to hope this bullying, lying scumbag of a Policeman is sacked?

[ComposHat]

Appalling behaviour from a crooked little Hitler in uniform. If he makes a cack-handed and arrogant attempt to frame someone whilst being filmed, it makes you wonder what he's done when he hasn't got a camera turned on him.

From the film I think that it's possible the policeman misheard him (though was perfectly clear on the film that he said 'tea').

The drink driving thing came out of nowhere on the film, and although we don't see the hours earlier to know what happened, it did seem out of the blue.

What confuses me most is why the policeman didn't say why he jumped to the accusation of drink driving. He didn't say 'I saw you' or 'you were seen at blah time etc' he just leapt into making another allegation. It's this combined with his determination to 'win' that makes me wonder about what was happening.

It escalates from 'stop filming', to 'get out of the way' to 'have you been drinkimg' etc with barely a switch in pace and it all feels a bit too pat.

The hat & gear in the mans photo seem to designate him as someone that is there to film in case of trouble, so the police may have pigeon holes him as an agitator? Obviously not ok.

Basically, it's not a clear case of police brutality/ set up, but it all feels a little off and like the policeman has a point of dominance to prove for some reason. I don't see his colleagues as doing anything wrong though after the policeman starts questioning. They are standing by what the main policeman says but, well, they have to given no evidence to the contrary don't they? They aren't close enough to hear all of it so I'm not sure what they can do except go through the procedures.

I could speculate all day but here's a few:

Scenario a: man is 'known to be one of / associating with' the protestors (or assumed to be) and therefore police feel justified in being ready to up the ante or find an excuse to confront him. Not ok.

Scenario B: man has been around driving and smells of drink and that's why policeman is so keen to up the ante. Still not really ok but I sort of see it unfolding like that when everyone is tense & tempers are raised. Related thought, should police be in better control of their tempers? Or is adrenalin difficult to regulate in these situations? And are we ok with that excuse? Meh, I can't really justify it.

Scenario C: police are so riled up by real/ imagined taunting/ violence/ ruckus that they are just waiting for someone to start it, lots of adrenalin, maybe fear, maybe fun of fighting... Again, not ok but I can see it happening. Again it's the adrenalin thing.

I suspect the enquiry would hang on the smaller evidential details: whether the car mentioned was really the guys car, did the mans breath smell of alcohol? Was anyone else aware of the car driving ...

And the real truth would depend on knowing whether the policeman had that attitude on him to everyone, or was calm and fair all the rest of the time, or whether he's a bully who uses his official status to dominate others and gets a kick out of if.

Unfortuneately we can't answer any of that!

Agree with the rank pulling, that is the thing that damages a professions reputation. It doesn't seem to be happening here though (unless I've totally missed something?)

He was charged with some sort of drink driving offence but it all fell apart, didn't it Constable Savage Kehoe?

what it looks like to me is policeman A wants peers to get out of the way. arrests were being made, peers had already been knocked/pushed/fallen over whilst filming so it was a reasonable request to ask him to leave the area. policeman assisted peers in leaving (perhaps a bit too forcefully, perhaps not) and peers objected to being handled in whatever way was being used and claimed assault, this raised policeman's hackles and he thought 'right- fuck this, I'm getting him out of the way properly and teaching him a lesson' and he goes for what he knows has worked in the past, loudly declaring him to be drunk (possibly thinking of the 'drunk and disorderly' charge) and then thinking on his feet to add the 'you were driving' bit.

Sadly Officer Kehoe is a sergeant not a constable. That's why the other officers in the film were doing as they were told, even though he was obviously behaving like an arse.

It's very clear

Police officer" are you drunk"
Man"no"
PO "have you been drinking"
Man "no"
PO " you've been drinking this morning"
Man "no I have not"
PO " you've been drinking this morning"
Man "I've had tea"
PO "you've arrived in your car this morning"
Man "no I've not"
PO " you've arrived in our car this morning"
Man "no I've not"
PO " you've arrived in your car (man "no ive not") you've had a drink this morning haven't you,you've had a drink this morning, where's your car" turns to other officer " he's had a drink this morning"
Man "no I've not"
PO " you just sad to me that you've had two drinks"

So even if he misheard the tea comment the man still said very clearly prior to that comment that no he had not.

He told an outright lie

Second car bit should say your not our

And yet the buffer between officers that lie and a victim of such crime is the defence practioner. The ones who last night a AIBU poster was pondering how they do such a morally reprehensible (IHO) job. The ones who are losing their careers though cutbacks. Oo and now PC Wallis sentenced for lying about Mitchell. .

Some police officers are fabulous. Others, not so much.

I have a question for anyone who might be in the know (vicar possibly but I understand she mightn't want to come back here to this thread)

almost as soon as peers was arrested his camera was switched off. I am not sure whether he switched it off or it was switched off by someone one else. my question is- do people have a right to film what happens to them (either by a camera on their hat/mobile in their pocket or by having someone film it for them) from the point of arrest onwards? obviously if someone else is filming it they cant go in the police car or station or cell but if filming it yourself do the police have a right to tell you to turn the camera off or confiscate it themselves before you go through the handing over personal belongings stage.

viva - its called the hip flask defence but it rarely works for the drunk driver - we have very specific ways of finding out what the level of alcohol in the body is compared to what was drunk and when.

sillybilly - anyone can film what they want - as soon as i arrest someone i do a search to check if they have anything on them that they should not have - the only time i take property of a person is if they could use it to tamper with evidence (ie - mobile phone if they could call the victim to tell them to drop charges etc - happens in DV cases...)

otherwise they can film to their hearts content until we get to custody. then all their property is taken and put in safe storage which is auditable. this saves things going missing/getting lost/ and covers both the prisoner and the officers.
anything valuable would be taken and put into prisoner property until the prisoner is released.
ive had one bloke tape on his mobile phone but he was feigning being beaten up - i was driving! he kept shouting "no no dont hit me" and such like....load of bollocks - he was a 6ft bodybuilder and im 5foot sod all plus i was driving....unless i am very ambidextrous then i fail to see how i could drive AND beat him up in the back of the car.....

this is the kind of shite we get subjected to daily. all unreported.

thanks for responding vicar. I can imagine how people try to set you up like that. I couldn't do your job- you are up against so much. pricks like kehoe make it all the harder for you to go about your work.

fwiw here in NI we do get to see quite a bit of what the police are subjected to and my F&F are as vocal as I am in their disgust at how the police get treated by some members of society.

for those trying to contrive some other form of events that differ from what was on the video & trying to defend the 'policeman' in question..
He lied on camera and to other officers.

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/salford-anti-fracking-protester-sue-greater-6676499

Defend them when they need it, not as a default position and certainly not when such damming evidence is present.

so i see my advice on keeping an open mind was a blinding success then.

good job not all coppers are as closed minded as those on this thread eh!? or everyone would be damned as guilty based on what the majority thought.

luckily we dont yet have mob rule.

some cops are wrong. impatient. rude. aggressive. some might even tell fibs.
i can happily say in my experience they in the minority.

the sgt on that clip would have to be all kinds of stupid to deliberately try to stitch him up with a camera pointed at him. i doubt sincerely that that was the intention.

cops cant win.
had the bloke with the camera been drink driving? who other than he and those who were there know?
if had he run someone down the cops there would be getting lambasted for that too.

why not just let the investigation run and wait for the facts.

its like the william roach trial verdict today....cops were vilified for not taking the victims of Saville seriously.
today the news is asking if lancs police should have ever brought the Roach case to trial.
double standards.

i am not defending the actions of that officer if he was in the wrong.
if he was wrong he was wrong. but im not judging what happened that morning from a biased 5 minute clip on you tube either.

jumping to conclusions isnt in the hand book. good job too.

why not just let the investigation run and wait for the facts.
The investigation has run, hasn't it? The news report says: "Father-of-four Dr Peers was then arrested and charged with failing to provide a specimen of breath but the Crown Prosecution Service decided there was insufficient evidence for a conviction so withdrew the case at the first hearing at Manchester and Salford Magistrates' Court."

Vicar, i have a lot of respect for you as a poster, but you're insisting posters are being 'close-minded' and accusing people of 'mob rule' which seems incredibly unreasonable given that (a) the incident was filmed and the officer is recorded telling lies and (b) the Crown Prosecution has decided there's no evidence to support a drink driving charge.

Vicar, you aren't keeping an open mind either.

You are transferring people's comments about what they saw on the video and what was decided at the magistrates' court to some kind of general mob rule and attitude about policemen in general, trying to defend this man by reference to the (no doubt impeccable) work that you do.

He is not you. Your high standards have nothing to do with what kind of standards he might have. Criticising him is not an attack on you.

The way I see it there are there kinds of posts here:

a) the all policemen are dreadful camp- OTT and wholly unjustified as far as I am concerned. As stupid as saying "My asthma was misdiagnosed when I was 7 and therefore all doctors have to be bad".

b) yours: "I know I am a good police officer and therefore people who attack this (totally different) police officer are being unfair"- same line of argument as above really, just the other way round

c) those like Miscellaneous who sit in the middle and try to actually analyse the evidence concerning this particular case

Have you not been listening to what the more balanced element are saying on this thread? What worries us is not so much the occasional bad policeman- you get occasional bad individuals in all professions and we have to live with that. What is worrying is a perceived tendency for the police to close rank and defend a colleague whether it is justifiable or not, because they see any attack on an individual in the force as a personal attack on themselves. That is where the general public needs reassurance. Please show us that this perception is wrong.

I mean the investigation into the officers conduct.

the other thing I have learned is that no evidence for cps doesn't mean not guilty necessarily.

what im saying is that you, nor I, nor anyone who wasn't there knows if he was lying or not, it is entirely possible that the person who looks like the victim could also be lying. people lie to cops all the time! (shick horror. ...) I have had some very respectable people lie in investigation if they think it gets them off the hook.
the police have had some very bad publicity lately, but one or two bad apples dont mean that the entire system is corrupt. its.very disheartening.

ive learned to not take things at face value because very very often things are not that black and white.
but.it doesn't matter what I say because people have already decided that the officer is guilty and the bloke withthe camera is innocent.
if i were to make the same snap judgements based on the same 'evidence' then we wouldn't have a police service. we would have state rule.

thankfully we don't.
I strive to do a fair and balanced job.

Cory I am keeping an open mind. thats why I say let the investigation into the officers conduct run its course. if he has done wrong I can guarantee that his force will not stand for it.
the.upper echelons will be keen to distance themselves ifthat officer has brought the force into disrepute.

He bloke recording could be a hardened criminal for all we know but it still would not justify the police officer's behaviour.

He is being paid to police,part of that is being honest.

At the very least that officer needs serious training in how to communicate.

Vicar, you are still being emotional and taking it personally. That is what feels so worrying, your evident feeling that any suggestion that a specific group of policemen in one specific case might be covering for each other is a sign that we believe in the corruption of the entire force.

I am getting the impression you don't see the more reasoned arguments on this thread at all, because you have already made your mind up that we are all rabid police bashers. That is not keeping an open mind.

We know that the general public lie to the police. Pretending that the more sensible posters on this thread are denying that is setting up a strawman.

I came on this thread to support you, and it is your own posts that are making me worried.

Going back to my own particular confrontation with the police from years ago, my problem then was not that I did not believe they were able to know things behind the scene. No doubt they knew this man was a known thief. No doubt they knew he was a liar. I am even perfectly willing to believe he had perpetrated the crime in question. Quite likely they were right.

What worried me was that these particular policemen were convinced they had the right to use that inside knowledge to take a short cut and persuade me to say I had seen something that I was clearly never in a position to see. They were frustrated with the situation and wanted it resolved. The fact that the solution would require me to commit perjury did not seem to worry them.

There were several of them there, all hearing this conversation, and not one of them said "oi mates, we can't do this, it's against the rules". I can't imagine standing by and not speaking up if somebody in my profession is breaking the rules to the detriment of somebody we are supposed to be looking after.

There was no issue of safety or adrenalin at that time, no reason they had to protect each other: I was a calm, sober, well conducted member of the public who had reported a break-in in an office near my workplace.

This is not intended as a general comment on police forces past and present. I am perfectly willing to believe that they were a unique case.

I have cited it solely as an illustration of the fact that having inside knowledge of a person does not excuse breaking the rules.

Vicar, you are one of my favourite posters; funny, warm, with bags of empathy.

And on this thread you are confirming all my long held beliefs about the police.

Despite a video showing an officer acting in an arrogant , aggressive manner and actually lying, you have gone into "Close ranks, the police are always right mode". And the fact that you seem like a nice person makes it even more worrying.

Fwiw,

In my work and personal life I come across hundreds of police officers I have also had 5 armed ones rescue me,all apart from 2 have been great and I don't just mean good police officers,I mean more than good going over and beyond expectations.

the 2 who were not even good were shocking,and I'm glad that one was dismissed and the other is on suspension.because those bad ones reflect on and damage the reputations of the hundreds and thousands of good and great ones.

i promise you i am not closing ranks - if the investigation into that officers conduct proves that he was lying then he deserves all he gets.

i stand alone very often in the job if i dont agree with something.

the clip looks like he was bullying. it does. but i will reserve judgement because no one can judge the whole thing from a 5 minute youtube clip by someone seeking publicity for their cause.

in briefings, in training, i am very vocal if i disagree with something - when i did my public order training they showed a clip of a protest in which a woman was manhandled completely and utterly illegally - and while all around me were murmuring about being wound up etc i stated very clearly and for all to hear that found it disturbing and wrong.

i am very sure on my legislative powers before i so much as touch another soul.
you cannot arrest someone because you dont want them there - i am very very aware and in support of that. i hate the way some public order or protection units work. if there were more women on serials then i think a lot of the bravado rubbish would stop.

but i am reserving judgement - i have to say that i thought it entirely possible that when the officer asks "have you had a drink" and the reply is "tea" its quite possible if in a noisy environment with lots going on he could have misheard and thought he said "two" - now that doesnt mean that the officer should have just ploughed on regardless - and its clear he does not listen to the man with the camera from that point on.....

but.
please dont tar me with the same brush by suggesting i close ranks - in reality i will argue till blue in the face with any colleague who asks me to do something i dont agree with or with statements made that give us a bad name.
for this i am a bit of an outsider because i still regard myself very much as a member of the public....i treat people how i would want to be treated.

that said the police service is a uniformed service and if given a lawful order then you are expected to follow it. not mindlessly. but it is a regimented profession - you do have to be mindful of that.

when the sgt gives the order to the other officers to detain him on suspicion of being unfit through drink or drugs it is lawful - IF he genuinely thinks the man has been driving under the influence.
IF he said it to get him out of the way then its totally wrong.

i will reserve judgement until i hear from the horses mouth on both sides what the story was.
and thats just the way i roll.....
i wont condemn anyone until i get their side.

and with that before i fuck my reputation on here right up by continuing to suggest that all may not be what it seems i will take my leave.

peace-(ful protests) and love to all.

Yes vicar you come across on these boards as a nice person so I have no doubts thst you are a scrupulous, professional and empathetic officer, however you do seem to have a bit of a blind spot when it comes to police brutality, negligence and corruption.

I get it is a job where you feel got at from all sides but 'good officers' fo themselves no favours by excusing the corrupt, vicious colleagues who use their position as a power trip.

I feel that you're minimising the Sgt Kehoe's behaviour as fibs when it is naked lies, told with the purpose of tring to arrest someone on patently false grounds and sating that you'd suspend judgement until the enquiry - would you say 'oh wait and see' if it had been a video of a bunch of protesters kicking the shite out of a copper as they were on the ground?

Your posts exactly offer much comfort to those of us who hold the view that the police look after their own come hell or high water.

The saying 'afew bad apples' concludes 'will soon ruin the whole barrel' and this would sadly be the case if good police officers are ready to excuse the bad.