Ben Poole

The police are terrifying

I’ve already posted about unconscionable scare-mongering by the Metropolitan Police. Now, following the Ian Tomlinson tragedy, more apparent police brutality is being unearthed:

BBC news: Police to probe ‘woman assault’. This is seriously nasty, seriously uncomfortable stuff. Combine this with the abuse of anti-terror laws, horrendous levels of closed-circuit snooping, and pre-emptive arrests to prevent peaceful dissent… Who would have thought the police state would come so soon?

Posted at 13:07 PDT on 14 Apr 2009  |  Categories:   |   (3 comments)

Comments

1. I'm with you on this - as you know http://blog.woowar.com/jw/blog.nsf/d6plinks/7N5HF5 !
   
   The police do an essential job in keeping society running smoothly. But in recent years they've overstepped the mark more and more, without proper rebuke. This brain-dead government doesn't help by constantly dreaming up new powers to give them, and when thinking people point out that the powers are ripe for abuse the response is always "They're designed to give police the power to do X, and won't be used for any other purpose". Um, right, that's why we have them arresting photographers under anti-terrorism laws is it? http://www.fadwebsite.com/2009/01/08/another-artist-arrested-under-anti-terrorism-laws/
   
   The sorts of stories you linked to are very scary - not that they happen (there will always be thugs and idiots in the police, same as everywhere else), but that they go unpunished.
   
   1. The scare-mongering stuff is either plain stupid, or Orwellian and nightmarish, depending on your viewpoint/mood.
   
   2. The Ian Tomlinson and 'woman assault' cases are down to individual violent morons who should be sacked from the police and prosecuted for manslaughter and assault respectively.
   
   3. The really scary one is that final story: they arrested 114 people and didn't charge a single one of them with any offence?! That is insane, and the senior officer who sanctioned the operation should be charged, ironically but perfectly fairly, with wasting police time.
   on 15 Apr 2009 by Julian Woodward (#)
2. That particular incident made news here in Australia. By any modern measure it's too heavy handed and uncalled for. But the police have a tough job dealing with these clowns constantly abusing them. So at the same time I think the stoopid cow wanted to just abuse people, and needed a bit of a smack for stirring the pot....
   on 16 Apr 2009 by Giulio (#)
3. Hmm, I’d say that’s a somewhat specious argument.
   
   If the police didn’t practice kettling (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8000641.stm) and the like in the first place, I’d suggest that tempers wouldn’t be fraying so much.
   
   In any case, they are public servants and know that they are entering a pressured environment. It doesn’t matter whether you’re being abused or not, you don’t lash out like that, twice.
   
   Anyway, that’s just one event, and the tip of the iceberg when it comes to burgeoning police powers in the UK over the past few years:
   
   http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/apr/16/police-delete-tourist-photos
   
   http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/nottinghamshire/7996394.stm
   on 16 Apr 2009 by Ben Poole (#)

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