As an avid reader of David Copperfield's "Coppersblog" I am glad to say that my Christmas was far less eventful than his. Why? If I knew that I would market a drug to stop people hating each other. Trust me, it really was quiet!!!! Yes I definitely saw some constables, who normally wander around the station in plain clothes, kitted up and ready for action, but it would seem that peace and goodwill, on the whole, applied to all men/women/ethnic etc., you get the gist.

One of these uniformed people who spend their time in the volume crime unit did say at one point, "I've just got to go for a wee and then we should go out on patrol as I've spent too much ******* time in this station."

This brings me onto another point. I have had an attachment to CID in the past, well something akin to CID, well at least I thought it was, errmmm, now I'm confused. Either way, it involved being a police officer who had not been classed as independent, but was deemed worthy enough to go and speak to some extremely "pleasant" customers, who lived in some "dodgy" areas where no man, without a stab vest, had gone before.

On this particular attachment my colleagues (in this case probationers who had joined at the same time as I) had to deal with what could only be described as "the scrapings from the litter tray that the cat could not use to cover up it's own mess". Granted, we were only trainee police officers and it did give me an idea as to some of the dross I would experience at some time in my career, but it has left me with the feeling that I would rather dunk my head in a vat of boiling oil than deal with crime reports of people who have lost their mobile phone, whilst intoxicated, but are sure that it was their best mate [insert name here] that nicked it "'cos they've been shagging each other behind my back the bastard". It has also left me with the sense that I have no desire to be posted to plain clothes and would probably transfer to another force/agency if I was assigned to this.

References to "Little Britain" have sprung to mind when I was on this weird and wonderful attachment. There's no escaping it, you just meet these people and they believe that the loss of their phone as as bad as their mother being hacked to death by a mad axe murderer recently released from the whacky bin for good behaviour or they've been misunderstood.

Okay, if you've done the exams, the interview training, etc. then the job is probably quite interesting in a paperwork sort of way, but if you are at my stage in the career (but in some respects force allocation to departments seems to be a lottery) you are just a resource and you can be assigned anywhere in the policing area with little or no training and then left there to, errrm, die? This could well be my ticket out of the police in so far as I will need to find another job. Inflexible, maybe, but a complete phobia, oh yes! With any luck this sort of "re-shuffle" will happen after my two year probation so in which case I can change forces, go to Austrlia etc., etc.

Anywho, on a more sober moment in my last few days on duty I have had to attend two incidents that involved dead people. To their relatives I have to say, errm, happy Christmas?

Despite the these deaths I do give the relatives my deepest sympathies, even the one who smacked the ambulance person as they believed they were not doing their job properly in reviving a relative who had been dead for at least three hours. However, to the other death I had to be involved with, I do sincerely send my thoughts to the deceased's family.

Now on this final note. To those who may actually read this drivel, have a good New Year and I will tap some stuff in 2007.

Christmas

Just realised it is Christmas day. Am going to be working but I'm sure some of you will have a merry Christmas. What do I want for Christmas? Peace and goodwill to all men would be nice.

Always the optimist.

Seriously, I hope you enjoy yours. Hey, who am I trying to kid, nobody reads this stuff!

Video Evidence

Right then. Been working on a trivial case that has required me to obtain evidence from CCTV footage in a well known building society. CCTV is one of those things you either love or hate. I for one love it unless I am on a night shift and you are just about to sit down to eat something, yes the police are human and we do eat when we get the chance, and the radio springs to life with "Hello control, this is CCTV, are you looking at your monitor? There's a person acting suspiciously in the park." Now, bearing in mind the time this kind of call comes in there's always someone acting suspiciously in the park. The main reason for this is due to the clubs closing for the night and the usual drunkards, such a harsh word let's call them "pissheads", losing their automatic pilot and ending up in the bandstand. This normally happens just as soon as you have lovingly prepared your tin of soup/macaroni/stew/stuff, sat down, placed and then placed the spoon in the bowl. You then are required to leap up, put your stab vest back on and head towards the offender who by now may or may not have fallen into the river or at least vomited somewhere nearby. Nine times out of ten you are able to revive the said person and send them back on their homing pigeon course and that's it. However, by this time your stodge has gone cold or been thrown away as it was assumed you'd be away for a while.

That's one thing I like about night shifts. The hour after all the clubs are shut you get to witness a phenomena that most people will never see. Drunk people going home. We are not talking about the ones that cause criminal damage or try to punch anything that moves, we are talking about the people who still manage to find their way home without a taxi. It's a bit like a scene from "Dawn of the dead". Zombi type persons walking along the road. When they are this drunk everything from a crack in the pavement to a lamp post is a challenge. The most interesting bit is when they reach a kerb and have to cross a road. By the way they walk you would think that the kerb was 6ft high and it always amazes me how high they lift their feet to climb it.

Anywho, I digress, but CCTV does have its uses, one good example is where a male was alledged to have assaulted a male causing him to suffer a fractured skull but the CCTV footage shows that he was having an argument with the victim but it was a completely different male who casually walked up to the pair and smacked the injured party (IP) in the head. Also in the case that I originally started waffling about it has its uses as well.

Scenario: complaint by a bloke that he had been shouted at and dragged around by a female offender, we'll call her Delores, into the local building society before being ejected by staff. Delores was arrested, interviewed, and denied the whole thing and said that she had been assaulted by the "IP". Let's bear in mind the fact that the "IP" and the "offender" are both well known, erm, well not very upstanding members of the community.

It took a little while to obtain evidence of the event. The town CCTV amazingly managed to miss every bit of the incident!?!?!?!? However, the last bit of evidence was from inside of the building society. Hey presto, as clear as day you see a lot of the incident, enough to give the offender a happy Christmas £80 fine. The footage itself starts off showing a number of upstanding members of the public "gawping" at what is happening outside the building society before Delores drags "Herbert" into the branch, rants and raves before being ejected by staff, and then outside of the branch you can still see Delores having a go at "Herbert". After viewing the footage Delores says, "Are you sure you've got the right video for that day?" Arrrrggghhhh, nope, it was a random tape I acquired from "Police, Camera, Action." Other comments were, "Well I don't think I was wearing that coat", to which my response was, "You were when you were booked into custody."

The funniest part of this incident was that when Delores viewed the video I had ro rewind it to the correct place. As I did this she said "Look. You can see him pushing me!!" It had to be explained clearly and slowly that the tape was, in fact, going backwards and if I was given the chance she could witness it in real time and going forwards. After a couple of viewings the comments went on to the lines of "My butt was smaller then." Ho hum.

Oh, on a completely different subject, if you are using your mobile phone when driving please do not try and deny it by saying "I've got an ear infection and I don't have a phone like that." Ear infections can easily be proved or disproved, but it's the "phone like that" bit. Errmmm, phone like what?