Paper romance…

With quantum computing just round the corner and communications satellites enabling us to stream funny cat videos to our smart phones whether we’re on the bus or at the top of Everest, you may be forgiven for assuming that our courts would have kept pace with technological advances.

As paperless offices were all the buzz at least ten years ago and Wi-Fi now pretty much a basic human right, surely the people dealing out justice to the futuristic spandex-wearing citizens of 2013 would be up to speed on computers?

Unfortunately not.

Enter a court room and not only will you see folk running around with funny wigs on, you’ll also see on every available surface big thick paper files that have to be carted in and out of the court by grumbling legal understudies with back problems.

Stack up all the 160,000,000 bits of environmentally hostile paper used by the justice system each year and the resulting pile would be fifteen times higher than Snowdon. That’s a lot of paper.

It’s not only a reliance on paper that is a little out of place in our futuristic times, it’s also that the most is not being made of the technologies that’d make everybody’s life much easier and save time as a result.

Examples include available Wi-Fi in court rooms so files can be shared electronically and better use made of electronic displays eliminating the need for folk to run around with multiple VHS tapes whenever CCTV evidence needs to be displayed.

It’s in response to concerns such as these that the Ministry of Justice has launched the ‘Transforming the Criminal Justice System‘ initiative under which it aims to have a digital court system up and running by 2016.

At £160 million it’s not cheap, the savings in terms of everyone’s time and the associated reduction in costs that would follow though I think mean this is an investment that would likely pay for itself.

Amongst other areas, the money is proposed to be spent on:

• Installing secure Wi-Fi in most courts so that all necessary files are available at the touch of a button.
• Digital Evidence Screens so that documents can be displayed without the need for paper copies
• Court Presentation Software allowing legal folk to easily navigate complicated court files

These are set against a wider range of proposals under the initiative to help improve the efficiency of the court system including adapting to digital systems now used by police and providing electronic portals on which victims can track the progress of their cases.

Last year in the West Midlands we switched to paperless first hearing files which saved a huge amount of the time that we would previously have spent sitting in funny paperwork nests after charging someone.

Rather than printing out case summaries, witness lists, statements and everything else we instead had the option simply to complete the file online and hit the send button to transfer it to the court.

The time this saved – hundreds of thousands of hours – can then be spent back out on the streets where we belong, shining torches down alleys and blowing our whistles at traffic.

Part of the proposals are that the majority of officers will provide evidence via video link – again this is something already trialled in the West Midlands and has drastically reduced the amount of time wasted by officers who are called to court, spend a morning twiddling thumbs in the witness room before being told they’re not required.

As an estimate, some four and a half million officer hours could be freed should the proposals be implemented in all forces which is a good thing for everyone other than criminals.

I’m a big fan of proposals that result in criminals losing out and as I’d rather not spend any more time than I have to ‘file building’ in the office, I’ll be following the implementation of the Transforming the Criminal Justice System initiative with great interest.

Night terror…

Mention ‘terrorism’ and images such as this may come to mind. What does ‘terrorism’ mean though and do definitions alter our response to the threats? (Image from TheMachineStops)

Following the events over the weekend involving an explosive device igniting at Walsall’s Aisha mosque, there’s been some discussion on the internet as to how the incident ought to be classified.

At current time, it’s been looked at under the term ‘hate crime’.

Hatred is an aggravating factor, according to the definition that the CPS use it implies amongst other things that the offence involved ‘hostility based on the victim’s membership (or presumed membership) of a racial or religious group’.

Rather than a stand alone offence, a suggestion that hatred was the motivation behind a crime makes that crime much more serious and means that tougher guidelines are followed by the CPS when they come to consider sentencing.

Due to the circumstances of the Rutter Street incident, officers from our Counter Terrorism Unit (CTU) have also joined the investigation and will be lending their considerable expertise to help identify offenders.

As their name implies, CTU tend to focus on terrorism hence there is a suggestion that the incident could be considered against the definition of terrorism and classified accordingly.

This is where things get very tricky as when it comes to terrorism, how exactly do we define the term and what does it mean to most people?

I think that the idea many people hold of what ‘terrorism’ looks like is well summed up by the results thrown up by a Google image search on the term.

The images returned are of 9/11, George Bush, Osama Bin Laden, AK-47s and troubling chaps in balaclavas. Islam features heavily.

Now do these images really help define terrorism as it should be best understood or are they missing something? Where are the pictures of Anders Behring Breivik, Timothy McVeigh and others who don’t quite fit the mould suggested by the search results?

In terms of a generally accepted definition of the term ‘terrorism’, it’s a term that’s quite literally fought over. ‘Freedom fighter’ or ‘terrorist’ can be interchangeable, depending on whose side you’re on.

One academic study counted upwards of one hundred different definitions of the term ‘terrorism’ with the only common theme running through the definitions being the use or threat of violence.

Chamber’s Dictionary defines terrorism as ‘the systematic and organised use of violence and intimidation to force a government or community to act in a certain way or accept certain demands‘.

This is a general definition though and gives only a flavour of what ‘terrorism’ may imply. I think a more useful definition comes from law rather than literature.

Here again, each country’s legislation defines terrorism differently meaning that understanding who the enemy is of the ‘global war on terrorism’ is far from easy as variations in definitions imply variations in who ends up a ‘terrorist’.

In the UK our definition of terrorism comes from S.1 of the Terrorism Act 2000.

As a piece of legislation, the Terrorism Act is wide-ranging covering a number of terrorism related offences including fund-raising and training.

The definition of ‘terrorism’ itself is similarly encompassing, allowing for an array of activities to be considered under the Act.

S. 1 identifies ‘terrorism’ as the ‘use or threat of action’ designed to influence the government or to intimidate the public with that use or threat made for the purpose of ‘advancing a political, religious, racial, or ideological cause’.

‘Action’ means serious violence against a person, serious damage to property, endangering a person’s life, creating a serious risk to public health or safety and/or interfering or disrupting an electronic system.

Aside stating that ‘action’ to have occurred outside the UK will still be classified as terrorism, S. 1 also adds that if the action involved the use of firearms or explosives then it will be classified as terrorism whether or not there was a desire to influence the government or to intimidate the public.

So this is what we mean by ‘terrorism’ in terms of UK law and as it’s this definition that’ll be applied by security services during investigations and by the courts prosecuting, it’s perhaps the most relevant.

As mentioned, it’s a broad definition likely to cover much more than the stereotypical collections of suicide bombers and extremists that ‘terrorism’ may bring to mind.

Recognising that terrorism is a broad topic is important as by focusing on more traditional images of what a terrorist is expected to look like, a risk is run that chances to confront other people and groups posing an equal risk will be missed.

As the British born bombers responsible for the 7/7 London bombings illustrated, terrorists won’t all be from the Middle East and with varying motivations behind attacks in Oklahoma City in 1995, Norway in 2011 and Boston this year, religion shouldn’t be seen as the prime motivation for acts of terrorism.

Being a broad subject does not imply though that there aren’t common themes running through our response to terrorism – themes that apply no matter which of the hundred or so definitions you’re applying.

The first and foremost would be that information on anything terrorism related is shared at the earliest opportunity.

More than any other area of policing, the work of CTU is intelligence-led and their ability to prevent terrorist plots is largely dependant on the quality of intelligence that they have to work on.

Supplying information, no matter how trivial, is one of the best ways you can contribute to the fight against terrorism and it’s easy to do so too – just pick up the phone and dial 0800 789 321 to speak to the Anti-Terrorist Hotline.

Hand in hand with this goes the necessity to approach issues surrounding terrorism in a mature, sensitive way and not get caught up in the rhetoric spat out by certain groups wanting to spin perception to their own ends.

Terrorism is by no means an exclusively Muslim issue and should someone from an Islamic background have been responsible for an act of terrorism then they are likely no more representative of Muslims in general than are the those responsible for killing abortion doctors in the States representative of Christians.

These points considered, no matter how the incident at the Aisha mosque is ultimately defined, the response from the public ought not be much different.

We’ll need strong community cohesion, trust-based relationships between public and the police and a mature appreciation of the issues surrounding both hate and terrorism.

From my own experience of working with the people living around the area of the Aisha mosque and the general impression of the communities across the West Midlands and further afield, I’ve every confidence the public response will be an assuring one.

How can you know what it is you don’t know?

If you’re a Walsall resident or alternatively, like me just caught wind of the story in the news this morning, you may be aware that that a suspect item was discovered at within the grounds of a mosque on Rutter Street last night.

If you’re not, officers were called to the mosque late last night on discovery of the item and cordons set up accordingly.

Home owners living nearby were evacuated as a precaution whilst the army’s bomb disposal team attended, the cordon has since been scaled back as police enquiries continue.

As I’ve not had any involvement with the incident itself, I can’t give any further information on what the item was, although I am aware the matter is now being dealt with as a hate crime.

Investigations are at a very early stage, detectives are asking though that anyone with information which may aid the investigation should call West Midlands Police on 101.

Alternatively, Crimestoppers can be contacted anonymously or as a further option, you can use the Stop Hate UK service to report hate crimes through a variety of sources including at one of the many hate reporting centres around Walsall.

Keep an eye on our appeals section, social media feeds and the like for further information and as I say, if you have information that might be of use to the investigation then please contact us as soon as possible.

The hardest part…

Unfortunately hospital is where some officers’ shifts will end. Policing can be a dangerous job and I wish PC Koch a very speedy recovery.

It’s an unfortunate fact that the job of a police officer can sometimes be very dangerous indeed.

The danger can form part of the attraction of the job in the first place, knowing only that all you really know is that at any moment you could find yourself plunged into a situation completely unforeseeable at the start of a shift.

In their more innocent moments, these sudden turn of events, the next ‘immediate’ call waiting on the radio, can produce moments of excitement that few other jobs could ever offer.

At their darkest though, these events can be the sudden flick of a knife or acceleration of a car that can leave an officer in hospital – an officer who like thousands of those like us around the country started their shift off in the locker room, slipping into a stab vest and joking with friends in the expectation that they’d be walking out of the station at the end of their shift.

It’s an expectation tinted with a reluctant acknowledgement, how ever far buried, that the peaceful end of their shift is never guaranteed.

Sadly for two West Midlands officers over the past few weeks, their shifts hadn’t ended back in the locker room as they should have done.

With PC Peter McGinn hit by a car during an arrest attempt and PC Adam Koch suffering stab wounds tackling a man armed with a knife at a mosque, the unpleasant risk of coming to harm during the course of our duties is painfully underlined.

It’s fair to say the very least any officer asks of a shift is to walk away unharmed at the end of it.

Sadly this won’t always be the case, the only conciliation is that the injuries suffered weren’t worse and that both officers should make recoveries enabling them to return to the jobs they perform with such pride.

I’m hoping that both officers make speedy recoveries, their shifts ended the way that any officer’s could have done and that is a very sobering thought indeed.

If anything, that the same officers currently laying in hospital beds are determined to return to duty shows how determined those officers are to serve the public – I don’t know about you, but I find that pretty inspiring.

Gonna change my way of thinking…

Victims retracting complaints can be both frustrating and concerning too – how do we manage an investigation when someone is unsure if they still want to press charges?

High on the list of things that frustrate us police officers (alongside cold coffee and stale doughnuts) is receiving a call from a crime victim informing us that they’re considering retracting a statement they have made.

It’s the sort of call that often comes following a considerable amount of work having been put in to help bring offenders to justice.

Early on, it could be that officers have spent several hours taking statements, photographing evidence and writing up reports at the station.

Later on in an investigation, arrests may have been made or persons even charged to attend court.

A victim’s change of heart is not only problematic in terms of our chances of convicting people for what can be some very serious offences, it can also be worrying as it can expose the same victim, or someone else, to the risk of suffering more issues in the future.

The first thing we’ll consider when someone expresses a desire to retract is why they’re looking to do so.

Sometimes it can be pressure from the suspect, or someone nearby them, in which case we can consider offences such as witness intimidation and take steps to ensure that the victim is properly safeguarded.

Another reason may be that things have settled down since the original incident and they don’t feel a prosecution is as relevant or necessary as it seemed at the time.

Efforts may have been made to patch things up or move on, promises that someone will ‘change’ given.

These are grounds that require very careful consideration as from what we tend to see, many of the offenders we deal with do not change and victims who have dropped charges in the past sometimes find themselves registering near identical complaints a few months down the line after promises have been broken.

In some cases the new complaint will be much worse, a far more serious harassment or assault for example.

Second chances can seem a kind option but allowing them can be dangerous too, especially in domestic cases where the bravery of the person standing up to the abuser may prevent a future escalation.

Another reason that might cause people to want to retract is a fear of attending court and what the process might involve.

Sadly court may not be the most pleasant experience, this isn’t to say though that victims aren’t offered support throughout the process and there are a range of special measures that can be applied for to make giving evidence easier.

With concerns such as these and anything else causing doubt fully explored and if a retraction still seems the preferred way to go, officers can take a retraction statement in which the witness explains their decision.

This taken, its impact on the case will then have to be considered and it’s important to remember that a retraction will not necessarily stop the case nor the investigation.

Even with a retraction, it might be the case that suspects will still be arrested and the investigation be carried out as far as it can.

Similarly if a matter has reached court, there are circumstances in which a ‘victimless prosecution’ will go ahead, independent of the original complainant.

If the evidence allows this will often be the preference in domestic abuse cases as it’s recognised how hard it can be for domestic abuse victims to stand up to the perpetrators and how vulnerable people can be if the abuse is not challenged.

Complaint retractions are the last things that officers want to have to address and for good reason they’re not taken lightly.

We’ll make sure we understand why someone would want to retract and then look to see what we can change to give people the courage to go through with complaints.

If retractions have to be taken then it’ll be down to ourselves and the Crown Prosecution Service to ensure that the right steps are taken after that point.

We’re both victim led and victim focused – the way we’ll look to deal with retractions takes into account both the victim’s views and their interests also.

Summer’s here and the time is right for dancing in the streets!

Less than a week after I was freezing my handcuffs off up Kinder Scout it appears that Summer has now made an appearance and what’s more, I have it on good authority that we’re going to enjoy an unbroken period of warm, sunny weather right the way through to mid-September.

Probably.

Because we’re British and better equipped to talk about the weather than actually cope with it, we often do funny things when the sun has got his hat on.*

Napkins will be worn on heads, topless blokes will be dragged down the high street by their angry looking dogs and women will be reaching for the Summer wardrobe brought in anticipation three years ago from a shop that apparently had not ready access to mirrors in its changing rooms.

Nice as the hot weather is, it doesn’t reduce the chance that an antisocial so and so with an attitude problem might try to lodge something sharp and pointy in us officers.

This being the case, we have no choice but to go on wearing our fashionable Summer 2013 range of stab vests, equipment harnesses and belts.

Some officers cope by drinking a little more, patrolling on the shaded side of the street or in the case of PC Ian Northcott, banging out a rather good version of Wonderwall for shoppers near New Street to raise money for the homeless.

As my tutor during my first eighteen weeks at the WMP ‘police academy’ back in 2010, Ian had impressed on the class the importance of having a decent social consciousness when it comes to approaching policing.

To this end each year he runs his ‘Socks and Chocs‘ initiative during which socks, chocolates and sleeping bags are donated to those who have found themselves living homeless in the West Midlands.

Last year fifteen hundred pairs of socks were donated, along with a thousand pieces of chocolate and sixty sleeping bags.

You can find out more about Socks and Chocs here and if you would like to help – perhaps you have some ‘spare’ chocolate laying around – then please get in touch by sending a quick message to socksandchocs@yahoo.co.uk.

As in reality it’ll probably be snowing again by the end of the week, now is a great time to help get those less fortunate than ourselves in a better position to cope with life on the streets.

As Ian would say, “Maybeeee you’re gonna be the one who saaaaaaavveees me”!

* Hip, hip, hooray.