!’

Strangely this reaction was quite common. No one ever said, ‘You became an accountant, how odd’, or, ‘Imagine you, a sales rep.’ But join a job that often requires little more than honesty and hard work and everyone expresses surprise. Maybe it is indicative of the view that you are no longer in their ‘world’, but slightly apart, a different creature of some sort, the other side of ‘the line.’

Anyway, after a few minutes’ conversation about this and that, John’s teacher made an odd request.

‘Can I knock your hat off?’

‘No,’ came the obvious reply.

‘Oh go on, I’ve always wanted to knock a policeman’s hat off. What would you do if I did?’

‘I’d lock you up.’

‘Never!’

John’s patience was wearing thin by this point. What had started as a pleasant encounter had become silly and irritating.

‘Look’ he said, ‘it’s the middle of the high street on a busy afternoon. You can’t seriously expect someone to knock a policeman’s hat off and him do nothing about it. So don’t try it, because I am quite serious, I’d arrest you.’

Slightly disappointed, the teacher agreed with John’s point of view, and shortly afterwards said goodbye. He was soon apparently lost in the crowd.

A few moments later however, John heard footsteps approaching at a run from behind him. It could be only one thing – the teacher had decided he wasn’t serious, and had decided to do a quick ‘knock and run’ to satisfy his strange wish.

There was only one thing for it. He would have to arrest him, make him learn the hard way.

As the footsteps were upon him, John swung round and delivered a punch to the man.

To his horror he watched as a teenage boy fell to the floor, hands to his face and blood pouring from his nose. Across the road was the hire car containing the lad’s rather surprised parents. They were looking for their hotel, and had told their son to ‘go ask the nice policeman for directions’. Their admiration for law enforcement was dashed as the officer had whipped
round and pole axed their innocent child in front of hundreds of shoppers.

John’s job, pension and freedom flashed before his eyes.

But he was nothing if not quick-thinking.

He helped the boy back to his feet, dusted him down and walked him back to the car, his mind in overdrive as he tried to work out what to say. It didn’t take long to ascertain that the family were American, and this was the key to his salvation as he returned the injured youth to his parents.

‘Sorry about that – you obviously don’t understand. We don’t carry guns as you may know, and because of this we are highly trained in self defence. NEVER approach a British Policeman from behind. Your son could have been killed.’

By the time they drove off John had a full apology and the boy had been told off by his parents for his reckless faux pas.

This was typical of John’s charmed life. I often wondered how successful he could have been if he had put as much effort into tackling his work as he did into avoiding it. He had previously been on Traffic for several years, which was an ideal place for indulging his favourite hobby – womanising. Any female was a challenge, and one of his most bizarre liaisons occurred when he went for a night time coffee at a favoured ‘brew spot’, a ramshackle filling station a couple of miles out of town. On this particular evening one thing had led to another, the attendant rose to the challenge and John found himself and the young lady standing up, wedged between the cigarette display and the till, going at it hammer and tongs.

The attendant was described as ‘generously proportioned’ to say the least, and the space in which they were enjoying each
other’s ‘company’ was cramped. The shop lights were on, but outside was pitch dark for miles around. This fact preyed on John’s mind, and the relationship ended several minutes earlier than John would have liked when he pondered out loud. The comment ‘If anyone pulls up outside we won’t see them but they’ll think I’ve set off an inflatable life raft’ resulted in an instant and total loss of passion by the unfortunate woman, and the deletion of the filling station from John’s list of refreshment points.

Those who (unlike John) had not been thrown off Traffic, worked as a Unit separate to us on ‘section’, but every so often they would ask for an observer if they had a space in the passenger seat of one of the patrol cars. To me this was a dream come true – I had no wish to go on CID. Their culture at the time meant that neither my wallet nor my liver could stand their pace of life. On nights I would do my foot patrolling with a breath test kit in my pocket. This wasn’t strictly allowed as foot patrols didn’t get routinely issued with breath kits, but if there was a spare I would take it with me, and add a breath test to any stop-check if I thought the driver had had any alcohol. I managed to produce quite a good tally of arrests by this method, and built up a reasonable knowledge of traffic law as a consequence.

Around 1 o’clock one morning I was ambling along when a car pulled up on the far side of the road, stopping in an area which was clearly marked as ‘no parking allowed’. Thoughts of a parking ticket turned more ambitious as the driver got out, staggered backwards into the road, then lurched up to the offside rear door and opened it. This revealed a second firmly
intoxicated individual, smiling happily to the world in general. The open door also afforded a view across to the front seat passenger who was giggling helplessly. Now it was looking less favourable – a drink driver I could cope with, but three drunks against one policeman could prove tricky. As I wondered how to deal with the situation, the driver turned round towards me, pointed behind him in the general direction of the rear occupant, and shouted,‘Officer! Arrest this man. He’s pissed!’

All three men then collapsed in fits of uncontrolled laughter. In my experience drink drivers did their best to disguise their inebriation, not advertise it, so this was a strange development for me. The other two occupants of the car then got out, and as they did so I suddenly recognised the driver and front passenger – they were the night cover CID Sergeant and Constable. The identity of the third man was easily guessed as he helped the others to the front door of an adjacent pub, unlocked it and the three of them disappeared inside.

My status as new probationer was far too lowly to do anything about this – the whole organisation revolved around the CID, and an inexperienced ‘flatfoot’ arresting any member for a road-traffic related offence would have resulted in a swift report saying I was ‘not likely to become a fit and proper Constable’ and seeking the dispensing of my services. To my annoyance discretion had to prove the better part of valour on that occasion.

Despite this minor setback, my enthusiasm for traffic-related work increased. Not that I had anything against crime work, it still formed the bulk of my workload, but given a choice
between a road accident and a shoplifter I would go for the road accident every time. It was interesting to see the way the different departments functioned – CID very ‘rugby club’, lots of drinking, late nights, with a gung-ho mentality. Traffic was more laid-back, quiet and measured. But both shared the same approach that I was finding ran through the rest of the service – a belief in the ability to solve problems, to sort things out and make a change. This had been a major appeal of the job in the first place and it was proving to remain so. People would ring for 24 hour a day help, and in the vast majority of instances we would attend, advise, and most of all make that difference.

Take for example a burglary – we would get a phone call from someone whose world had been turned upside down by a wicked intrusion into their private lives. Along comes a policeman who:

These simple and very obvious steps leave the impression that all is not lost, normality can be restored and we care and sympathise. The officers also develop a belief in their ability to
solve problems, which is necessary to do the job properly and to present a confident manner, even when you are doing what was often referred to as a ‘duck impression’ – calm as anything on the surface, but out of sight paddling like mad to stay afloat.

While a confidence in your own ability is generally an asset, it did give rise to some odd situations when someone would think they had a better plan than anyone else and stick doggedly to it, and not knowing what to do when they were wrong.

One night shift I was put with Len, a very steady and reliable man who never hurried anything and never lost his cool. He could arrive at a domestic with people shouting and screaming at each other, but with some opening words along the lines of ‘Can we all just calm down so I can get a bit of hush now’ it was as if a blanket of tranquility had settled on everyone, there would be no more raised voices and he would deal quietly with the whole affair step by step.

This particular night we heard a chase coming in over the radio from another force. Two men in a stolen pickup truck had been followed at high speed by two traffic cars for over 30 miles, so their determination to keep going was evident. The amount of advance warning and the fact it was a quiet night meant that by the time the pickup came onto us there were two of our traffic cars and about nine pandas waiting for it. Len waited at the first roundabout it would come to, at the opposite end of a
mile-long piece of road to where all the other patrols were waiting. Len was convinced that at the speed it was travelling the pickup would overturn at the roundabout. But it didn’t. Instead it took the first exit and headed over a bridge into town. Len put the car into gear to give chase, but had to wait as 12 other cars went past to end up ahead of us in a flurry of tyre smoke and screaming engines, like a scene from a cops and robbers film.

Our humble panda car wheezed into 13th place at the rear of the convoy, and by the time we arrived at the far side of the bridge we were so far behind I felt tangible disappointment. I could hear on the radio where the chase was, hurtling around the town centre. Everyone in the thick of it but us.

Then Len had an idea. ‘I know where he’s heading – I know exactly where. Come on – we’ll go round the ring road and cut them off. You’ll like this.’

Excitement returned. Len’s experience (he had worked in the town since shortly after the Romans left) would ensure we outwitted the thieves and were in at the kill. How lucky I was to be with a man whose brain would win the day over the reckless chasing by the rest of the shift. We drove along the town’s inner ring road, skirting the area where the others were still chasing round fruitlessly, them being denied Len’s perceptive powers. About half a mile up the ring road it reached an elevated section on a bend, with another half mile before a roundabout. As we entered the bend, I saw blue lights in the darkness ahead. A few moments later a blaze of headlights came towards us. It was the pickup! We had done it! We were ahead of the chase. Unfortunately we were also on the wrong side of
the dual carriageway, so I watched in despair once again as the whole convoy, still without us, hurtled past in the opposite direction.