Comment by pjc50 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by pjc50 | Hacker News Reader

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The social and racial divide becomes a problem in itself, which makes it much easier for the police to rationalise the use of excessive force.

The UK had this problem with the Royal Ulster Constabulary, and more generally the policing of Northern Ireland with troops. The only way out of it was the restructuring, renaming, and re-populating with affirmative action of the force as the Police Service of Northern Ireland.

Another key part of the solution is a willingness to actually prosecute unlawful shootings. The key case here is Lee Clegg, a paratrooper on a roadside checkpoint who shot at a car driven by teenage joyriders that failed to stop. It was ruled that shooting after the car had passed was no longer justified.

The US has got to this point because it is not willing to effectively prosecute the use of lethal force against black men where it is not absolutely required. The US also has a very flexible and expansive idea of "required".

(PSNI are routinely armed, unlike most of the rest of the UK, except anti-terrorist patrols at airports and high security locations.)

Fantastic point, I'd never thought to put this into the context of NI before.

To emphasise what you've said, the root and brach reform that has happened in the RUC/policing in NI over the last decade (or more) can't be underestimated. Among the biggest factors, as I perceive them are both top down and bottom up:

* Engaging the civilian leadership of the effected Catholic/Republican communities in leadership and accountability positions (e.g. Sin Fein/Stormont)

* Making on the ground community relationships with the effected communities a huge priority, through: targeted engagement; community relations and frankly, demonstrating the RUC's value through active/effective community policing and crime reduction.

* The confrontation and acknowledgement of the previous injustices. Truth and reconciliation is key.

It's been a LONG and painful journey interlinked that isn't finished, but it really could serve as a great lesson to improving minority/police relationships in the US.

It absolutely could serve as a model for community reconciliation, and ending terrorism. Unfortunately it requires the people in power to back down and treat those they regard as inferior with justice and respect, which makes it a hard sell.

Which reminds me, the odious Michael Gove wrote in 2000 against the NI peace process: "it enshrines a vision of human rights which privileges contending minorities at the expense of the democratic majority". But that's exactly why human rights are important: protecting the minority from 'democratic' but unjust treatment from the majority.

I keep trying to bring NI analogies into US gun discussions because when people talk about armed resistance to the government being a constitutional right, that's what it looks like in practice. It's awful.

Mind you, last time I ran the numbers, a random resident of 70s Belfast was less likely than a random resident of 80s Detroit to be murdered. America is a violent country.

It's also difficult to prosecute police officers for a variety of reasons. Even when prosecuted, the results are often more lenient. The story below is about Washington state, but all of the US states have problems prosecuting law enforcement.

http://www.policemisconduct.net/the-problem-with-prosecuting...

> "PSNI are routinely armed"

I think another important point is despite being armed the PSNI rarely use their weapons. I honestly can't remember the last time someone was killed by a PSNI officer.

Certainly. And when they do they are investigated. The system works: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-33085729

Police officer uses gun in inappropriate situation, wounds man, is subject to impartial investigation and disciplinary action.

That's what America needs to do to fix its police race relations problems.

Single data point: I was slightly shocked to see in Gloucester, a Policeman in Tesco supermarket with a pistol in a holster on his belt. Wonder if this was a one off - I hope so.

Gloucestershire (UK) has a number of sensitive sites.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/1...

Correct. This sighting was in Churchdown not far from Imjin Barracks, a couple of miles from GCHQ and Staverton airport. He was climbing into a BMW X5 parked prominently and poised for a quick exit. I believe it was an armed response vehicle.

In general, only Armed Response Units (ARUs) in the UK are actually armed. There are a small number of ARU's in each police constabulary, but it depends on the size of the area covered and the perceived threat from assumed criminals.

Most ARU's are rarely called on to use their weapons, and every time they use their weapon it is seized as part of the investigation. Every bullet has to be accounted for.

Each officer receives an extremely intensive training, and only the best, with a secure psychological profile make it through. They have to follow a rigid set out protocols before they can engage a threat.

I find the British police protocols and training to be an excellent example of how to approach armed policing. That being said it sometimes goes wrong. In those cases the actions of the officers need to be reviewed, and any negligence or deliberate acts of harm need to be punished within the law.

These officers don't have an easy job. On the most cases they've had to make a split second decision based on their training and their immediate situation.

I'll exclude Charles de Menezes from that, since I still believe that he was shot by armed SAS soldiers operating in public on British streets, authorised by the home office, which they'll never admit to, as it would cause a public outcry:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Jean_Charles_de_Menez...

Strictly speaking, the only requirement a police officer need meet to be armed is to be authorised by a substantive Superintendent or higher. Hence the term 'Authorised Firearms Officer'.

All ARVs are AFOs, but not all AFOs are ARV. The difference is about 4 weeks (9 weeks vs 5 weeks), and the majority of that is the additional tactics around search and 'call outs' which an AFO (usually being entirely reactive) would not deal with.

The training is intensive, but there's no specific psychological screening beyond the instructors (and colleagues) realising that an individual officer ought not be trusted with a pen, let alone a firearm. There's more screening to become a sexual offences/CSE investigator than there is to become an AFO.

There are more AFOs than you'd imagine, and the majority of them will be only carrying a sidearm.

>They have to follow a rigid set out protocols before they can engage a threat.

No, the protocols are far from rigid. The training means that an AFO is fluent in the 'National Decision Model', which means that they can make dynamic assessments of risk without being hamstrung by a rigid "if this, then that" set of behaviours.

>I'll exclude Charles de Menezes from that, since I still believe that he was shot by armed SAS soldiers operating in public on British streets, authorised by the home office

Then you've been reading too many conspiracy stories. The whole thing was a fuck up from start to finish, but there's nothing in it that needs the SAS to be involved. If they had been, they would have had their own tactical command and De Menzes would probably still be alive.

The comment about the SAS came from an active AFO, who worked in London at the time. I don't want to give any more information than that. I'm probably risking too much by just saying that.

The comment was quite specifically, "we aren't trained to do that (execute suspect by putting the gun to his head and pulling the trigger), but they are at Hereford".

It's hearsay, but far from your usual conspiracy theory.

>"we aren't trained to do that

Most AFO's weren't. Some were, as part of Op Kratos. That was the problem - there was a massive disconnect in training between two sides of the business (the CT side and the ARV side) which meant that when commands such as "stop him", were given, the expectations of both parties were very different.

Don't forget that a common-or-garden AFO on an armed OCU would have had his five weeks training, with bi-monthly top-ups, whilst the AFOs offering armed support to surveillance teams will have been massively upskilled.

Had an SAS team been deployed on a surveillance job (and I literally cannot imagine the circumstances that would require that), then tactical command would have been taken by soldiers who would (generally) have been clear and explicit about the task ahead. As it's been held that De Menzes was mistakenly identified and that there was only implication that he might have been a bomber rather than any explicit statement that he was, it is unlikely that there would have been the massive cock up in communications that resulted in him being shot.

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