Fundraiser for sacked police officers

[Icefoot]

Apologies if this has already been done, but who's donating to this? £130k raised now.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-67236220.amp

who is going to risk a stop search if there is any chance of getting a complaint and losing your job ?

Try stopping some white people. When I was growing up it was all the white kids carrying because they never got stopped. Ever. The black kids had their pockets sewn up to stop drugs being planted.

There are plenty of white people searched .

2021-2022

"there were 27.2 stop and searches for every 1,000 black people, compared with 5.6 for every 1,000 white people"

It very much depends on the demographic of the area

To reiterate - no one , black, white , should be stop searched outside of the legal framework

The criteria is clear .

My ex dh used to be stopped at last twice a month , when he used to walk to work at 2am . Things were lax back then , I'm pretty sure they had no legal recourse to stop him . It never bothered him because he was out at 2 am with a carrier bag wandering up the street . It would bother me , now, because I know the legalities of it .

It does depend on the demographic of the area. In London, it's worse. "there were 40.5 stop and searches for every 1,000 black people in London, compared with 14.2 per 1,000 black people in the rest of England and Wales"

Definitely agree with this and agree with pp about this is an indicator of how rotten the institution if a significant amount of police officers are doing this .

I hope the couple who were involved in this sue someone ( the Met?) and get significant compensation.

My white DH got stopped years ago whilst doing his postal worker job. He thinks it was to do with targets, because he was in full uniform and had his postbag with him. Police officer stopped him, gave him the spiel, some BS excuse for the search, asked him what he was doing and where he was going. DH said, I'm doing my round, told him what it was, and he can be verified by ringing his manager which was declined by the officer. He had his pockets searched, and had a superficial body search.

PO asked him what was in the bag. Post, replied my DH. I need to look in the bag, asked the PO. You can't, replied DH. It's the property of The Crown until I deliver it. (This is true) PO got arsey, demanding to see inside.DH stood his ground, saying if he wants to escalate the situation he can ask his manager to contact the borough commander to ask why his officer is tampering with Crown property. Also, my DH signed the Official Secrets Act when he joined the post decades ago so there was that complication on top. PO grumbled but backed off. DH noted his number, got his receipt and carried on with his job.

I know in the past posties have done dodgy things whilst doing their job but he couldn't believe the PO didn't know the law. Also, he thought it smacked of fulfilling a target rather than having any genuine suspicion of wrongdoing. DH rang his manager about the SnS and the manager complained to the Met but nothing came of it.

Specifically regarding the TSG, who stopped the couple, they are known ar**holes. They are supposed to concentrate on things like protests and large events, which they mostly do, but they have a reputation for overstepping and for using their power inappropriately. Earlier this year the TSG arrested some volunteers who were advocating personal safety by handing out flyers in the West End. The volunteers had permission from Westminster Council to be there but the TSG arrested them anyway.

I have donated

For obvious reasons

I have donated

And still you get people claiming the police are fantastic. 🤦

The culture is rotten to the core, they prioritise protecting their own over actual justice, some of their attitudes are fucking cult-like and nothing will change any time soon.

Woke nonsense?

They were sacked for gross misconduct. A bloody miracle in itself considering how much they close ranks and cover up!

I fail to see how that's 'woke'.

Oh please don't encourage it, just report.

Yes you already said that.

They weren't sacked for the stop. They were sacked for lying. Yes, behaving erratically and being obstructive to the police is not on but the police can't just lie to suit their own narrative! It is disgusting racism

I'm baffled as to what the fundraiser is for? To fund legal action against being sacked?

If so, that would be a employment legislation issue for a specialist barrister to take up and IMO there's no way that there's been a legal discrepancy in the way these two were sacked from their posts, it will have been done to the letter of the law.

As for 'smelling cannabis' - it is written into PACE procedures that an officer only has to have 'reasonable suspicion' and to basically 'believe' something in order to enact a search. So, you can say I strongly believed I smelled cannabis and that's that. Doesn't matter whether nobody was found to be smoking any or that there was none found at the scene and nobody else, even fellow officers, didn't smell it. You can just stand in front of your Sargent or a court of law and say 'that is what I believed' at the time.

Notable that the white privileged folks of leafy green streets in North West London don't get dragged out their cars and searched in the middle of Hampstead High street despite they often heavily use drugs, drug drive, drink drive.

I guess what one does in the face of these situations, is counter-act the madness by setting up a fundraiser for organisations that combat abuse of police powers and tackle racism? Has there been one?

In my area the police are corrupt scum and I can legit type that because even every single review and assessment of the London Metropolitan police has come back saying the situation is untenable and unmanageable. Charlie Uniform November Tangos.

just suggesting that wether you’re black, white or purple

This phrase is interesting. It's meant to highlight the colour-blindness of the poster, applying the same rules to everyone. But what it actually does is highlight that someone is ignoring the structural racism and different treatment people get as a result of the treatment of their ethnicity.

The police clearly aren't thinking 'LALALA I don't now if someone is black, white or purple' they are stopping proportionately more black people. Because of racism.

Racists,

Racists donate.

agree. It’s not a good look at all for an organisation widely found to be institutionally prejudiced. Almost like they don’t care.

It's drummed in to student officers in my force that smelling cannabis isn't enough on its own

Well I'm glad to hear that but unless that's written into and updated version of PACE, then it still stands in law. Unless I am ignorant of there having been an update.

Unfortunately for those on the receiving end of abuse, that which is written in black and white stands in law and if / when it goes up in front of a judge in a court of law in the UK, it will be upheld in favour of the officer who 'believed' they saw or smelled something.

@JFT the point about middle class white people taking drugs is well made.

The fundraiser is to cover loss of earnings, in a way, I understand.