Friday, March 04, 2005

Stop and Account

No doubt I will mention Stephen Lawrence and the impact his senceless death has impacted not only the police but the world we live in.
It is a topic very dear to my heart for reasons I will not divugle here.
I will at some point address the issues but it's magnitude and scale and depth cannot be simply explained away in a few posts.
One of my bigest fears on joining the Met would that I would be judged simply on been a police officer and that my race and own ethnicty would simply be ignored or even worse be a cause of comment or a consideration for others.

I am however very relived to only of have very positive experences so far.
Todate every police officer I have met have been honest and straight foward people, doing a difficult job in difficult times, for that I am grateful to learn with them.

I will address Stop and Account and the 5090 form shortly and the impact it has on the police and from what I can see of the commuinty.

Stay tuned !

3 comments:

English Marc said...

Just wondering what part of London you patrol. Are you based in the SE of London? Possibly at New Eltham Nick?
I'd love to hear from an insider at that place as I assume thats the closest shop to Stephens murder. I lived in the SE and as a black teenager would never really go down that way unless I really had to. To say it has/had a reputation is an understatement, so I'd love to hear if the police there are as 'straight' as anywhere else.

thinblueline said...

Thankfuly with the influx of new officers over the last 3 years there has been a major change in the Met, the old dinosaurs and old sweats are disapearing from the service and have been replaced by young intilligent londoners and europeans.

I think what is often forgotten is police officers on the front line going to calls are often family people who are married with kids or have partners with or wih out kids of there own, and while living and working in london are cosmopolitian as the area they police.

Recent surveys posted show the average age of new police officers has changed from been 22 years old to 27, which reflects that new officers have a bit more world & Work expereince and are not easly subjected to "peer" presure or of the canteen culture that used to persist in the good old bad old days.

thinblueline said...

Mystic mog - I know very well that the vast majority of officers are outstanding and exceptional. I think one of the blackest day was when Sir John Stevenson gave an actual (guess) on the numbers of officers who were not. That was a silly mistake of placing a figure on it.

Investigations - 183 | Crimes Solved- 85 | No Crime - 47
% Detection rate - 46.4 % (Counting year April 08 )


Investigations - 129 | Crimes Solved- 53 | No Crime - 36
% Detection rate - 49.3 % (Counting year April 07 )