Accepting a police caution question

[Hiddentext]

My other half accepted a caution for criminal damage to a van a year ago, he felt railroaded into accepting it despite many reservations, but we just wanted it done and gone at the time, never having been in trouble with police before. We now regret not challenging it, without going into too much detail, the people alleging criminal damage waited a month before bringing it to our/police attention, the policeman involved admitted not having seen scratches in person, or seeing proof of payment of repairs. We never saw scratches in person. We are now challenging this as part of a larger complaint/investigation. There is however cctv footage, police will not release CCTV footage used, photos which he said he saw but we never saw, and will not address the point of whether they saw proof of payment for a pretty large amount of money for scratch repair. Does anyone know where we stand on this? Are we wasting our time pursuing a year after event?

[quote Hiddentext]@LemonTT I don't think it's going to go to the IOPC stage. We have complained formally through Local constabulary channels, particularly about the wrongful arrest, after over three months of investigation we had a whitewash response back to our complaints, but, there were things in the report we got back from the investigation into our complaints that we hadn't known about before, whether deliberately included I don't know, where the PC had obviously lied to us and his sergeants who ok'd the arrest, we have put together a very well considered and polite response to the report as we were invited to, pointing out many things, I get the feeling there is more going on behind the scenes than we know about, I'm hoping that although we may not be able to over turn the caution, we may get some redress for the wrongful arrest at local level.[/quote]
OP,
As you have said, there is some significant back story which we don't know. If I understand you correctly, are you saying that the owner of the van deliberately orchestrated a complaint against you and the police accepted their account? You suggest possible influence by the van owner because of a friendship with the cop? Your husband then signed the caution because he was intimidated and unaware of its implications? If this is your neighbour and he is able to maliciously engineer police action against you, that must be a pretty stressful. Do you plan to move?

Second, your husband had legal advice, what did they tell him to say/do? If they advised him to admit the offence and he could avoid court with a caution then the issue is with the legal advice not with the police.

Not all legal advice is equal. Or even correct. Especially if you're not paying for it.

Lawyers - especially duty lawyers - can make some astounding gaffes at times.

@ProfessorSlocombe

Second, your husband had legal advice, what did they tell him to say/do? If they advised him to admit the offence and he could avoid court with a caution then the issue is with the legal advice not with the police.

Not all legal advice is equal. Or even correct. Especially if you're not paying for it.

Lawyers - especially duty lawyers - can make some astounding gaffes at times.

Fully agree. But that would suggest the complaint should be with the legal representative rather than with the police which is why I asked and is what I said.

Op do you have legal insurance as part of your home or car insurance? (Or through work, union membership, bank account etc?)

If so why not speak to them - you’ve already paid for the advice.

Fully agree. But that would suggest the complaint should be with the legal representative rather than with the police which is why I asked and is what I said.

Yeah, well ... you'd have to be spectacularly crap as a solicitor to actually have any complaint about pisspoor advice you gave stick. You need to remember that there are no guilty people in prison - they are all innocent.

Apparently.

So there's an inbuilt presumption in the system that complaints against solicitors are really just sore losers.

It's well worth bearing in mind - tattoo it on your eyeballs if needs be - that if you are charged with something, and you have a solicitor, no matter how good - or bad - they are, it's you that is going down when alls said and done.

There used to be a lot of ethics around solicitors doing the best for their client yah di dah. But recent events have confirmed my long held view that they are rather a moveable feast. I certainly wouldn't want to rely on them protecting me in court.

@ProfessorSlocombe

Fully agree. But that would suggest the complaint should be with the legal representative rather than with the police which is why I asked and is what I said.

Yeah, well ... you'd have to be spectacularly crap as a solicitor to actually have any complaint about pisspoor advice you gave stick. You need to remember that there are no guilty people in prison - they are all innocent.

Apparently.

So there's an inbuilt presumption in the system that complaints against solicitors are really just sore losers.

It's well worth bearing in mind - tattoo it on your eyeballs if needs be - that if you are charged with something, and you have a solicitor, no matter how good - or bad - they are, it's you that is going down when alls said and done.

There used to be a lot of ethics around solicitors doing the best for their client yah di dah. But recent events have confirmed my long held view that they are rather a moveable feast. I certainly wouldn't want to rely on them protecting me in court.

Regardless of the merits of your argument I'm not sure how this helps the OP now.

Regardless of the merits of your argument I'm not sure how this helps the OP now.

I think I stated in my first post their DH is beyond help. Caution accepted . Job done. However it doesn't do any harm to put some facts out there for the next person ...

I don't know the stats. I wonder if women are more likely to be pressed to accept a caution than men ?