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Police Report

  
  

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rizla mission
14:31 / 20.06.04
I was in the unpleasent situation yesterday of having to report a crime - thankfully NOT one involving me and, well, not even a crime in progress really - let's just say it looked like a potentially pretty grim situation going on with signs of previous or impending violence, and I wouldn't feel very good about myself if I just ignored it.

So anyway, obviously being yr. standard scruffy anarchic "we wanna ride our machines without being hassled by the man" type, it's the first time I've ever felt the need to actually call the police about anything, and didn't really know what to expect. So I phoned up the police switchboard (or whatever), reported what I'd seen and gave my name and address when prompted (although theoretically I'd prefer to remain anonymous this is obviously fair enough, since if they end up arresting anyone I could be needed as a witness).

They said they'd send someone to check it out, and I assumed that would be the last I'd hear about it. But then 20 minutes later two cops appear on my doorstep looking quite stern with "MAY WE COME IN?" - and before asking me to repeat my statement they ask me a quite disconcerting number of questions about myself. And when there are two policemen standing in your living room demanding to know my occupation, date of birth, how long I've lived here etc., it's hard not to feel a bit threatened. Especially since I'd just phoned up to let them know that somebody *several streets away* looked like they were in danger of getting hurt..

Reading that back, I probably come across as a bit of a paranoid hippie loser, but y'know, I could have done without a few minutes of tough and largely pointless police questioning, and I realised after they'd left that I've got drugs in the house forchristssake - cops turning up unannounced is probably not a good thing.

I don't know what, if anything, transpired when they went to check out the incident I'd seen, and possibly they just thought I was wasting their time, but still - this sort of thing doesn't really encourage me to report anything in future, y'know?
 
 
VonKobra,Scuttling&Slithering
15:03 / 20.06.04
Latest encounters:

They rang a bloke I know and told him to get all his stolen gear and drugs stashed because he was going to be busted in the next week or so;

This asshole came around to fix our wiring(very fucking illegal in itself) and bragged about how he and an American cop on loan from the states started a Riot recently by bashing the shit out of this girl;

My flatmate was pulled up drink driving. She flashes her tits at the cops. They give us a ride home and forget about the whole thing. (we're talking SHITFACED drunk here)

I've been arrested a few times. I don't like the Police as a rule. But who you gonna call?

I wouldn't fucking trust the bastards though.
 
 
Foust is SO authentic
15:21 / 20.06.04
Sometimes police are simply goons and sometimes you need to be a little mouthy and show that even in the face of a person armed with a club, pepper spray, and a gun, you are not afraid.

Just so long as you aren't confusing cause and effect. Each of your stories, iao, involve you attracting the attention of the police with your actions and choices. Combine this with the attitude expressed above, and I'm thinking the cops act like goons because they are sick of dealing with people like you all day?
 
 
the cat's iao
07:07 / 21.06.04
Just so long as you aren't confusing cause and effect. Each of your stories, iao, involve you attracting the attention of the police with your actions and choices. Combine this with the attitude expressed above, and I'm thinking the cops act like goons because they are sick of dealing with people like you all day?

Hi Faust. Nice to hear from you too.

Hmm, so to you there is no cause to be upset or angry or otherwise annoyed with a police officer when s/he lies on the stand?

As for your generalizations, well, they're meaningless. The police aren't a single entity: there are decent people who are also police, and there are not-so-decent people who are also police. The encounters I've had with the decent ones have typically passed fairly smoothly. I think of the time I was picked up for skateboarding on a downtown sidewalk:

The cops drive by in a police van and shout out the window, "Hey, get off your skateboard." So I did. And when they were a block away I got back on it. Apparently they circled 'round a block or two, and hooked up with me at a bus stop where I was waiting to meet up with another skater friend. Well, I knew I was fucked, but they were all nice about it: no attitude, right? So I was all nice about it--gave them my name straight off (knowing I had a warrant for an upaid skating ticket)--they asked me to step into the van. Yeah, no problem. Saw that I had a prior for the possesion charge and asked, "Any drugs in the back pack?"

I say, "No, I'm not really into that kind of thing anymore." They laugh and leave it at that. No hassels. They take me to my bank to get the money for the fine, then take me to the station downtown to pay it. All the while we talk about two subjects: the legalization of pot (so they could spend their time in better ways), and the lack of a skatepark in the city. After I paid the fine they let me go on my merry way, and we all bid one and other a friendly "have a good one, eh."

Simple. Easy. No attitude.

Yes, all the cops simply loathe dealing with people (some vague group, yes?) like me...
 
 
Madman in the ruins.
18:30 / 21.06.04
Wee story for ya.

Cops scrwe other cops over.

A few weeks ago I cet a call out to inspect a machine, for a Policemans daughter. Turns out its not worth reparing.

Few days later she stops me in the street saying her Dad found her one on some kind of Police message baord. He brough the machine for her from another daughter of a Cop.

I go round to give it a safety inspection. The Seller had lied about the age and condition of the machine. Once again I ad to expliain that this machine was also a no goer.

Cops screwing over the genral public is in a way understandable. Cops screwing other cops over. The mind Boggles.

Not to mention the CID Seargant who was on his way to a Murder scene and was done for speeding by a Traffic cop.
 
 
The Natural Way
22:43 / 21.06.04
I've got both good and bad memories of the police.

When I was 8ish a policeman broke up the beginnings of a rather nasty fight between my Mum and a slightly psychotic taxi driver.

Later, in my teens, I was stopped and searched numerous times. My house was watched. My mate's cars were stopped. Sometimes the police were downright intimidating....when they really didn't have to be.

Now: police are generally pretty polite to me these days. Seem nice enough.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
23:30 / 21.06.04
My favourite two police stories...

ONE: which I've recounted here many a time, so I'll cut to the chase. Basically, I'd been a victim of "friendly fire" at a Reclaim The Streets which WENT BAD (Oh, if only Greg Evigan had been there. I could be a star, y'know) and after an afternoon of running battles with cops, being pissed and covered with blood from a gushing head wound (and yes, it DOES bleed a lot... strangely enough, you don't care as long as you're shitfaced) finally realised I may need treatment. So I went up to the two (non-Dredd Squad) cops who were sat there taking notes, and Christ knows what came over me, but I went up to them covered in blood and barely able to stand, and said, as politely as I could muster: "I'd like to make a complaint". They looked all excited- I'm guessing they were PCA or something (hence the notebooks), and said "What? What is it?"
They got really fucked off at me when I said "Some cunt's horse has shat all the way down Charing Cross Road, and that's just not fucking hygienic, is it?"
(To their credit, they said "Um... yes, but you may not want to repeat that to the guys with the sticks". I took their advice. Epilogue- I DID end up spending the night in hospital. The most embarrassing injury EVER.)

The other has a slightly more tragic note. Myself and a couple of friends had gone to see a secreening of the KLF's "burning a million quid" film in a pub in the East End. Far too many people turned up, the cops turned up and booted everyone out of the downstairs bit (where they were showing the film). The cool thing about that was... no-one disconnected the beer taps, so we got MUCH free booze in the confusion.
Anyhoo, the shenanigans proceeded upstairs and outside (nothing nasty, just lots and lots of drunk people and Gimpo in a hat. I SPOKE TO GIMPO!!! I was so not worthy.) and a guy over the road got busted for something (Drunk & disorderly or the like). Another guy who was there with a camera was taking photos of the guy getting busted- so they bundled HIM into the meatwagon as well, at which point everyone got a bit arsey.
While the cops were being a little nasty, they weren't being that bad, really. (Other than to the people they'd arrested for no reason).
I, being pissed, decided to start swearing at the fuckers. A couple of 'em threatened me, but one looked genuinely hurt, and said "I'm just doing my job". To which, being a drunken early-20s twat, I replied "Ah! THAT's what they said at Nuremberg!" Now he looked REALLY hurt, and was all "it really upsets me when people call us Nazis". Conversation ensued, and we ended up having quite a nice chat. He then told us which cop-shop they were taking the guy with the camera to so we could go and lodge a complaint.

We got there. WRONG PLACE. We'd just started ranting among ourselves about how the "nice" cop had led us a merry dance... when that self-same cop came in the door and asked about the same guy. Because everyone else had told HIM that was where he was taken. He saw us, and was really apologetic.

Thus began the Great East End Police Station Crawl, which somehow ended without either myself or my friends getting busted. And that cop was cool. I bet his career was short-lived, however.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
23:41 / 21.06.04
Oh, and a friend of mine had a suspended sentence for "assaulting a police officer" which he hadn't actually done... I think he was more fucked off about the fact that he hadn't done it than the fact he had to go to court for it.

And another friend of mine (from years ago- and I hadn't seen him for years when this happened, so don't judge me, fuckers) actually got done under the Prevention of Terrorism Act for driving around with a truck full of explosives. This was no miscarriage of justice- he WAS actually going to blow up a meat packing plant for the ALF. He got off on a technicality despite having admitted (on telly and everything! fair enough, it was TSW, so it doesn't really count) his guilt.
Thinking about it, he was always a bit weird...
 
 
Mazarine
01:37 / 22.06.04
Well- I'm in a play, right? And I'm also one of the only ones who owns a sword. So we're rehearsing in a classroom in one school building, the back door of which faces a parking lot on the other side of a street where I was parked. I went to the parking lot, grabbed one of the three swords (all never sharpened, one just a fencing foil) in the trunk of my car and make my way back across the street to the building we're rehearsing.

By the time I make it up to the third floor of the building and leave the stairwell, I hear a voice say "Excuse me?"

I turn around. It's one of the friendly campus policemen with his hand on his gun (still holstered). "Can I have that please?" he asks. So I very very slowly set the sword on the ground and take a step away from it. He then picks it up, and we have a little conversation about toting around pointy objects.

This is how I found out that having anything that resembles a weapon on state property is illegal in New York. I was asked to sit in the room with the lines on the wall to measure your height for a while, but never actually arrested or charged. The officer did mention that he'd maintained enough distance between us so that he could shoot me if he had to, which was a little creepy. But all in all, it was a misunderstanding, and no one really overreacted. I didn't flip out (okay, I did after it was all over because I was worried I was going to be expelled, but I'm a sissy that way), the cop didn't flip out, and everything turned out okay.
 
  

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