Sarah Everard

[Ella77]

- Bus drivers love speeding past people who are waving at them to stop
- Most bus drivers are men, and would probably either "not want to take sides" or actively side with the male police officer.

[Lily]

This song has been running through my head over the last few days. The desperation to protect someone and rescue them feels visceral.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sehoXPF3Pg

It was written by Allison Crowe after her friend Lisa Marie Young disappeared, presumed murdered.

[smalex]

So you've got to hope you're on a bus route. At the point when a bus passes. With a civil minded driver.

Good job I sprint like a cheetah eh.

[Mountain Goat]

Even if we assume bus drivers are all fine upstanding citizens, heroic and true, and fully trained in martial arts, I'm not sure they're paid enough to risk intervening in a suspected assault by a police officer.

[Heebie Jeebie]

Well exactly. Would a bus driver really stop if someone apparently being arrested tried to flag them down?

Even after all this my instinct would be to get in the car and do what any apparent police officer told me. They can be absolute cunts to anyone who doesn't.

[purple_dress]

Not to mention in London that many bus drivers may be from ethnic minority groups who also don't feel confident when it comes to how they'll be treated by the police. Oh I forgot there's no institutional racism in this country

[Ella77]

Good point, purp.

[rosy]

All these ideas that I’m seeing (not here) of asking to see the police officer’s warrant card and phoning the police to check that they are a real police officer are spectacularly missing the point that Couzens would have passed those checks.

As would this man: https://www.blackpoolgazette.co.uk/news ... hop-232763
And this one: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/202 ... r-banfield
And this one: https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/p ... e-24159971

Two of those three kept their jobs, FFS.

[Marth]

Bus driver on the bus where my son got attacked and his mate got his cheekbone fractured, just carried on driving.

[Lily]

All these ideas that I’m seeing (not here) of asking to see the police officer’s warrant card and phoning the police to check that they are a real police officer are spectacularly missing the point that Couzens would have passed those checks.

As would this man: https://www.blackpoolgazette.co.uk/news ... hop-232763
And this one: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/202 ... r-banfield
And this one: https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/p ... e-24159971

Two of those three kept their jobs, FFS.

The only thing I'm thinking here is that the police officer, whoever it is, would not then go ahead with a fraudulent 'arrest' if any check call had been recorded.

It should be routine that if an officer arrests someone it is recorded somewhere :vague: so they and the person they're arresting know it's been logged.

[Livilla]

Yes, it’s the fact that it means that the assailant knows that if anything happens to their intended victim, they will immediately be linked to the disappearance, which should be enough to put them off (that intended victim at least).

[geek_kitten]

Well exactly. Would a bus driver really stop if someone apparently being arrested tried to flag them down?

Even after all this my instinct would be to get in the car and do what any apparent police officer told me. They can be absolute cunts to anyone who doesn't.

A mate of mine used to drive buses. They're told not to get out of their cab for any reason and they're even told not challenge people who don't pay the right fare (obviously some do but it wasn't company policy to do so with that firm).

So in short, the bus advice is utterly useless. I hope the driver unions come out and shoot it down in flames.

[Bat Macdui]

Politico had a good (awful) summary of the bad apples thing this morning:

One bad apple? The question both Westminster and Scotland Yard are unable to answer this morning is exactly how the Met and other police forces will ever be held to account when there has been no interest in reform despite years of repeated wrongdoing. The official government line last night was that Couzens was just “one bad apple,” as Environment Secretary George Eustice put it on BBC Question Time. Read today’s newspapers and that claim does not appear to stand up to a moment’s scrutiny.

A few more bad apples: Today’s Times splash from Fiona Hamilton — whose reporting from the Old Bailey this week has been essential reading — reveals five serving police officers, including three from the Met, are now under investigation for allegedly sharing “grossly offensive,” “misogynistic, racist and homophobic material” with Couzens months before the murder. Two of the Met officers are now being criminally investigated, the paper says, in a story that will detonate any attempt by politicians and police forces to downplay the scale of rogue officers. Don’t forget, a Met officer involved in the Everard search back in March was removed from their duties at the time after sharing an “inappropriate” graphic.

Just a handful more: Several papers note the alarming revelation in Lord Justice Fulford’s sentencing remarks that “some of his colleagues have spoken supportively of him.” A Whitehall insider told Playbook they would “expect the police to show they are looking into that.”

And some more: Former Met Chief Superintendent Parm Sandhu gave an astonishing interview to BBC Radio 4’s World at One in which she called the force “very sexist and misogynistic” and warned: “A lot of women will not report their colleagues. What happens is that male police officers will then close ranks and the fear that most women police officers have got is that when you are calling for help, you press that emergency button or your radio, they’re not going to turn up and you’re going to get kicked in in the street.” She also called for Cressida Dick to go, saying she “cannot move with the times.” It is worth reading Sandhu’s comments in full.

An orchard: The i’s Amy Walker reveals today that more than 750 Met employees have faced sexual misconduct allegations in the past 11 years, with just 83 of them sacked. Some 771 Met officers and staff were accused of sexual misconduct in that time. A staggering 163 Met officers were arrested for sexual offenses and 38 were convicted. Since 2018, 600 members of U.K. police forces have faced sexual misconduct allegations — 54 were able to resign before they would have been sacked.

Roll call of shame: Labour MP Nadia Whittome has listed some of the worst recent cases of police misconduct and violence against women across the country. These include, police officers who took selfies with the bodies of stabbing victims Nicole Smallman and Bibaa Henry and shared them in a WhatsApp group with colleagues … Shana Grice was fined for wasting police time after reporting her abuser to the police five times. He later murdered her … PC Clarke Joslyn pinned a woman against a wall while holding a knife and was found to have shown a “continuously abusive course of action towards women.” He was allowed to resign before he could be sacked … PC Oliver Banfield used police tactics to apprehend a woman before viciously beating her. He was also allowed to resign before he was sacked.

And this:

[Bat Macdui]

Also, in today's 'you absolutely fucking what' takes: this :

Speaking on BBC Radio, Conservative Mr Allott said women should be aware this was not an indictable offence - one considered serious enough to warrant a prison sentence or crown court hearing.

"So women, first of all, need to be streetwise about when they can be arrested and when they can't be arrested. She should never have been arrested and submitted to that," he said.

"Perhaps women need to consider in terms of the legal process, to just learn a bit about that legal process".

[smalex]

My fucking God. Is this some sort of weird dare to see who can say the most outrageous thing?

[Ella77]

I want to know why they all hate us SO much.

[Marth]

That is appalling.

[Lily]

PC Oliver Banfield used police tactics to apprehend a woman before viciously beating her. He was also allowed to resign before he was sacked.[/b]

So someone has done this before? FFS and then some.

[Marth]

Well exactly. Would a bus driver really stop if someone apparently being arrested tried to flag them down?

Even after all this my instinct would be to get in the car and do what any apparent police officer told me. They can be absolute cunts to anyone who doesn't.

A mate of mine used to drive buses. They're told not to get out of their cab for any reason and they're even told not challenge people who don't pay the right fare (obviously some do but it wasn't company policy to do so with that firm).

So in short, the bus advice is utterly useless. I hope the driver unions come out and shoot it down in flames.

I totally understand the risk to bus drivers and support them keeping safe and not challenging people. I understood though that they had a method of alerting their controller about different levels of issues occuring if needed.

[Kenickie]

I'm actually speechless at that Allott quote.