Suella Braverman statement about police behaviour and TRA police officer response

I'll add to that, the one activist who was lifted for inciting a large crowd to commit violence and beat women who wanted equality and rights, (you know, actually illegal),

.... was lifted only after some days, following initially a lot of shrugs and the police saying they gave him a little warning at the scene to use his kind words.

Spot the difference yet?

He was lifted only after much negative publicity towards the police and government, and pressure from above upon the police, and because the individual in question had breached the terms of his parole on a number of occasions. Largely he was lifted for causing the powers that be some tricky PR issues, not for breaching his parole or inciting the battering of women who stand up for their rights.

The police do a tough job, yes.

But it's fairly obvious in the difference of treatment.

Women have been lifted including being removed from their home in front of their kids, held for hours in cells, waited weeks before CPS grudgingly admitted they'd done nothing wrong, for stating facts and biology that some twit got all offended by and wanted to use the police as weapons to punish them for it. In this case, a woman photographing a sticker ffs.

Women have reported rape threats, death threats, racial abuse, homophobic abuse and actual assault, with evidence to the police and received nothing but shrugs.

There is differential treatment, and it's sex based and it's politics based. And it stinks to high heaven.

All I see when i read the nonsense from Felix is “we’re scared that the person complaining about a sticker might make things hard for us so we’ll go and make things hard for someone else to avoid that”

Ive no sympathy for that point of view.

That why they cannot win, ever . In an issue between two parties with opposing views they are only thre to see if a crime has been committed not take sides or referee. Someone out of the two parties will always be left feeling badly done to because they didn't get their way .

but I'll bite.
"officer officer, I'm all of a flutter because i saw an ancient lezzer take a photo of an anti-trans sticker"

how DO you think that should be handled?

piffle.

We know, because there were newspaper reports, that Shana Grice was stalked, reported the stalker to the police several times and was punished (by the law) as a vexatious litigant.
That suggests to me that the police do actually know how to put 2 and 2 together. The shame is that they made 5.
Because she was then murdered by her stalker. Because the police are, frankly, not up to the job of treating crimes against women with the seriousness they deserve.

Now, Felix, because he and i have been round and round the houses with this - thinks that they can't put 2 and 2 together to recognise a vexatious litigant (on threads discussing a very well known one) because they have to be "impartial" (which i think they think means lazy or inactive, but who knows?) so they can't say "oi, you fucker, pack it in or we'll charge YOU with malicious reporting and wasting the Plods' time".

Disbelieving women who report rapes. We know from the recent case in Scotland where 4 victims waived their right to anonymity in their rape case, that they were treated from the very outset as liars, whereas the perpetrator of the crimes was handled with kid gloves, advised of all his rights along the way etc etc. (amazingly he was tried, convicted and jailed - but it took women waiving their right to anonymity to get that far)

So no. It isn't a thankless job. It is a job. That they don't always execute to anything approaching satisfaction in many many cases.

What crime could possibly have been committed by taking a photo of a sticker? This is not any form of impartiality.

As I'm not British I find it confusing over that police officer. He insulted the Home Secretary and the police don't arrest him for a hate crime, but they arrest a woman for taking a photograph of a sticker?

Nailed it.

This is the crux of impartiality however

Because what's vexatious to you may be someone else's genuine concern

Ironically if you're discussing police impartiality they have to be impartial to EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE!

That why they cannot win, ever . In an issue between two parties with opposing views they are only thre to see if a crime has been committed not take sides or referee. Someone out of the two parties will always be left feeling badly done to because they didn't get their way .

It's a thankless job.

As I'm not British I find it confusing over that police officer. He insulted the Home Secretary and the police don't arrest him for a hate crime, but they arrest a woman for taking a photograph of a sticker?

I'm afraid I would favour a three strikes approach here.

Make a vexatious report to the police once, we'll chalk it up to a misunderstanding. Twice and you get a verbal warning. Three times and we will not respond to any complaint you make in the next year unless you walk into a police station to report having been raped or you call 999 to report an emergency. If you get burgled in that time, tough shit. Shouldn't have got yourself put on the time wasters list.

Hopefully a tiny minority as we seem to be getting more Orwellian by the day

What next? A woman looks at a sticker with her eyes?

Because this is an easy gig. A wailing "victim", an easily identified "perp". A visit to said perp to solve the "crime". And words to said perp to "prevent" future crime.

Victim mollified, justice served, future crime rate reduced. All the while collecting Stonewall brownie points. What's not to like for the current police service, any pretensions to being a force long since gone.

The suggestion that going round to essentially intimidate a woman just to make a trans activist who makes vexatious complaints to the police feel satisfied that something has been done is utterly astonishing.

to be fair to Felix - much as it sticks in the craw - unlike other threads where we did know it was a serial complainer (same one complaining about the same person more than once and crowing about it) - there is no indication (I think) that this is a serial/vexatious complainer here.

Having said that, given what Felix has said in the past, we will never know because s/he (I think he's said he's a he though?) has indicated often enough that each thing must be treated on its own merits and therfore would never check if this is the 94th complaint by that person, let alone the 94th complaint by that person about the same person multiple times.

@Dumbo12 In fairness you only have Felix's word that they are a real copper. But even if we assume they are not only entirely genuine but that there arguements are in good faith you still have to ask why the police didn't confront this particular dilemma by saying they will look into the matter, issuing a crime number and then doing nothing further. This seems to work as a policy for many other crimes (despite press/public outrage) so why only in the case of stickers are they FORCED by a judgemental press and the cruelty of public opinion to act.

TW police officer Lynsay Watson is able to call the Home Secretary a "Fascist Pig", claims that the Home Secretary is undermining existing law whilst declaring war on "the LGBTQI Community", and urges people to tell her to "do one", and Leics police are just looking the other way?

I'm sure that the local population are so reassured at the quality of their officers.

htips://twitter.com/WeAreFairCop/status/1698034987826614582/photo/1

I think so, although I have been off MN for a while so I can't be sure. (I got a week in the sin bin and then decided to take a break for the summer holidays with two kids at home.)

The suggestion that going round to essentially intimidate a woman just to make a trans activist who makes vexatious complaints to the police feel satisfied that something has been done is utterly astonishing.

What do you think these bullies want when they report women to the police in connection with stickers, Felix?

I'll give you a clue. It has got nothing to do with their anxiety. It is about causing anxiety in others, namely women who don't share their political views. What could be more threatening to a woman than having an aggressive activist on Twitter telling her that trans women are women and if she doesn't like it she can suck their dicks? Oh, I don't know, probably a visit from an actual real life police officer wearing a rainbow coloured lanyard and saying that there have been reports of her behaving in a way that could be inconsistent with believing that trans women are women, and don't you know they are incredibly vulnerable, and you wouldn't want to get into trouble now, would you?

Because that tells her that if she complains to the police about the activist who threatened to rape her, they won't be on her side.

She's spot on. Well done to her. One thing I do agree on.

But Felix, please stop and think.

If they are going to bleat that the police don't take them seriously - it will be approx 2 minutes before someone on Twitter finds out EXACTLY what the complaint was and post it.

So how do you think that makes the police look? that they didn't do a minimum amount of checking into what happened?

Again: you lot will go for the low hanging fruit every time. We know this because you are here confirming it to us. We know because we can read.

I have a suggestion for everyone out there in internet land: every time something happens that you should report to the police. Report it. And then give us their response on the internet. So we see: bike stolen and reported, automatic answer "here's a crime number for your insurance"

small bump in your car "take it to insurance nobody was injured"

there was an eldely lady photographing a sticker "3 PLODS WENT TO HER HOUSE AND PUT THE FEAR OF GOD IN THAT OL' LEZZER"

you will soon see what the public REALLY think.

is this your first encounter with the Policesplainer aka Felix, Margot?

Felix. As usual nothing you say endears anyone but the arse lickers to the police. You are wrong on so many levels it is as now as though you are parodying yourself. (my fault for actually replying to you)

I'm genuinely appalled by this response. I know you're trying to show things from the point of view of the police but I think you're just confirming many people's point of view that the police are ideologically captured, lazy, and can only be bothered to go for the low hanging fruit, thus making it easy for a political lobby group to manipulate the police into serving their interests rather than those of the general public.

You seem to be implying that if someone from this particular special group cries hard enough about how someone triggered their anxiety by taking a photograph of a sticker, instead of suggesting they make an appointment with their GP to seek help with their mental health problems, it is reasonable to pay a visit to a completely innocent person who has done nothing wrong and quiz them about their behaviour and beliefs.

Has it not occurred to you that a visit from the police over something as trivial, and indeed non criminal, as taking a photo of a sticker, might cause distress and anxiety to that person? That they then might live their life in a constant state of fear about whether they might get another visit from the police if they are seen looking funny at a trans person, or commenting that they don't think Isla Bryson should have been sent to a women's prison under an article that appeared on their news feed on Facebook? That they might worry about the potential consequences of their name being known to the police in connection with a "non hate crime incident"?

What a ridiculous concept anyway.

Surely a "non hate crime incident" is a "non crime", i.e. something the police should not be bothering you about (but might anyway if they think their job is to do the bidding of TQ+ activists rather than, you know, preventing, dealing with and investigating actual crimes.

Your post has me thinking that we need some sort of access to justice for people who are harassed by the police in this way. That we need a system whereby people like this woman can make a formal complaint about the police which is investigated by an independent third party, and have the right to information about what action was taken against both the vexatious complainant and the officer who made the call to attend their home.

We need people who make complaints about things like this to be subject to fines, but it appears that if the police were responsible for issuing the fines the system would be a non starter, so it needs to be administered independently of the police and have the power to sanction individual police officers who side with the cry bullies when there is clearly no case to answer, causing harm and distress to completely innocent parties.

AlisonDonut
It is perfectly fine to take photos in public

I know it is - and I haven't said any different

Felix125

You'll be surprised! We had a case of a 'little old lady' not liking cars parked on her street, so regularly scratched them as she walked past. Even got to the point where she would walk onto people's drives to do it. And these were expensive damages.

Another 'older person' who collected dog dirt from the street and assumed it was all from one house - so used to throw it on their drive. This couple didn't own a dog however. 'older person' didn't believe it and continued.

Older allotment holders who are jealous of their neighbours crop - sneak onto their plot and destroy them.

The term 'old' doesn't mean a great deal - I sometime think the older a person gets, the more childish they become.

In none of those instances was a little old lady taking photos with her own equipment to look at with her own eyes. It is perfectly fine to take photos in public, perhaps you need to do some refresher training.

But then people always throw the argument that we police by consent. By consent of a population/community as opposed to an individual.

The press will stir up the community to react against the police and show that we are not policing by consent.

The way this thread is going confirms, for me, that we now have policing to the standards of "public opinion" (for which read loudest voices) rather than the law.

Brefugee

Because the person who goes to the press is going to spin it their way. They are not going to say that 'my feelings were hurt' - they are going to say "...that the police are just lazy and not helping victims again and look at how much medication I am on, how many days work I have missed, how I can't even walk down the street anymore.........."

They are going to make it sound far worse than it is

When the press get a statement from the police it will say "... we took no further action in this case as it was apparent that this person was trying to demonize an older lady for they way she thinks - which is not what the police are here for"

You will then get a back lash from the community about how bad the police are for not caring about this person and causing them more stress & anxiety.