Last year we had one hell of a kerfuffle over #CrimeStats, they were, quite rightly, shown up by James Patrick for exactly what they are and what they’re worth – Nada.
Any Police Officer or ex Police Officer who chooses to be honest would tell you that at the very least the figures are ‘massaged’ and in the worst case scenarios outright fiddled. I’m absolutely certain that the degree varies from Force to Force, and they may each have their own unique reasons for cooking the books, but I’m equally certain that it’s a universal problem and I’m not convinced it’s properly mended yet.
#CrimeStats are not the only controversial set of figures however. How about Unemployment levels? How ‘fixed’ are they?
For absolutely decades we have seen “Unemployment is down” only for a corresponding increase in the number of sick and incapacitated. There wouldn’t be a connection surely? The government wouldn’t be that cynical would they.
Then DWP decide they want to get people ‘back to work’ off the sick, and Unemployment rises again, but still no connection between the two you understand.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m in no way in favour of fiddling the #CrimeStats, I’ve long since advocated publishing the true figures, good, bad or indifferent, and deal with what comes out. This is also true of Unemployment, Sickness and Incapacity etc. People should not be shuffled off one list onto another to suit the Policy of the Day, but whichever list they happen to be is presumably where they properly belong and steps should be taken within that context to get them back to work if possible, not onto somebody else’s list.
So, if anybody is listening and not too busy banging the table to welcome Mr Camoron into the room (how very childish) (that’s one tradition he doesn’t mind observing but can’t bring himself to thank the Police after the Election) I call the government to get THEIR house into order. The Police are trying to sort the nightmare that is #CrimeStats out and get some accurate figures out, and until they do, we don’t really know whether crime is up or down, I’ve yet to find an accurate method of measuring Unreported Crime. Let the government finally publish ACCURATE figures on Unemployment etc which don’t swing backwards and forwards on a whim.
For months and even years now, ex PC James Patrick fought the law, and the law won. Whistleblower Extraordinaire, he exposed an undeniable truth, that CrimeStats were being routinely fiddled by a variety of people within the Met, and for a variety of different reasons, no doubt. Undeniable because 100s and thousands of us KNEW that he was telling the truth because we have lived through it, it was the ‘norm’.
At the end of the day it cost him his livelihood, it cost him his tranquillity, it cost him (in a manner of speaking) his reputation, because he now has a Disciplinary Finding of Guilt, which won’t exactly act as a reference if he ever decided that he wanted to rejoin the Police Service. In all the ways that matter, though, it has enhanced his personal and professional reputation immensely.
So, after a while Parliament conducted and enquiry/investigation into #CrimeStatsGate which culminated in yesterday’s news headline criticising the Met for its treatment of James. Bernard Jenkin MP told parliament ex-Met PC James Patrick was the victim of “monstrous injustice” and was “hounded” from his job.. Quite strong words really, don’t you think? Just because they are uttered with the benefit of Parliamentary Privilege doesn’t make them any less true.
“Mr Patrick had said crime figures had been manipulated and sexual offences were under-reported by 22-25%.” Errrrmm and how much have reports of Sexual Offences gone up by now? Surely there can’t be a connection? Can there?
To illustrate the enormity of James’ actions I will reproduce a selection of verbatim quotes from the transcript of PASC’s meeting yesterday;
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con): Although I am now a proud member of the Public Administration Committee, I was not a member when the report was done. Does my hon. Friend agree that PC James Patrick’s actions were both courageous and in the public interest, and that he has done a great service to this country in ensuring that this matter is highlighted, as the Committee has done?
Mr Jenkin: My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is worth emphasising that under the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998, PC Patrick should have been afforded some protection. I will come to the position of whistleblowers later in my remarks………………………………….We found strong evidence that the police have under-recorded crime, particularly sexual crime such as rape, in many police areas. There remain wide disparities in no-crime rates—that is, where police decide that a crime did not take place—following reports of rape, for example. In January 2014, Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary, on behalf of the Rape Monitoring Group, released a compendium of statistics on recorded rapes in each force over the previous five years. I invite right hon. and hon. Friends and colleagues to look at the table showing how wide the variation is among different forces across England and Wales in their no-criming of rape. According to the figures, in Lincolnshire, for example, 26% of all reported rapes were no crimed in 2012-13; by contrast, in Merseyside, only 4% were. The national average was 11.9%…………………………….The main reason for misrecording was the continued prevalence of numerical targets. ………………
Our official police witnesses, most notably the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, were somewhat defensive and seemed unready to acknowledge that their statistics were inherently flawed. Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe told us that the accuracy of data on rape and sexual offences was
“a lot better than it was, if we took it back five to 10 years.” [Well that’s alright then]……………..
even the Metropolitan Police Commissioner agrees that
“there is clearly something that PC Patrick raises that we need to get to the bottom of.”
Despite that, I can only describe the treatment of my constituent James Patrick as shameful. By doing his duty and raising the issues, he showed the highest commitment to the core policing values, but as a result he became the victim of the most monstrous injustice. He was in effect hounded out of his job, following a long period of harassment by the Metropolitan police command chain, which, I dare say, used and abused the disciplinary process to get rid of him. It does the police no credit that a whistleblower should be treated in such a way. He was, for example, accused of a conflict of interest for publishing a book about the misuse of police recorded crime statistics, even though the proceeds were paid to a police charity. In an LBC radio programme in December last year, Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe said that he would meet PC Patrick. He never did so.
There is much, much more in the PASC document, but I think the above will suffice. I had never encountered Bernard Jenkin before James’ problems, but in the limited contact I have had with him he strikes me as being one of a rare breed, a decent and honourable politician. I just hope that I am not proved wrong.
So, Dear Reader, if you’re still with me at this point, just how despicable was James’ treatment at the hands of the Met? You decide.
This should make you smile James:- A new entry in Oxford English Dictionary perhaps; INTEGRITY – James Patrick, The quality of being honest and having strong moralprinciples:
Who Would be a Whistleblower? Not many, it takes a particular type of person.
Who would be a Whistleblower in the Met? Not very many at all, and after the recent shenanigans I would be entirely surprised if anybody at all within the Met thought it it was worth the risk and aggravation.
After James Patrick’s stirling efforts in exposing the sham that is called Crime Statistics (amongst other things) the end result was that he felt that he had no other alternatives, so he resigned. Baroness Jenny Jones asked Boris and The Met questions about their Whitsleblowing policies, all of which were met with wishy washy (if any) answers. Requests to the Met under the Freedom of Information Act were either refused or responded to with confusing and contradictory answers.
Then Jenny Jones asked Deputy Commissioner Craig Mackey if he could provide ONE single example of a Whistleblower in the Met feeling that it had been a ‘positive experience’. Not one single person who exposed wrongdoing does not feel their career was negatively impacted or that they were treated fairly despite 1,121 reports being made through its internal reporting system ‘Rightline’ in the last four years. NOT ONE out of over 1,100 cases.
That is a damning indictment of the Met and its Management.
The Metropolitan Police is quite clearly more concerned about its image than it is with being loyal to its officers and staff, particularly those 1,121 people who put their heads above the parapet.
Craig Mackey, told the Assembly’s Police and Crime Committee that rewarding whistleblowers “is to effectively inculcate them and to provide some support around them in terms of the process around it.” Well that all sounds a bit pink and fluffy to me. Thick old me didn’t have a clue what ‘inculcate’ meant so I went away and looked it up. The Oxford Dictionary defines it thus ;”Instil (an idea, attitude, or habit) by persistent instruction:“, so there you have it.
So, I ask you again, “Who would want to be a Whistleblower in the Met?”
Come to think of it, can anyone provide me with a single example where anyone in the Police Service ANYWHERE has had a ‘positive experience’ whistleblowing?
Can anyone provide me with a single experience of anybody in the Public Sector (NHS, Local Govt etc etc) that has had a ‘positive experience?
I’m here all week to take our replies, I thank you.
Balance of probabilities is the standard of proof required in all civil cases (and Disciplinary Hearings). It basically means that to win you need to convince the judge/Chairperson that your case is 51% likely to be true. i.e. your story only has to be slightly more plausible than the other side’s story.
This can be contrasted with a criminal case where the standard is beyond reasonable doubt, which is very near to 100% certainty before the defendant can be found guilty.
What the hell is he blathering on about? I hear you ask.
Well he’s blathering on about Ex PC James Patrick’s series of ‘Cathartic Blogs’. James has had a bit of ‘Unfinished Business’ and he’s now taken the opportunity to dump all that baggage, free himself from the shackles, and hopefully move on, rebuilding the lives of himself and his family.
But allow me to be mischievous for a minute and take a peek at James’ blogs;
The first one was
Withholding Evidence From Parliament
In this blog James alleges that a Senior Police Officer Suppressed Evidence On Crime Figures The Commander of the Directorate of Professional Standards refused permission to present Parliament with evidence of the manipulation of police statistics. Commander Gibson apparently refused James’ request to appear before the Home Affairs Select Committee to provide evidence of ‘number fudging’. Why was that do you think?
Next we have
Use of Temperature in Interviews
in which James relates how Met Police Using Degrading Interview Techniques: The Directorate of Professional Standards are using high temperatures and dishonesty to pressurise police officers under investigation.
“In an interview room on the 21st floor, adjacent to the entrance of the male changing rooms, me and my Federation Representative found ourselves in a box room, where the temperature exceeded 28 degrees.” “The interviewing officers, a Constable and Sergeant from the Directorate of Professional Standards told me that there was a “heating fault which had been reported”, ” There is a witness to this, the Federation Representative.
“Later in the year, a family member made a Freedom of Information Act request to the Met police, asking what heating faults had been reported and resolved in that room, a month either side of my interview. The Met responded, after an internal review – first having missed the statutory deadline for reply – stating that no heating faults had been reported or recorded during the entire period. This was confirmed a second time, to my legal representatives, in December 2013.”
I have read the relevant Freedom of Information request, and the Met’s response. James’ account is accurate, they recorded no heating fault despite the assurances of the DPS officers conducting the interview.
#3 goes like this
Deliberately Witheld Disclosure
Police Whistleblower Accused Of Fraud After Discovering Witheld Documents:
Written records of management meetings, which the Met denied had taken place, were discovered and spurious accusations of dishonesty were made by officers involved after the alarm was raised. The events contained within this blog just left me speechless, a rare occurrence I can assure you. Did James offer to repay the money at the first opportunity having been asked so to do. Yes!! Did he commit any wilful, dishonest act in order to bring about this over-payment? Seemingly not.
#4
‘Pissing Off’ Superiors
Police Officer Put ‘Noses Out Of Joint’ By Exposing Sham Crime Figures: Crime statistics whistleblower went to Parliament after a meeting in Scotland Yard in which he was told that he risked ‘pissing off’ superiors by continuing to report his concerns about the recording of sexual offences. So James risked pissing off ‘superiors’ by exposing the truth? How does that work then? Surely these so-called ‘superiors’ should be big enough and ugly enough to survive the TRUTH? Wouldn’t you think?
#5
Procurement Fraud
Metropolitan Police Covered Up Smartwater Procurement Fraud: Scotland Yard breached its own procurement procedures yet found itself innocent, while senior officers delivered briefings saying they were covering up potential offences by the force. With James’ consent I have discussed this with a retired Auditor of some note. He/She more or less agrees with James’ take on the situation and points out that at the very least there is a clear Conflict of Interests, and that it is not the first time that the Met has had similar issues.
Finally;
Conflict and Intimidation
Met Police Used Scare Tactics Against Whistleblower And Family: After he had given evidence to a Parliamentary Select Committee about the manipulation of police crime figures, uniformed officers were sent to the family home to ‘rattle their cages’. Having lodged grievances against one or more members of the DPS staff, James received this text one day“Can you let me know whether you are both ok and that you have received the email I sent you? James R and I have both tried to call you but got no reply. Simon Laurence has asked me to set up a welfare check to your home address if I don’t hear from you shortly”.
“The Met requested that Essex officers attended my home, stating that they had tried to contact me several times, and were concerned about my welfare as there had been ‘developments’ in my working arrangements which may ‘have caused him some distress’. Uniformed officers, in a marked police vehicle, attended my home at quarter to nine in the evening, while my wife and I were watching television and our children were asleep upstairs”.
My reaction to this is short and blunt. Please fill the Comments section below with any other instances where an officer facing Disciplinary Proceedings has been ‘fortunate’ enough to receive a Welfare Visit at his Home Address from a neighbouring Force at 9 o’clock in the evening? Plenty of space available, fill your boots.
So, on the Balance of Probabilities, have the Met been Bang Out Of Order? Have they pursued a Disciplinary matter diligently, or have they tried to use their power and might to wield the sledgehammer that would crack the walnut? Don’t forget, Balance of Probabilities, not Beyond A reasonable Doubt.
I find the case proved and order that the Met pays ex PC James Patrick substantial financial compensation.
I almost never have any time for Richard Littlejohn, so this is probably a first for me, and maybe for you.This is an old article from the Daily Fail dating back to December 2012, prophetic in parts, and probably not too inaccurate.
If you really must read the whole article you can find it here, but the potted highlights include:-
“Of course it was ‘disproportionate’. [The arrest of a Police Officer under #Plebgate] Disproportionate is what Hyphen-Howe does these days, ever since he became Commissioner.”
“On Merseyside, he was the ‘Hail Fellow Well Met’ chief constable, always happy to share a drink and a meal with reporters. After arriving at the Yard, he now sees himself as a true and perfect knight in shining riot gear”
“Seasoned crime correspondents have received menacing phone calls from anti-corruption officers demanding to know where they got their information. The Met even used the Official Secrets Act in an attempt to force a Guardian reporter to disclose her sources.”
“Within the Yard, officers speak of a reign of terror as the professional standards unit, under Deputy Assistant Commissioner Pat Gallan…….”
“Gallan is a ferociously ambitious, former Merseyside colleague of Hyphen-Howe, said to fancy her chances of becoming the first black, female Met Commissioner. The aim is to stop any information getting out, except through rigorously controlled official channels.”
“A Met constable, PC James Patrick, [December 2012 don’t forget] is also being investigated for gross misconduct for criticising police practice and reforms in a book based on his Twitter postings.
Compare and contrast his treatment with the book published by bent copper Ali Dizaei, which was serialised in The Times and featured as Radio 4’s Book Of The Week. [Book of the Week? FFS]
Far from being disciplined, Dizaei was subsequently promoted, even though his book was fiercely critical of the Met and he was forced to pay libel damages to two senior officers.”
I apologise for the lazy copy/paste style blog but on this occasion Littlejohn says everything that we’ve been saying, so why paraphrase it?
Littlejohn has encapsulated everything that is wrong with the Met at the moment. Normally I would actively avoid him and his articles, but on this occasion seems he has been practicing with tea leaves etc.
One thing I will agree on is that the Met and NSY are not happy places to be right now, and, yes, Ali Dizaei could easily have ended up as Commish.
That the Met has lost its way. Never before have I known it to flounder and flap around like a fish out of water as they are at the moment under their current leadership, Sir Bernard Hogan-Who and his team of muppets. Even in the disappointing times under McNee (The Rubber Hammer) they were a more positive organisation than they are today.
Take the case of James Patrick. I’m not going to bore the pants off you by repeating everything, and James is currently waiting his Employment Tribunal, but just look at what’s already in the public domain about his treatment by the Met and the disciplinary matters that have arisen.
He was subject to Gross Misconduct proceedings, a review by an outside Force decreed this constituted no more than Misconduct. A process that hung over his head for 18 months or more was concluded in a hearing lasting no more than 10 minutes, you can read James’ views of this elsewhere.
James decided that be had no alternative but to resign, then whilst serving his ‘notice’ was served with further discipline papers alleging Gross Misconduct once more. James has now the left the Met, as you know, but has the disciplinary process been staid? No it has not. James now runs the risk of facing a disciplinary hearing after his resignation, possibly in his absence, and be added to CoP’s list of Struck-Off officers, with all the consequences of that. This seems to me to be driven by spite and revenge. The Met clearly don’t know how to handle a man like James, but is this any way for an ethical organisation to behave?
Take the case of the TSG6 as highlighted by Tessa Munt MP recently. She was covered by Parliamentary Privilege when she made her revelations but they were absolutely staggering, accusing senior members of the Met of criminal acts, and, once again, highly questionable behaviour by Directorate of Professional Standards officers. You can read the transcript or watch the video elsewhere. Is this any way for an ethical organisation to behave?
Call me picky but I can’t think of a single Freedom of Information request that I have submitted (in relation to James) where the Met has actually told me anything. On at least one occasion I truly believe that the Met has LIED to me.
Another FOI is delayed while they consider the Health and Safety implications of supplying me with a set of Minutes of a meeting.
In relation to another I have asked for a redacted copy of a letter sent to James by DPS. They have refused this request on the grounds of Personal Data. The only Personal Data this letter could contain is someone’s name, i.e. the author of the letter.
This from an organisation that has had a policy for over 10 years that officers will display their first name and surname on their uniform or name badge.
So Personal Data under the terms of the Data Protection Act doesn’t really float does it?
Members of the House of Commons and the House of Lords have expressed their disapproval of James’ treatment at the hands of the Met. Is this any way for an ethical organisation to behave?
The Met briefed Counsel to oppose James at the first hearing of his Employment Tribunal, specifically to oppose Interim Relief, which, if granted, would have ensured a basic income continued up until his ET was settled one way of the other. A few thousand pounds. The Met spends millions on defending actions, paying compensation for something or other. There was a time when the Met would pay up without even questioning what it was for, but thankfully those days are over at least. All in all it has the smell of VINDICTIVE about the whole sorry saga.. Is this the way an ethical organisation should behave?
I find myself with three questions;
Are the Senior Management of the Met and the officers of Directorate of professional Standards so out of control that they can treat their ‘underlings’ in this manner with impunity?
Is this merely blind panic as they find themselves in a situation they don’t know how to deal with and haven’t got the balls to admit it?
What on earth would happen if a PC/PS/DC/DS etc treated a member of the public, or even the criminal fraternity, with such venom and apparently a total lack of regard for Disclosure and the law in general?
It wouldn’t be a pat on the back and a quiet retirement I assure you, but then I’m stating the bleeding obvious again.
If you live and work in the UK, at, say, maybe somewhere like the Met for example, you could be what they like to call a ‘Whistleblower’. You can report wrongdoing, corruption, unacceptable practices, maybe even dodgy #Crimestats to your management, the bosses, those people that have taken the place of Leaders in the Met. In return you can get shafted, publicly maligned, bullied, humiliated, forced to the point of taking your employer to a Tribunal only to be deprived by them of all your income. I have it on good authority that things like that happen occasionally. Allegedly.
Or you could do it the Irish way. No this is not a Paddy joke, bear with me, read on.
Irish barrister Sean Guerin conducted an investigation into claims of corruption and malpractice in the Garda after allegations by Garda Whistleblower Sergeant Maurice McCabe.
The report vindicates Sgt McCabe, but finds that Garda Síochána and former minister for justice Alan Shatter failed in their duties to properly investigate matters raised by Sergeant McCabe.
The report says that a comprehensive commission of investigation is “desirable in the public interest” to ensure “continuing confidence in the institution of An Garda Síochána and the criminal justice system”.
Responding to the report, Taoiseach Enda Kenny said that a root and branch analysis of the policy and practice of the administration of justice in Ireland is now needed. Mr Kenny said the Dail would debate the content of the Guerin report next week and he would welcome the contributions of all members.
“This is not just about politics, it is about getting it right for the people of our country, for the citizens, for the next generation, for everybody to have integrity, belief and faith in the Garda Siochana, in the accountability, in the transparency in the way it is run,” he said.
Sgt McCabe expressed his thanks to Fianna Fail leader Michael Martin for taking on his case and forwarding his file outlining his concerns over garda conduct to Taoiseach Enda Kenny.
Mr Guerin found that the “overall impression given by the internal Garda investigative process was that complaints or matters of concern were put through a process of filtration or distillation so that, by the end of the process, any matter of concern had been removed as a form of impurity, and only what was good was found to remain.” Maybe that sounds familiar to some of you, I don’t know.
How about donating the cost of just ONE drink to the James Patrick Fighting Fund?
Since I started these blogs for fundraising they have been read by over 3,000 people from a couple of dozen countries around the world. Donations have been received from USA, Canada, Switzerland and Africa as well as the UK, but the total number of individual donations is only just over 130. That’s not many out of 3,000 potential donors, plus the total number of serving and former Police Officers.
Not everybody CAN give, I get that. Not everybody still serving feels comfortable, I get that too. But if you CAN give and you haven’t already, please think about giving the cost of your favourite tipple, just once even.
Certain sections of the Press that ran James’s story to sell some papers now look as they may have given up on the story, or maybe there’s just more important news to fill their papers, who knows. The bottom line is that James could do with a barrister in September(ish) to help him slay the dragon Met. Your cup of coffee will definitely help James in his quest, and we know his fight is honourable. Are the Met’s intentions honourable? Are we going to leave him to fall to the flames of the Met’s dragon?
Sir Bernard Hogan-Who hasn’t donated yet, but you can, here.
If you have a Paypal Account it’s easy;
From within your opening screen (after logging in to your account) choose Send Money
Send it to the following email address
justice4pcpatrickAToutlookDOTcom (see what I did there?) (substitute an “@” and a “.” as appropriate)
Enter the amount in GBP you wish to send
Click on “I’m sending money to family or friends” This option should be free of charges unless you pay by Credit Card and the money ends up in exactly the same account as if you had pressed the Donate Button.
A little more complicated and it only works for Paypal account holders but every fee that we can reduce is more for the Fighting Fund
You are both well aware of the total furore that has erupted in past months about the alleged ‘fiddling’ of crime figures.
I am aware Mr Winsor that your HMIC recently published an interim report on the matter and I am in the process of digesting it. To help you with the rest of your report, and to better inform Sir Bernard on how it’s done I thought I’d put together a little montage of genuine ways in which crimes have been ‘distorted’ or ‘misrepresented’ over a large number of years.
It will also help the public to better understand what all the fuss has been about but because the majority of it has been about Rape allegations, but it exists in so many other areas as well.
In no particular order
Criminal Damage (Value under £20) for many years that would have been No Crime’d by Force Policy since the early 70s, but a crime had still been committed (allegedly).
House/Shop/Car window smashed – No Crime, window broken by stone thrown up from passing lorry/bus/car wheel.
Attempted Burglary classified as Criminal Damage. Arguments will rage forever over this one, but we all know it happened.
Post Sentence Visits to convicted felons in prison to ‘Clear Up’ some outstanding crimes. A dubious practice designed solely to influence the Clear Up Rate, I doubt that any outstanding stolen property was ever recovered and restored to the victim.
Bringing prisoners out of prison to the police station cells and driving them round so that they could point out the houses they had burgled. See my previous comments above.
A local prolific burglar for example dies, suddenly he seems to have been credited with a large proportion of the unsolved crimes, shown as Cleared Up. Dubious to say the least.
Theft Person being classified as No Crime, property lost in the street. The nature of ‘Dipping’ is that the victim is frequently unaware of the offence at the time of commission, that is no reason to record it as Property Lost, if there is some credible evidence that it has been stolen then the appropriate classification should be used. However, there are tales such as this “Known Dipping.. CID sent out a memo. We Had to ask the question. If it ‘could’ have have fallen out, the bag was open. report it as Loss in the street! Even though it was at the bottom of a bag”
Now this one’s rapidly becoming a favourite of mine. Theft of a large bird from garden premises, classified as No Crime – bird flew away. It was made of concrete.
Fraud was never properly investigated for years because it was no-one’s priority crime.
I have heard recently of one Attempted Burglary being classified as No Crime because “a trapped, enraged bumblebee caused the damage to the window?”
Assaults with counter allegations were frequently classified as No Crime instead of two or more assaults, even one would have been better.
Assaults where the victim refused to substantiate the allegation even where there was corroborating evidence in the form of CCTV footage. Shouldn’t be No Crime’d. It;’s still a crime, it’s just the victim doesn’t want to go to Court.
Burglaries in bedsits, hotels or offices with multiple victims that all went down as one burglary.
Offences of Criminal Damage by Graffiti were frequently classified No Crime if they could be cleaned off.
A whole road of cars damaged – one Criminal Damage with 24 victims. 24 Crimes same venue?
“Another favourite was number plates stolen…..no they fell off. Both front and back. No crime”
“Kited cheques with obvious intent – No crime, victim referred to bank. And… obvious frauds using cloned cards etc – victim referred to bank.”
“A certain concert venue somewhere in South London where people were never dipped, they just danced so hard that their phones fell out of their pockets/handbags and were lost. No crime”
“I tried reporting Crim Damage. Occupants in lounge, saw group walking past , making a noise and saw one throw a brick to someone on opposite footpath. Over threw and it smashed glass in door. I put it in as crim damage but got memo saying it was an attempt burglary. I tried to argue my corner but crime desk wouldn’t have it. Strange decision.”
“I retired 2 years ago having spent my last 4 years in the Met heading up the XXXX Crime Management Unit. All crime classification change requests came through my team. I have seen all manner of stupidity. The range is incredible. From a DS who became an internet expert on the thermo-dynamics of sealed double glazing units and how a sudden drop in overnight temperature can cause them to shatter! He wanted an attempted burglary no crimed. Unfortunately, the dets already explained how the victim actually disturbed the suspect walking down the shingle path below the window, and found the brick used to smash the window too…..! The other extreme being the self appointed “hate crime champion” for one borough who liked to remove Racial flags (on undetected crimes of course..) on the basis the Mr Ahmed (sic) must have been mistaken in his belief that the only reason he felt he was the victim of race crime was because none of his white neighbours had dog shit continually posted through his front door. Sadly, I have too many stories like these, as well as more about those who were too spineless to respond to official reports of such corrupt practices. Believe me PC Patrick is very brave, but his story merely scratches the surface.”
“I remember a smash and grab at a pet shop where an expensive Macaw parrot was stolen there were no witnesses no CCTV. The D/S on the crime desk wrote it off as No Crime putting it down to the parrot making a successful escape from captivity after the shop front window was broken by, as mentioned earlier on this post a stone thrown up by a passing vehicle!”
Sir Bernard, PC Patrick has given the more analytical version and I have given you actual examples from current or former officers. May be you could explain to the public exactly why you didn’t invite PC Patrick to become part of the solution, and continued to oppress him, eventually instigating further disciplinary matters during his period of Notice?
Mr Winsor, your team have completed the first part of their study, maybe they would like to look for examples such as these when they do the next part.
Mind you Mr Winsor I’m disappointed that you didn’t mention on Radio 4 the other morning that you have already met with Constable Patrick. Gives people the wrong impression.
Maybe, Sir Bernard, you or Mr Winsor would like to contribute to the James Patrick Fighting Fund, if you have a Paypal Account it’s easy;
From within your opening screen (after logging in to your account) choose Send Money
Send it to the following email address
justice4pcpatrickAToutlookDOTcom (see what I did there?) (substitute an “@” and a “.” as appropriate)
Enter the amount in GBP you wish to send
Click on “I’m sending money to family or friends” This option should be free of charges unless you pay by Credit Card and the money ends up in exactly the same account as if you had pressed the Donate Button.
A little more complicated and it only works for Paypal account holders but every fee that we can reduce is more for the Fighting Fund
You will doubtless be aware that Constable James Patrick of the Metropolitan Police Service is less than one week away from his resignation date, having ‘blown the whistle’ on the way Crime Figures have been manipulated, certainly within the Met.
He has been hounded out of a job he loved, and I do mean loved, he was passionate about it, because he told the truth and showed the Met up, exposing their crooked practices.
Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe can say what the hell he pleases, but James was right and I, together with thousands of other retired Met officers, knows he was right. I joined in 1972 and it was common-place then. I can’t speak for your Force, I only have experience of the Met, but trust me everything James said to the Public Administration Select Committee and elsewhere was correct.
To validate James I will be giving examples shortly of the sort of practices went on that Hogan-Who and his senior management claim they know nothing about, even though Lord Stevens no less, acknowledges it.
The purpose of this letter is this. I am fully aware that as serving Police Officers you may well feel that you cannot comment on this case. I understand that.
You probably feel that you cannot openly express any support for James. I understand that too.
I’m not even going to ask you to agree that fiddling the figures goes on your Force.
I’m asking you for 25 PENCE.
James has told me roughly how much his legal fees will be for his Employment Tribunal, about the same as a House of Commons Barrista earns I believe.
But if every serving Constable in England could give at least 25 pence that will cover it. All donations are anonymous. We obviously see the details of who has sent it but those details remain confidential to us. There are only 2 of us involved in raising funds James, I’m retired and the other man has never been a Police Officer, or civvie, so they’ll need a warrant to get anything at all out of us.
You don’t have to make a comment, you don’t have to go public, just quietly click on the link below and donate.
If you check back through my previous blogs you will see that 3 Peers of the Realm have publicly come out in support of James, and Baroness Jenny Jones is even skirmishing with Mayor Boris in an attempt to resolve the latest nonsense.
BREAKING NEWS – I have largely solved the problem of Paypal fees reducing the donations. For people who already have a Paypal Account, are willing to create one, the solution is this.
From within your opening screen (after logging in to your account) choose Send Money
Send it to the following email address
justice4pcpatrickAToutlookDOTcom (see what I did there?)
Enter the amount in GBP you wish to send
Click on “I’m sending money to family or friends” This option should be free of charges unless you pay by Credit Card and the money ends up in exactly the same account as if you had pressed the Donate Button.
A little more complicated and it only works for Paypal account holders but every fee that we can reduce is more for the Fighting Fund
