London Letter 1
LONDON LETTER
Simon McIlwaine
Here in the UK, we have volunteer/auxiliary police officers, known as the Special Constabulary, of which I am proud to be a member in the London Metropolitan police. I am part of a multinational team of volunteers including several South Africans, Poles and many more!
The role is unpaid, but we hope to be richly rewarded in Heaven!
The Special Constabulary is the oldest part of the UK police service and predates the Metropolitan Police.
We share the same powers as regular officers, with the exception that some powers that are reserved to Inspectors and upwards can only be exercised by substantive senior officers in those ranks.
We have opportunities to deploy in neighbourhood patrols of course but can specialise in level 2 public order, Emergency Response (which in SA would be the equivalent of Flying Squad) and even computer crime. There is something for everyone, though many older officers like grassroots community police work with Safer Neighbourhoods and Town Centre Teams.
As ever, there is much humour to be found, and I will share a recent experience of mine (changing names and locations for privacy).
About 5 weeks ago I was on a live facial recognition operation looking for wanted missing / failure to attend suspects; I was with Bob, ex SAPS from Cape Town and a good guy whom I work with a lot.
Up comes a BEEP BEEP with a wanted missing, failure to attend for breach of non-molestation order.
There is our man’s pic. We pull him aside and establish who he is, and I then arrest him, cuff him, caution, give the necessity grounds etc, as I search him under s32 of our Police and Criminal Evidence Act, I’m putting his stuff in a bag and reciting “one mobile phone, one Orthodox Christian crucifix” …
He’s a large Nigerian chap, very nice with us, and he pipes up with “oh I’m a prophet in my church, officer”.
I’m a bit confused but find out there seem to be a few more than I’d heard of in the Bible. But, hey, every day’s a school day!
We arrive at the custody centre, we get out of the van, and my prisoner asks if he can pray. As he’s been polite and given us no grief, we say of course, for we have time.
UK Police custody suites involve a lot of waiting, with the custody officer at some stations a bit like a nightclub doorman with a guest list and you are not quite sure if you’re on it, as cell space is so limited!
Anyway, our prisoner kneels and starts to pray for “these officers with me, may they be guided by righteousness” and then, sotto voce, “forgive them O Lord for they know not what they do!”
Out comes the Custody Sgt, who is also Nigerian, very affable, and he and my prisoner start chatting in this patois, gist of it being prophets and “oh yes, Samuel so and so is a prophet too”.
I bring my prisoner in after wanding (sic) and searching him and then present him to custody, where, after detention is authorised, the chat about African friends and the home country continues and eventually leads back to Prophets.
By this stage I’m developing the uneasy feeling that I may have arrested someone like Jeremiah, Isaiah or Ezekiel and am thinking I may have a few extra questions myself when I am presented to my Maker at that Great Custody Desk in the Sky.
We take our man to the cell, bring him a Bible as asked and sort out a cuppa and biscuit for him and wish him well before I go to write it up on Connect, our IT case management system.
But especially after writing up the recommendation to the court that my prisoner should be remanded in custody over the weekend, I’m still unsettled and on the way back decide I need to talk it over with Bob who knows African ways, and I am wondering if we are like the Roman soldiers at our Lords crucifixion-in other words, “are we the bad guys ?”
But then I realised after chatting it over, that if my prisoner was so good at prophesying, he’d have known that two cops were going to arrest him and he wouldn’t have gone to the bank in Croydon that day, instead of staying at home!!!
- Simon McIlwaine is a volunteer police officer in London.
