Police withdraw stalking protection order application against Caroline Farrow

NotBadConsidering

Another poster raised the subject that the OIC was away for 7 weeks - possibly annual leave.

It was in answer to that subject.

Let's face it, the case is now unlikely to go anywhere now the SPO has been dropped. I know precisely what Caroline's submissions were, why it was binned, and what the state of play now is. Given the order couldn't pass a basic hurdle, it'd be unusual if there was now a criminal case to pursue. The only frustrating part is having to counter police insanity and other lies. Still, Surrey are being sued over this, and already have a large costs bill, which begs the question if they want to continue blundering ahead.

Today on Mumsnet:

Annual leave patterns of the modern British constabulary.

Tomorrow:

Observations of evaporative loss of water content of the Dulux range of ceiling white 😴😴😴

MrsDanversGlidesAgain

Like I say, its not a common occurrence - but I have known it happen. The officer had to use all the annual leave for that year and any carry over to cover it. It also incorporated seeing some of their family who live over there.

Had to be authorised years in advance too.

Most of us are like yourself and struggle to get ant time off - especially over the summer or Christmas.

The seven weeks may also incorporate a course. So they are on holiday for two weeks followed by a 4 week course. So, they are away from shift for seven weeks.

Yes not a very common occurrence to have 7 weeks on holiday, but it can happen if its planned and approved. This will cover things like a wedding and honeymoon in Australia for example

SEVEN WEEKS for a honeymoon? oh the poor underpaid overworked police, how my heart bleeds for them.

Most I've ever been able to wangle for a holiday to Oz is 3 weeks.

As I see it, Caroline wins either way since the spotlight is now shone very brightly on abusive men of all stripes, both in and out of the police. She won't - and this is one thing I'm confident of - be going to prison because people can't stop themselves from stalking her social media and then whinging to everyone.

Needmoresleep

No problem - if you want to derail with grammar issues. I'm a professional cop not a professional English Teacher. If you want to see examples of poor spelling & grammar - read some of the doctors reports we get from the hospitals.

You might want to let 'BezMills' know that 'ah' should have a capital 'A' as its the start of a sentence. Also their previous post didn't have a full stop at the end of the sentence.

Excellent .

ah I get it, like if you had some number of bears (bears are quantised to units of one bear unless you are talking about butchery or cleaning up after some kind of serious forest explosion), and put a shirt on one, you would have fewer bare bears, and that one bear would be a less bare bear.

Felix, I am not normally the grammar police but since you claim to be a police professional, it is “fewer cops” not “less cops”. Like bear and bare.

If only that was the police’s attitude with rape cases. Sadly they have zero interest in protecting women, only in prosecuting them.

LarkLane
It's a bloody long time since I heard of response teams having 20 operational cops on them. Oh how we laughed to read that!

How many do you think they have?

And if its less where you are - then it increases the problem as there will be more jobs to sort out with less cops to do it.

Wasn't there an old game show on the radio 'Surrey, I haven't a clue?'

Cleveland second, I'm sure there is a poster on here who is proud of that one.

You are right Bez, and this would help keep Surrey Top of The Complaint Pops.
Obvs they cherish the position.
https://epsomandewelltimes.com/surrey-police-top-complaints-table

It's a bloody long time since I heard of response teams having 20 operational cops on them. Oh how we laughed to read that!

If this is correct, and CF gets costs (I very much hope she does) then what? PC Useful just goes "yeahna, seemed legit at the time, soz lol", and the Chief Superintendent and the Police and Crime Commissioner go "yeah shit happen, no big deal, let's just cut a cheque for the 12K in completely avoidable legal fees and move on".

Unless the case is being investigated by a specific team - such as CID, DV, MIT etc etc - it will stay on the response team with that OIC.

The response team will have about 20 cops on it - each cop will be carrying a case load of about 15-20 jobs each. Each job will need enquiries doing and case files to be completed and sent to CPS. Add into this the constant incoming emergency jobs, priority jobs, more jobs with enquiries attached, missing from homes, cell watches, hospital watches, sudden deaths, MH etc etc. You don't really get chance top do your own jobs let alone other peoples.

So you can't just pass your 15-20 jobs onto you team mates when your off. There will be about 5-6 abstractions from the shift at any one time - so that will be about 100 enquiries which will have to re-distributed around the shift.

It doesn't work that way.

Unless its a significant job which you can pass to a designated team - it stays with you to sort out. The other cops on the team won't get chance to do anything with it in any case as they have their own cases to sort out. If you're lucky, you might have a cop on light duties or office bound who can sort out some of the admin for you - but that's about it.

7 weeks away. Yes not a very common occurrence to have 7 weeks on holiday, but it can happen if its planned and approved. This will cover things like a wedding and honeymoon in Australia for example. It may be a case that the OIC is away from shift for 7 weeks - so a 2 week holiday followed by a 4 week course, blue light driving courses take 4 weeks to run usually.

We don't know what the enquiries are - the phone down loads take ages to come back. For it to go to CPS, they have to be professionally downloaded and a report supplied by an authorising body - often having to go through RIPA for approval. Its not just a 'quick look'. The police may have had a 'quick look' at CF's phone for the purpose of the interview, but that's not good enough for a case file.

Then the case file has to be assembled & redacted and sent to CPS. CPS have a month turnaround, but that often gets delayed as they have staff shortages. This is possibly what the delay is for and the increase in the bail time.

If PC Useful has any important (to the force) casework on their desk, it will be covered.

The process is the punishment remember, a 7 week delay is just more juice for the same amount of squeeze. Perfect pass agg as well. Officer Useful was on holibobs so yanno, you just have to sit and endure another 1/8th of a YEAR in this kafkaesque nightmare we're kindly putting you in. Lol, Surrey Plice

Alternative scenario is that they are on a training course, but then someone else should be picking up the case. You don't go on a training course for 7 weeks without your work being covered by other colleagues.

@DrLouiseJMoody
I was thinking that, if finally, Professional Standards were concerned about the behaviour of the Investigating Officer, they wouldn't be telling CFwhat was truly going on internally obviously ... but they would be shifting the officer out of the way while they had a squint at the case files.

I think the officer is on the ropes for some reason. Defo not on holiday with a bucket and spade is my strong guess. I do hope that I'm right.
(p.s. not a cop)

@LarkLane I have wondered if the officer was, er, told off given the force now has a substantial costs bill over the failed SPO but I've really no idea - an out of office on holiday reply was received and, once again, Caroline is in limbo.

Far be it for me to suggest that the OIC is basically useless, is fucking about with this case because he can't be trusted with anything important and nobody would notice if he fucked off for 7 weeks.

Wouldn't it be interesting if the Investigating Officer is away having their gender affirmation surgery. I will admit at once that it's an entirely imagined idea! But wouldn't it be interesting.

Holiday leave or some other kind of "leave" I wonder?

That kind of extensive leave (7 weeks) needs to be approved at senior level.
Requests for lengthy blocks of leave like that are subject to operational consideration, particularly during times of high demand, and during peak holiday times. Like now.

Given that these police forces are all allegedly understaffed and struggling to meet targets, Surrey manages to grant THAT particular officer seven weeks holiday in peak holiday time August?

More to it than that I think. It doesn't ring right with me. But then none of it does.