Schoolgirl, 12, questioned by police for trying on nail polish (hey. she was wrong but)

 

oh ...  and a final thought here.  Three cops?  three?  When the powers that be are saying they don’t have enuff in their budgets for more cops on the beat?

Hey ministers and other blood suckers of the public purse.  Cancel the 2012 olympics ... save that 12 BILLION pounds and growing, and get more cops on the streets.  And stop this damn taxpayer support of illegal immigrants and the list can go on forever.

1. I guess the kid didn’t have £2 to pay for the polish?

   Posted by Drew458       07/18/2008  at  12:58 PM  



2. I can tell you from experience, that sometimes, the individual cop has no choice but to do what these guys did.  I used to be a police officer and I can’t even begin to tell you the number of times I went on calls of just this type, where the theft amounted to no more than a couple of bucks.  The store makes the call on whether to prosecute or not.  This store obviously wanted to press charges or they would not have called the police to begin with and would have merely scared the girl.  However, you can blame the lawyers on the stores no longer being lenient.  You see, if the store detains a suspect, which is allowed by law under the shopkeeper’s privilege, and then just lets them go.  You can bet that a many number of times, that suspect initiates a lawsuit for the detention and brings all kinds of allegations against the store.  As you can imagine, these allegations are usually false, but in today’s litigious society, it happens way too frequently.  So, the old days of the store scaring the youngsters and letting them go in order to send a message are long gone.  In order to cover their ass, they call the police.  They have to if they want to have a decent defense against the BS lawsuit that may follow.  Now, when the cop shows up, he can NOT tell the store to NOT prosecute.  I have suggested on several occasions that the store no press charges, but that is all I can do.  I ask one time, and if they say they want to, I file the paperwork.  If I tell a store I am not going to file charges on their behalf, you can bet they will be calling my supervisor and I get a nice letter in my file saying “bad cop”.  This letter will affect my next review and hence my next raise.  Too many letters and I lose my job.  Better to make the arrest and file the charges.  Basically, everyone is covering thier own ass.  The store no longer wants the liability of detaining a person.  However, if a store gets a reputation of not filing, the cops will quit responding to shoplifting calls.  Also, the word gets out and shoplifting incidences increase dramatically.  So, the store calls the cops.  The individual cop makes the arrest and files the charges and submits it to his superiors.  The police department files these charges with the state attorney’s office so that it covers its ass.  The state attorney decides ultimately what to do.  We have only society to blame.  Because on at least several occasions in the past, a store was successfully sued and had to give money to a shoplifter all based on BS allegations of improper detention, blah blah blah (Don’t laugh..it happens way too often.) The store is in essence punished for going lightly on the shoplifter.  And because 6 jurors (made up of the public) decided that evil rich store ought to give money to poor misunderstood shoplifter.  If police don’t file charges that the victim’s tell them they want filed, there will be a public outrage.  It’s nto the police’s decision, it’s the stores.  It’s much easier to CYA all the way up the chain and let the big shots make the calls.  Another thing to understand is that if a store does call the police and then the store decides not to press charges, and makes a continuous habit of this, the police will eventually quit responding to shoplifting calls at that store.  The police aren’t going to continue wasting hundreds of man hours every year on a store that will not prosecute.  If the store wants a uniformed person involved, hire mall security.  The police are not in the business of being a security guard at the local five and dime.  It is all very sad, I agree.  But no one person, one cop, or one store has made this today’s policy.  And you really can’t blame the lawyers either.  As long as society protects wrongdoers and adds insult to injury and takes money from the store (who was the original victim) and gives it to the original wrongdoer, things will not change.  So, they call the cops, shoplifter gets arrested, charges get filed.  It doesn’t matter if its a 14 year old girl with a drop of nail polish or a 40 year old habitual criminal stealing a big screen TV.

   Posted by sdkar       07/18/2008  at  03:57 PM  



3. On the note of the girl herself, the problem here is that there are stores that DO allow people to do exactly what this girl did.  Having worked at some of them, I can tell you that from experience.  Now, granted, she should have asked beforehand, but at the age of 12, she most likely wasn’t QUITE at the point where she would have known to do so without someone telling her to.  That, of course, points to the parents.

   Posted by Josh C.       07/19/2008  at  10:31 AM  



4. 3 officers really is not too much.  A single male officer with an underage female prisoner.  OUCH.  The allegations are just waiting to attach to somebody.  The protocol on something like this is to have a backup officer (aka witness).  This is actually true for all minors...not just females.  Kids love to make up stories when they get mad at grownups.  (I can vouch for this personally).  If transporting, the moment you put youth in your car, you call dispatch, and log the exact time and the mileage of your vehicle. You get to destination (juvie hall, school, parents house, police dept.) ASAP, but without speeding lest you scare and traumatize said youth.  The second you get to your destination, you again call dispatch and log your time and mileage again.  I can tell you that the #2 complaint against officers is from minors making insane accusations, of course which all have to be investigated and taken seriously.  Anyone want to guess the #1 complainers?  Think white male officer. 

   Like I said...it’s all CYA.  While many of the things police do seem insane, you have to remember, the police dept. is a government agency.  Why do you think there are so many problems.  It’s almost impossible to be a normal rational person, work as a police officer, and go for 20 - 25 years of a police career and not get sucked in to the government machine of bloated, CYA BS and bureaucracy.  I think cops are like politicians to a degree.  We go in with motivation to make the world better and a pure heart.  It doesn’t take long to realize you have to play the game, all the while slowly turning into a cynic.  You realize no matter how hard you try, some things are inevitable.  You have very little impact and you realize that in order to not just get ahead, but to stay employed, you do what you are told.  I am sure whe have all seen the movies where the maverick cop bucks the system and gets the bad guy without ever doing what his supervisors tell him to.  I’m sure we’ve all seen Dirty Harry, Lethal Weapon, Starsky & Hutch, etc.  The truth is you would not stay a cop very long if you acted anywhere near like the subordination they show.  How about Smokin Aces with Ryan Reynolds?  It was a noble ending, but in the real world, he wouldn’t be able to get a job as unarmed night watchman at the local swap meet, nevertheless ever hope to carry a badge. 

   Sorry to get way to elaborate for a simple story.  It’s just that everyone is quick to blame the police for so much, when what most people don’t realize is that society has forced them to act this way.  The rules and regulations confounded by the public along with so many lawyers, Monday morning quarterbacking.  Cops are the guys you see on the “front line” so to speak, but we are puppets of a greater master.  Don’t blame us...blame the guys pulling the strings.  Another thing to bear in mind...the puppet masters will not hesitate for a second to cut those strings in a moment if the puppet doesn’t do as it is told.  Cops have to walk a fine line with the public (and their never ending scrutiny) on one side, and the real people who are in charge on the other side.  We used to joke that we needed bullet proof vests with ballistic plates in the front and knife protection in the rear. 

   So, three cops on scene for a 12 year old gir?  That is the minimum. 

   Sorry to get on a diatribe...but it strike a nerve.

   Posted by sdkar       07/19/2008  at  11:36 PM  

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