Donna Ferentes
jubliado
They could presumably say it wasn't true though?
Met Police accused of waterboarding
- Thread starter Badger Kitten
- Start date
They could presumably say it wasn't true though?
Fedayn
Well-Known Member
Such 'niceties' didn't stop them issuing numerous denials in aftermath of the death of Ian Tomlinson funnily enough.
Not really. There's no specific law or rule, but they avoid anything which would pre-judge the outcome of an investigation. There is absolutely no way any organisation can say that an allegation made against one of it's members is untrue until they have investigated.
Indeed (although that statement was issued on the basis of confirmation from a witness that police were not involved with him immediately before he collapsed (which they weren't) and it included the fact that the case had been referred to the IPCC for a wider investigation (which it had) and in that case the media were jumping up and down demanding something and there was a need to fill the vacuum with what was known to avoid rumours getting out of control which could have had major impacts in further disorder).
So not pre-judging investigations is a generally good thing.
Fedayn
Well-Known Member
I would agree on the latter point, however, such niceties didn't stop the original denials by the police, who went further and told blatant untruths, from being made. The intent of these 'denials' was clear, ie to shift blame away from them when in reality they had no evidence that what they were saying was correct.
Badger Kitten
oof
Well done the whistleblowing cop anyway.
Thread title says 'accused of waterboarding', following early headlines, and there is a discussion about whether it is heads in buckets or properwaterboarding on page 2, with heads in buckets being put forward as more likely and further linsk to media which have this detail.
Thread title says 'accused of waterboarding', following early headlines, and there is a discussion about whether it is heads in buckets or properwaterboarding on page 2, with heads in buckets being put forward as more likely and further linsk to media which have this detail.
8den
No I'm pretty sure that was 8ball...
Like say the claims Jean Charlies De Mendes, was wearing a heavy coat, jumped the turnstyle, and had cocaine in his bloodstream?
King Biscuit Time
Well-Known Member
SpookyFrank
Don't swallow the cap
Hence the charges against the alleged victims being dropped...
SpookyFrank
Don't swallow the cap
I'd say that it's the attempt to create the sensation of drowning, together with the extreme pain and lasting distress this can cause, which is more important than the methodology used in so doing. Maybe sticking someone's head in a bucket of water is a tad less sophisticated than the full CIA special, but the intention is exactly the same.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
That's not idealism at all, it's exactly the kind of blinkered pro-establishment bias one could expect from someone of Denning's ilk. Idealism would presuppose that Denning wanted or believed something outwith the "establishment" status quo. He didn't.
Donna Ferentes
jubliado
Different sort of idealism, surely? Denning certainly had ideals, though perhaps not ones you or I might agree with.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Das Uberdog
remembers the alamo
An ideal is an aspiration, not a pre-programmed response.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I suppose so.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I'm sure we can agree that Denning aspired to maintain the hegemony of his peers over the hoi-polloi?
Azrael
circling Airstrip One
What I'd say. Idealism in the sense I used it is treating the world as you'd like it to be, rather than how it is. The content of the belief can be anything. Denning could have been pro-Establishment while accepting that establishment is flawed and police malpractice is inevitable. Instead he deluded himself on an epic scale.
Exactly. Waterboarding is about simulating drowning. Holding a prisoner's head in a bucket of water might, as you say, be less sophisticated, but the underlying purpose is the same.
I went to a gig in Islington in the late 90's. Next thing i knew, for no discernable reason 3 loads of riot cops turned up. I was too pissed to remember what happened exactly but one of them crawled alongside 4 of us all the way to the tube station. We hadn't done anything wrong, just looked 'different'
It isn't. That is your opinion. It is not mine and it is not borne out by the actual press releases made (as opposed to the reporting of those press reports or the allegations made in relation to them). But I doubt you will ever accept that so it's pointless pursuing this point.
It now appears the police referral to the IPCC referred to "waterboarding" but the context on that reference has not been made public so far as I have seen, so it will be interesting to see exactly what the allegations turn out to be when the details are eventually released. Whatever it is, if substantiated it sounds like someone is going to end up getting charged with something pretty serious!
Please link to the police press releases, or official police statements, to that effect ...
The simple reality is that the pre-PACE system only worked because the police bent the rules to amke sure there was sufficient evidence to convict people ("verbals", planting bits of evidence, etc.). EVERYONE involved with the criminal justice system knew it and connived in it as they knew the system only worked because of it. Defence lawyers and judges went through the motions of challenging the bent bits but all a bit half-heartedly. The police went through ritual denials and everyone moved on. Occasionally something went wrong and (usually) some copper was hung out to dry in a particular case and it was portrayed as something of a one-off ... and then everything went back to normal.
All this changed with PACE. Suddenly there were limits on detention times, lawyers in interviews, etc. Tape recorded interviews came in at the same time, so the crafted confessions / part-confessions in contemporaneous notes went. Lay visitors were introduced and suddenly cells could be randomly visited at any time by a citizens panel. In the space of a couple of years everything changed. Convictions plummeted and the incompetence of the system became plain for everyone to see.
Since then there have been loads of changes made to try and redress the balance. The police have changed their investigative methods to comply with the law and do their best within the rules (investigative interview (PEACE) training, for instance) but even that alone was not enough and changes to the law have followed (e.g. allowing inferences to be drawn from silence) and it's probably just about workable again now ... but it's taken over twenty years!
Yeah, right.
There was, of course, absolutely no way that (a) they had recognised that you were "too pissed" to know what you were doing exactly and, hence, worth keeping a bit of an eye on to make sure nothing kicked off and (b) they decided they could have arrested you for being "too pissed", but decided instead to let you make your way home so long as you didn't kick anything off ...
Azrael
circling Airstrip One
Depends which pre-PACE system you're talking about. It appears that safeguards for suspects were quietly watered down after the Second World War -- especially by Lord Denning's 1965 decision Dallison v Caffey, which introduced "investigative detention" (not called that of course) without any new safeguards. Add in judges turning a blind eye to abuses and you have a recipe for disaster. Since the legal burdens of the pre-PACE system were much lower, the police could easily have worked within the law. Without proper oversight, it seemed many chose to cut corners. It would surprise only that old booby Denning.
Idealistic waffle from Denning's decision: When a constable has taken into custody a person reasonably suspected of felony, he can do what is reasonable to investigate the matter, and to see whether the suspicions are supported or not by further evidence. He can, for instance, take the person suspected to his own house to see whether any of the stolen property is there; else it may be removed and the valuable evidence lost. He can take the suspect to the place where he says he was working, for there he may find persons to confirm or refute the alibi. The constable can put him up on an identification parade to see if he is picked out by the witness. So long as such measures are taken reasonably, they are an important adjunct to the administration of justice. By which I mean, of course, justice not only to the man himself but also for the community at large.
Denning seems to have had in mind jolly consensual arrangements with George Dixon, not Gene Hunt. The more I learn of him, the more I'm convinced he lived in a fantasy world.
Since police in other parts have to allow lawyers to sit in alongside a full right to silence, Michael Howard's own royal commission said it should be kept, and conviction rates have did not rise significantly with its end, I don't think its abolition rebalanced anything. (Even if convictions did rise, how do we know they're safe?) If rules are so cumbersome ancient safeguards have to be destroyed to make them function, replace the rules, not the safeguards.
Meltingpot
Living in our pools we soon forget about the sea
Thanks for this post, very interesting. I read Bruce Reynolds's book about the Great Train Robbery a while back, and he made a claim that's never been repeated anywhere else; that the evidence they were convicted on - right down to the fingerprints at the farm they were hiding out at and the receipts - had all been faked, and that the gang had in fact been very careful not to leave incriminating evidence.
The odd thing is that with hindsight he doesn't really blame the detective in charge (Tommy Butler). He ends up calling him an "honourable detective" who "took short cuts he regarded as legitimate."
I have an interest in the Train because it's the first news story I can actually remember in my life, from 1963.
I'm not that old ... if you go back far enough a defendant could not give evidence in their own trial, even if they wanted to ... would you go back to that?
That's absolutely, totally, not at all "odd"! It is a concise summary of the situation (when I said everyone knew what went on, that included the defendants!).
You could precis many an exchange between old lag and detective as:
"You're bang to rights, me old china. May as well put your hand up, eh?"
"No way, copper. I know I did it and you know I did it, but you'll never prove it in a million years." (knowing, for instance, that they had carefully cleaned the farmhouse ...)
"Watch me ..."
JHE
.
Are you sure you were a police officer and not just an extra in an Ealing Comedy?
Azrael
circling Airstrip One
Even I'm not that much of a reactionary.
The Criminal Evidence Act, 1898, was introduced amidst much consensus and after unsworn testimony had been tried and found successful. It didn't remove any rights. I'm just saying a false choice is often presented between PACE and scenes from In the Name of the Father, or at least Life on Mars.Similar threads
