If you felt intimidated by a police vehicle patrol would you wave them down?

[HatThatWearsYou]

I recently related an experience where I, a lone woman took my dog out for a last toilet at night to a grassy area at the end of my 30mph residential zone street. I live in a small town with a low crime rate.

A police vehicle with two male police officers drove by me, then followed the road round, ignoring the other streets apart from the one they used to drive up to circle round and the rest of the town at large, in order to pass me a further four times in quick succession. The last two drive bys were at a greatly reduced speed and the final drive by was at a practical crawl and it was clear they were looking at me.

It only takes me about 2-3 minutes to walk to the grassy area from my door so the first pass bys were as I walked along a short street and the final two pass bys were when I had reached the grassy area. There was no one else around on the street at the time.

I have never had a problem with the police and I don't have a problem with the police or police patrols. In general I am very pro police and patrols.

I could understand them checking me out once, twice, maybe, just maybe even three times at a push but five times did feel a little intimidating and unnecessary.

I related this story on another thread and was told if I felt intimidated I should have waved the policemen down.

Regardless of whether you would have been intimidated by this particular incident, my question is:

As a woman, in this climate with faith in the police force at an all time low by women, would you wave patrolling policemen in their down if you felt intimidated by them late at night on a quiet street with no one else around?

YABU - I would feel completely comfortable flagging down the officers in the vehicle.

YANBU - I would not feel comfortable waving down the officers in the vehicle.

Like quite a few months ago lol, it might even have been early this year. I only really remembered it because of the other thread.

I wouldn't have flagged them down if I felt intimated. But I would have phoned the local police station when I got home to seek reassurance

It wouldn't enter my head to flag them down unless I needed assistance.

I guess some women might be more intimidated if two men approached them physically and started asking them questions rather than trying to assess from a distance. Whatever they do, someone will think they should have done it differently.

What breed of dog do you have?

I'd have assumed they were making sure you were ok or making would be criminals aware of their presence but they could have told you that.

FGS, the reason you’re in a low crime area is because they check out anyone wandering the streets in the dead of night…a dog is often a cover for a lookout while a partner does a bit of B&E. Once they realised you were a legit female lone dog walker, they were probably just making sure you were safe.

Yes out of 107,000+ male police officers they’ve caught one murderer of one woman but that is far far far better odds than any average woman with any average Joe Bloggs for a intimate partner.

I dont see why they should have spoken to you. If they had you’d probably have filed a complaint about being stopped and interrogated “like a common criminal”. Sometimes the police just cannot win.

I often find it helpful to read the OP's posts at least, I'm sure you'll find the same.

I've clearly said that I would have no problem being stopped, questioned and even lightly searched.

I'm trying very hard to point out in this thread that I am pro police, would be helpful etc and am not a complainer.

I felt a bit cross at the time and forgot about it. It's been a long time now since it happened and I was just gauging others opinions based on a comment from a poster in the thread that jiggled the memory.

@girlmom21 he's a big mixed breed dog so I do see that that could have been a factor in them wanting to run their eye over me once or twice, I don't think that's unreasonable of them at all.

I can’t understand why anyone would suggest you flagged them down when you were feeling uncomfortable that they were there.

I wouldn’t approach the police or attract their attention. I don’t trust them.

FGS, the reason you’re in a low crime area is because they check out anyone wandering the streets in the dead of night…a dog is often a cover for a lookout while a partner does a bit of B&E. Once they realised you were a legit female lone dog walker, they were probably just making sure you were safe.

Officers on patrol make little difference to the prevalence of crime in a community. And nothing about driving slowly past someone multiple times does anything to check up on how safe that person is.

PP may be correct that they were looking for someone who’d been reported missing/in need of a welfare check.

I wonder why they didn't just wind the window down, say hello and ask if you're alright, what breed is your dog, etc? Takes 20 seconds, then they could head off to their next patrolling spot. Kerb crawling you, which is what it seems to have felt like, is knowing intimidation and I'm guessing they knew exactly what they were doing. That kind of silent staring is creepy as fuck, no matter what uniform they're wearing.

Unfortunately my faith in the police has been eroded far beyond a point I’d ever have thought possible. After Sarah Everard, the behaviour of the police at the crime scene after the horrific murder of Bibaa and Nicole, all the variations of “check your thinking”, the likes of the rapists Mark Lindow and Lee Martin-Camp etc etc it’s become clear there is systemic misogyny within the police in the way there was - still is? - systemic racism. It’s all very well saying “Wayne Couzens was a one-off” but he isn’t, is he? He might be the one who went as far as murder, but there is a whole layer of enabling and cover up among other offices that emboldens attitudes like that.

So no, OP, YANBU in the slightest. In your position I like to think I’d have had the presence of mind to take photos of the patrol car and then ring the local station to find out why they felt the need to essentially kerb-crawl a woman walking her dog. But I certainly wouldn’t have felt confident in flagging them down. At the very least they’ve demonstrated they’re tone-deaf and unable to ‘read the room’ as to why patrolling past a lone woman more and more slowly might make her feel uncomfortable, so I wouldn’t be confident of an understanding ear even if I did speak to them.

Thank you for this. You said what I am feeling about the whole thing so much better than I think I could.

When the other poster suggested I email to let them know this might intimidate some women I did wonder if there was any point, would they even take on board what I was saying. I'm not entirely confident they would.

This reminds me of my incident in my early twenties . I was returning home from a night out and was suddenly followed by a car ( semi rural road ) . This car was right on my tail and I found it intimidating so I went faster knowing there'd be no one around to help if I was going to be carjacked . Anyway it followed me four miles home and it was only when I pulled up on my drive under a street light that I saw it was a police car . They gave me the search of documents and then the car , were my tyres ok etc was I legal . Then they said they were doing me for speeding . It was two male officers and I felt intimidated. I said I was worried I was being followed and that they should have put their blues on and pulled me over correctly if they wanted me to stop . They should have identified themselves not chased me home .
Anyway I rang my dad who was bloody livid and next day we went to the police station and demanded to see a senior officer . Dad explained why he was outraged and you do not chase lone female drivers in the dark down rural roads etc etc . The officer explained the usual garb but we got a full apology and the end of the matter .

This was over 30yrs ago and I would have hoped things had moved on now .

I read all your posts. I just didn’t believe you when you said you’d be fine with being stopped, talked to and even searched by the police, and in fact would have preferred it! You write like someone who has never actually been stopped and searched by the police…so it’s all “oh I’d be fine really, that would have been sooo much better than driving by me”.

But when you’re doing the eagle against a wall and being patted down, pockets searched and having questions barked at you…the reality is a hell of a lot more intimidating IRL than the patrol car going by a few times.

So yeah, I read it and was like 🙄 because you’re obviously reaching to have something to complain about. And I think your message that “women fund driving by intimidating, they’d much rather be stopped, questioned and lightly searched when walking alone late at night by two male
police officers” beggars belief. So no, I’m not going to agree with you.

Don't be ridiculous. They were doing their job at a quiet time and just checking any activity. Perhaps they were even looking out for you. With 2 officers in an obvious police car I would not be worried.

Sorry to derail but I'm not sure if this is widely known.

However, if you are dealing with the police, they should give you their phone so you can call a centre to give them the location and police badge number. I believe this is mainly when you're alone and with one police officer but am sure this is possible if dealing with two/more males.

Once you've finished you should then call the centre back to advise that you've finished the interaction.

It's insane women need to do this but the police aren't exactly female friendly.

I would leave the area immediately and go home. Police or not, 2 men in a car crawling past is a potential threat. I wouldn't feel safe knowing they were police, quite the opposite

Funnily enough, you are correct! I've never been stopped and searched before.

I have no issue with being talked to reasonably while they explain what they are doing and go through the procedure for a search.

I would definitely complain if I were practically jumped by uniformed thugs, thrown against a wall and roughly gone over while shouty police man shouted at me. I mean would anyone be happy about that?

Maybe this is part of my problem, I've grown up and got to my age with the belief that the police would treat me fairly and reasonably, not "pin me" anywhere unless I was doing or had done something overtly criminal.

I have at no point said that women in general would rather be stopped, questioned and lightly searched etc - I said I would.

If what you say is what would happen in reality then no of course I wouldn't be happy with that either.

I'm not reaching for anything to complain about, since I didn't complain

I wasn't asking for you to agree with my opinions, I asked for votes on options. Cheers for the opinions anyway I guess. You're rude as fuck btw.

Driving past someone multiple times is actually checking that they are still alive and well? Not sure how that doesn’t check on safety?

Patrols do actually have an effect on crime rates in communities, to the point of even a phantom effect. Past research into the effect of patrols didn’t have any controls (areas with zero patrols). They also assumed a simple input-output causal relationship between patrols and crime rates when crime is influenced by other factors such as economic cycles, strikes/protests, and so on.

Recent research seeks to correct that.
phys.org/news/2020-01-police-platform-patrols-phantom-effect.html

Also
Draca et al. (2008) UK
Used increased police presence post 7/7 in London to assess impact on crime rates. ‘Susceptible’ crimes (violence, sexual offences, theft and handling, robbery) fell significantly in the treatment areas.

Lin (2009) USA
Used a two stage least squares (2SLS) and two-stage quantile (2SLAD) regression model and found significant effects between numbers of police and number of property crimes, murder, robbery, burglary and auto theft.

Vollaard & Koning (2009) Netherlands
Found significant negative effects of higher police levels on property and violent crimes. Combined victimisation survey data and ‘precaution taking’ methods with data on police expenditure and numbers

🤣🤣🤣🤣 at calling me rude “as fuck” when you’re the one making snarky condescending remarks like ‘it helps to read the OPs posts…’ and swearing at me.

And no where did I say anything about “jumped” or “thrown” or “roughly gone over” or being “pinned” down. That’s not how it goes down…unless you resist.

It’s all very politely cold and professional when it happens, but trust me it is still very intimidating…and your insistence that there is a nice and pleasant way to be stopped and searched is frankly ridiculous.

I'm so confused by Discovereads are you pro or ant police, you seem to not know yourself.

I have noticed you about though and I think I've got the measure of you. I'll not reply to you any more.

FWIW to everyone else in the thread I am aware that I am really lucky to have not had any run ins with police in my time, I wasn't aware that that luck was considered a bad thing. Maybe pretty spectacularly naive sure.

I have a weird cognitive dissonance going on between the unrealistic hangups of my upbringing being told "don't bother the police and they won't bother you" (which I know in reality for a lot of people just isn't true at all), and what has been exposed in the police force recently.

I’m at core pro police. Police are a necessity. Pro police doesn’t mean pro brutality, pro corruption, pro racism etc all that has to be stamped out. Anyone who wants to abolish/defund the police (is truly anti police) doesn’t know history.

I would assume they thought I was dealing

I'm not sure tbh because what you describe to me sounds like typical police. For someone who's worldview and life experiences are different then I can see how what happened might be unnerving but then again I grew up basically being told that the police are not your friends.

I would have felt scared, so thankyou bringing it to my attention that it's another thing to have a plan for.

I think I would try to get a photo and if I couldn't get a friend to pick me up, I'd send them as much detail as possible about the car and driver. They may then be able to call the police station and provide reassurance while I hurried home.

I would definitely not flag them down.