Thought I’d relay an incident I observed the other day.
I was on my porch reading a book, heard a disturbance in the park opposite and was dismayed to see a guy beating up a woman.
My first instinct was to go lay him low but then I thought “no, do it properly, let the police handle it”.
So I called them, in due course a convoy of police vehicles has turned up (after doing a full lap of the park and disappearing down a side street in true “Keystone cops” fashion).
When they pulled up, I told them what I’d seen and pointed them in the direction of the guy.
I should point out that the park was far from unoccupied at this point, there were approximately sixty children ranging in age from around nine to maybe 15 in the park training for rugby.
There were a number of adult supervisors too, all did nothing.
One of the officers has asked me if the guy has actually punched her (apparently it’s acceptable by police standards to throw a woman by the head rag-doll fashion to the ground, but not to actually punch her).
I told him what I’d seen and said I was prepared to make a statement.
Said cop proceeds to go over to this guy (with around six other officers in tow), I didn’t hear what was said, but there was a lot of toe-ing of the ground and then…they get back in their cars and drive off.
Guy walks away.
Not taken into custody, not even searched for weapons, no “can we see some identification” just off you go home, you’ve been a naughty boy.
Can anyone explain to me how a guy gets to bash a woman in front of sixty (or so) kids, witnesses all around, police attend and he just gets to walk away? Because I certainly don’t get it.
Albury’s “top cop” can go into bat for his officers with open public letters till the cows come home, but blatantly stupid misuse of police discretionary powers like this just make me wonder why we bother with a police force at all.
Perhaps a little more time spent cleaning house and ferreting out the undesirables among his own ranks and a little less time spent issuing PR spin might be a worthwhile excercise.
