Mother arrested in front of child by Met over bus fare (that she had paid!)

[TERFinTheHouse]

Tw: upsetting content

twitter.com/saskia_cole/status/1682705268721737728?s=46&t=p6GESSn09HWHVXYgTLIbJg

Why was this woman arrested like this!?! Her poor child!

According to other Tweeters, she had paid her bus fare BTW.

An eyewitness said; Clement went on to add that the woman had her oyster card in her hand the entire time and that the officers could have simply taken it and checked it, which they eventually did and realised she did pay her fare.

But I doubt that would satisfy some posters on this thread🙄

Did you spend all your time outside the bus / train station? How did you know that the students were wealthy? Are you always so prone to exaggeration?

From a quick Google, you can use all sorts of contactless payment, including things like Apple Pay. You just swipe when you get on and swipe when you get off. You can use a contactless bank card without having an account with TFL, so you wouldn’t have an app on your phone to show that you’ve ‘swiped in.’ That’s perfectly acceptable according to the TFL website. All the woman had to do by their own regs is swipe when she left the bus.

All this ‘not showing proof of payment’ - how do you show proof you swiped in when the charge to your bank account is only made when you leave the bus on the second swipe?

What is going on?
What happened to just getting a fine?
Unbelievable i will lose my cool i cant accept that

Well Google is completely wrong. It's a flat fare on a London bus so you only swipe in. You don't swipe when you get off.

i think this is a really interesting point (and since the word "police" has been used on this thread a lot, i am expecting Detective Beetlejuice any second)

I am well able to believe how the situation, from her pov, could escalate if she is used to the everyday and every day racism black women tell us time and time and time again is something they experience. Some of us are listening - how can we help? What can we do?

I am well able to believe that the police were called based on (even unconscious) bias on the part of the ticket inspectors.

I am well able to believe that the police (oops, 3 times?) turn up and mishandle the situation because of institutional and/or personal racism and possibly sexism. Low hanging fruit is so attractive.

As for those who fail to connect the comments about this with the observation that murders are going up (are they?) or that the police don't turn up for burglaries and so on: it is because the busies are busy being themselves. Going for the easy win.

As people have said: we don't know the whole story, but we can extrapolate based on what people tell us. I believe them. I don't trust the police, unfortunately, not to be racist/sexist.

As she had an Oyster card it doesn’t matter.

Doesn't seem like a good use of police resources to me.

The video was taken and posted by a bystander who was questioning what the police were doing. At one point he asks the police why she has been arrested and tells them she’s his sister. However, just before that, he asks “is that her kid”. What sort of brother doesn’t even know that his sister has a child???
I’m almost certain that had there been absolutely no justification for the police actions that took place before the woman was handcuffed, that too would have been posted. Surprisingly, there appears to be no video evidence of what happened prior to the arrest. Now I wonder why?
We can all snip video clips to show what we want people to see. We can all shout from the rooftops that the police were racist, that it was overkill, that she should be allowed to go on her way without complying with the request from a ticket inspector. But we don't have the full story. All of the above may be right, but we just don't know!!!

They get on with a handheld device that you tap your card/hold your phone against and it shows you've already touched in at a reader within the timescale for no further charges.

I've got all the privilege of not having to worry about what happens if my chip doesn't read first time, but they don't ask for tickets (have travelled along that stretch many times - they probably picked it due to it being shortly after Tesco's/before another one and also being the major route into Central Croydon).

This is an aside from the issue, but it's funny how many people are wading into the argument about how to prove you've paid on a London bus despite having zero idea.

If you’re going to give the benefit of the doubt until proven otherwise, why not give it to the woman instead of the police? I don’t know the woman and have no knowledge of her having an history of inappropriate behaviour. I know the police and they do have a history of inappropriate behaviour.

Omg you're so racist. You should get it on a t-shirt. The fact the police let her go is clue 1. It was a wholesale disproportionate reaction to a wrongly accused fare evasion. This is the point of the thread. All the "as a mother" comments - wake up. As a black mother, is she supposed to role model subservience or show her children how to stick up for themselves in a racist society?

The police are supposed to be trained to de-escalate situations. That training with these officers needs repeating.

Most people aren’t recording before an incident. How would you know something was about to happen?

If that lady who was so badly treated by the police, for no reason at all as far as I can see, had been white with a white child, this thread would be so, so different.

I’m almost certain that had there been absolutely no justification for the police actions that took place before the woman was handcuffed, that too would have been posted. Surprisingly, there appears to be no video evidence of what happened prior to the arrest. Now I wonder why?

Well, the police ever so kindly ‘let her go’ eventually. Now I wonder why? Could it be because there had been absolutely no justification for the police actions that took place?

Also no surprise that there is no video coverage from before the incident was escalated by the police. Would have been a bit weird to be randomly filming someone before the police ploughed in.

@Soontobe60 actually, if you read any further than the initial reports on Charles de Meneses you will see he didn’t run or jump over a barrier etc. He was shot in the head from close distance and without warning. A tragedy.

@Soontobe60 do you genuinely not know why the black passer-by who filmed the incident called her “sister” or are you being deliberately obtuse?

I'm white. I live in London. I've been asked to show my oyster card to ticket inspectors several times on the bus. Then watch as they ask everyone to show proof of having paid. It just takes two seconds. Why did she refuse to do this and walked away? Surely she knew it would look suspicious?

I’m amazed that people still feel free to repeat the racist crap that he jumped the barriers, that he ran etc. He swiped his Oyster, he picked up a Metro, he heard a train coming and ran to the platform, got on and then was pinned in his seat by two murderous thugs while a third one emptied two magazines of pistol ammunition into him.

From the full article and the bus worker's pov, which unsurprisingly hasn't made the headlines. I think if you were being abused for doing your job and could see someone breaking the law you'd call the police too. She was arrested because she was abusive and the police are there to protect the bus workers and passengers. If she had escalated and hit someone - people would be complaining the police didn't do enough.

A bus worker called Joe, who was helping with the fare inspection operation and saw the whole incident, said that he was often subject to fare evaders who become abusive.
He told LBC's Nick Ferrari on Monday: "The inspector told her to please show the pass and she started being abusive to the inspector.
"And when the police asked her to show the pass, she started abusing the police as well. She could have just shown the pass and walked away - and that would have been the end of the matter."
He added: "She committed an offence by failing to show her pass when requested.
"And then the next thing to then verbally abuse the police and inspectors - and that was why she was detained."
The woman did not offer an explanation for why she didn't want to show her pass, the witness said.
He added: "Every single day we are subjected to abuses by people who fail to show their pass or people who fail to pay.
"It is a constant thing - it is a daily occurrence."
Joe said: "We are very concerned about our safety and we are constantly trained about how to deal with situations."

This. I'm in the same position. I'm regularly asked to show my debit card to prove I've paid. Why did she think she didn't have to do as she was asked?

The word you want is murder

The killing of Jean Charles de Menezes was appalling. The people who actually shot him believed him to be a suicide bomber. There were lots of fuck ups that led to him being misidentified.

Yeah, right. And the security in those handhelds is watertight, is it?