How Useless Are The British Police?

On a scale of one to ten, most victims of crime would say nine at least, victims of real crime that is, not imaginary crime, but let’s not talk about Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull who is currently en route to Australia.

Last month, the owner of a small shop in a suburb of Derby found out just how useless they are when he made a citizen’s arrest of a shoplifter. The theft was caught on CCTV which has now been released as has the act of 67 year old shopkeeper Jarnail Singh Atwal dragging the man back into his shop. Okay, stealing a tub of washing machine tablets is hardly the crime of the century, although in a previous century it might have seen the thief transported to the colonies. Nevertheless, small shopkeepers especially are under pressure, and theft is theft. So you can imagine the shopkeeper’s surprise when after phoning the local police station he was told to let the man go or face arrest himself.

You can read more about the case here. It was also reported by the local press which attracted some heavy comments from angry or simply bemused readers.

This weekend it has also been reported that Wayne Couzens is to appear in court again soon to be sentenced for indecent exposure. In March 2021, then serving police officer Couzens made a bogus arrest of Sarah Everard on the pretext of her breaking covid lockdown restrictions. Her remains were found the following week. The case caused outrage and genuine public concern. Couzens pleaded guilty to kidnapping, rape and murder; he was given the mandatory life sentence with a whole life order, meaning he will never be released. He appealed against this tariff and was given short shrift. In other words, he will die in prison, so what was the point of charging him with further and what in comparison are trivial offences? 

The reason isn’t far to seek, the police like easy targets, especially the British police, and there is no easier target than a man who is behind bars for life. It has been suggested that Couzens may have committed other murders, a suggestion that is worth looking into, but the expense and especially the time wasted on prosecuting a whole life tariff murderer for something like this cannot  be justified when the police could be investigating unsolved crimes and the courts processing currently unprosecuted ones. Like shoplifting.