To think the police are useless?

[RainbowsAndCrystals]

In my 20s I've been around many people that have had bad experiences with them and say how useless they are.

Something happened to me a month ago and it was caught on cctv.

Firstly the police said I had to get the evidence myself. So I had to ask around for cctv ... very difficult when people don't want to be involved and you're someone with zero authority.

Now a month later and they still haven't bothered to look at the footage.

It's so disheartening and almost like they have sided with the criminals.

I had a car window smashed and belongings nicked, and had to wait three days for them to come and check the car (it had clear hand prints on the paintwork).
When the forensics chap was dusting for fingerprints, he apologised it had taken so long to come out, but he'd been busy dealing with a murder scene.
They have to prioritise their resources. It's a sad fact but they can't respond immediately to everyone.

I live in an area where the crime rate is very high.

Any police officer I have spoken to (and believe me that's loads), are just as frustrated as the residents.

They didn't/don't go through all that training/gruelling shifts only to find they're so underfunded and understaffed, they can't do their jobs properly.

But that's the way it is I'm afraid and a lot of them (as residents) suffer from exactly the same problems as everyone else, regarding anti-social behaviour and crimes too.

As a police officer said to me only a few weeks ago, 'A lot of MPs don't give a shit because they live in gated communities/affluent areas where everyday crime really doesn't affect them.

YABU and extremely ignorant and ridiculous.

Parkednearby my local police (the Met) won't send forensics out any more for theft from a vehicle, unless the vehicle is suspected of being involved in a serious crime.

It just goes to show how resources are used differently from area to area.

Oh and my local police station is due for closure soon, despite 1000s of signatures on a petition, so things are only going to get worse.

My family have recently had dealings with the police on a very serious incident. They have been fantastic. It must be soul destroying for them to have to prioritise and know that the sort of crimes other posters have described are being left, but I can only say how grateful we are for their continuing efforts in our case. The amount of time wasted by the defence team is appalling though, and the distress it has caused my elderly mum is awful. Their actions have added innumerable hours to the legal process. I have truly no idea how they can do what they do.

YABU in the extreme.

The post above by neverknowing is a case of the police most certainly being useless. Her sisters attackers caught on cctv practically killing her, and not even spoken to by police? I'm sorry but understaffed or not there can't have been much more important than that to attend to. Disgusting.

YANBU.

It's disingenuous to blame current cuts, the police have always been useless.

What a daft thing to say purits

All of them?

Every single officer in the UK?

In every single area?

Dealing with every single crime?

My one experience when I called the police.

Two drunk (ex) friends, one trying to kill the other with a hammer.

I call police, crying.

When police arrive, two of them go off to get my friends. Another five stay with me. The ringleader policewoman accuses me of acting suspiciously, and is extremely rude to me. I am very upset, crying, but by no means shouting or swearing. She says if I don't stop being upset she will take me down to the station.

Then decides to breathalise me. I am trying to do it but am shaking because of the crying and it doesn't work. She then shouts at me that if I don't do it properly she's taking me down the station. Then it comes back clear, she looks pissed off. Tells all her officers to search my car! When there's nothing in my car she looks pissed off again.

Then when her colleagues come back she stalks off without another look back.

Looking back, I can't believe I didn't report it to be honest. I was just in such a state.

Parkhead I am so sorry.

I don't think the police are useless. Some may well be. But, in general, I think most of them are underresourced, understaffed, underfunded and underappreciated. When my car was broken into, they messed me about. When it was something more serious, they were very good.

MamaMotherMummy
I think you might have felt differently if the two drunk friends were trying to kill YOU.

OK, in my experience, they have always been useless.
I've just googled and found an article saying that the police solved just 6% of burglaries in 2015. Still cheering for them?

ParkheadParadise I don't understand what you mean. One of my friends was trying to kill the other. I rang the police. Then the police basically turned on me when I was extremely distressed.

I have made no value judgments about the police whatsoever. I have recounted my only experience with the police.

There are not enough police. It's going to get worse. Investigating crimes isn't like TV and the majority of CCTV is such shit quality, or erased, or the machine doesn't work or.....

There are LOTS of things more serious going on, all the time. If the crime isn't in progress when the police are called then you won't get a police car on blues. Sometimes you won't anyway - if there's only 5 on shift and 10 immediate threats to life - do the sums!

It's horrific, my husband is never home on time, rest days cancelled, he's going to lose 5 days leave this year because there's just not enough of them on shift before his leave year ends to take it. No refreshment breaks....I could go on.

Crimes can't even be put to people without a LOT of evidence - it's not actually the police's decision - the CPS are the ones who decide what is taken forward and what is dropped.

Thanks for making my evening.

Police cuts are part of part of the problem. A massive problem. However, in a previous job I worked closely with the police and of those attached to our service ( this was over a decade ago long before the cuts happened) and a significant minority were idle shiftless bastards, so fat they couldn't climb the stairs without huffing and puffing, let alone chase a suspect, even if they wanted to and were coasting towards their pensions and deeply resentful of having to do anything - two were nicknamed the Gurkhas as they never took any prisoners. One memorable day, one of the Gurkhas was sitting in the office, when a client kicked off making all kinds of threats and had to be bundled out the office, by four social workers, whilst a trained officer with handcuffs and a baton didn't get up from her desk to help or attempt to subdue the young person.

Purists - do you know how forensically aware those who burgle are now? Do you know they go out st night with socks stuffed in their pockets and leave no forensic evidence or prints? Do you know that fingerprints can't be taken off many items? Do you know most burglaries take about 5 minutes and CCTV is either not there or crap? Do you know burglars don't tend to show their faces when their out on a binge?

You're as bad as the DM, throwing meaningless statistics around. I wish the public did a bit of sensible crime reduction themselves instead of crying when the police can't nick or charge someone because there's literally no lines of enquiry.

And BTW, the Tories severely curtailed stop-search so they can't even prevent anything by finding people going equipped.

Hope you didn't vote Tory.