Everybody's sick for something that they can find fascinating

Probation: It Ain't A Bundle Of Laughs

2009-07-20T17:01:09Z

Edited to make this post public, because you know what, fuck that shit. This stuff should be available for the world to see.

One of the officers at work was assaulted by one of her offenders today.

Luckily, the assault wasn't serious - just a punch in the arm. Unfortunately, the response the officer got from the police was, in short, "It happens. What do you want us to do about it?"

Which is completely not the point. Yes, it happens, but no, it is NOT acceptable. In any job dealing with the public - or even with other members of staff - incidents like this have to be quickly and clearly dealt with to show that they are not acceptable, because otherwise people will feel they have a licence to treat you how they wish.

I've had a month of disappointments where the police (and the law in general) are concerned, it seems.

At the end of last week the magistrates at our local court basically colluded with an offender and the offender's solicitor. This offender has several convictions and arrests for domestic violence and regularly beats up his parents. His most recent arrest involved him beating his mother with a belt and destroying part of her house. He was in breach of his community order and Probation were basically saying we can't recommend any community penalty because he just doesn't comply. We also made it as clear as we could that a curfew was NOT appropriate, because it ties him to his parents' property and therefore puts them at risk.

But the magistrates didn't want to give him custody. They didn't want to give him custody, and they decided that their desire to not give him custody was more important than the safety of his victims.

So they gave him a curfew.

His mother told the Probation Officer that she's moving out. She is so scared of her own son that she will move out of her own home rather than stay there while he's on a tag. She can't even say "Get out of my house" to him, because she is too scared of what he will then do.

One of the guys who was in court put it best: "Today I watched a mother be abused by her son, a solicitor, and three magistrates."

Sometimes in this job I feel incredibly proud of our criminal justice system and have my faith in humanity restored.

Other times I just feel sick.

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Chinese Whispers, police style!

2009-06-12T17:24:02Z

My life is a trainwreck. I called my local police to speak to them about reporting a crime, and I mentioned that oh, by the way, my uncle is a police officer in this area, not sure which department he's in, but I don't want to talk to him about it because he's a family member and it would make things awkward for him through the conflict of interest thing. They take my details and tell me someone will call me back.

So a couple of minutes ago I get a call from the vulnerable adults unit, who asked me to confirm if it was correct that I didn't want to speak to a male officer.

Well, technically...

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What the flying fuck.

2009-05-27T10:25:18Z

So my pre-emptive hiatus is now ix-nayed, less than twenty-four hours after I decided to implement it.

The reason for the pre-emptive hiatus was that I was going to be a prosecution witness in a trial about stuff that happened when I was a child. The trial was set for next week, and it was going to dredge up some particularly unpleasant memories.

Today, however, I got a call from the witness people saying that the CPS (Crown Prosecution Service) have decided to discontinue the case.

While I am relieved in a way (because now I won't have to air a distinctly unhappy time in my life in a very stressful environment and be questioned by people whose job it is to make me look like a fool), I am also disgusted at the way the CPS have handled this.

I was first contacted to give a statement about this two years ago. The offences the defendant was charged with were rape and indecent assault on a child (edit: not me, for the record). I was willing to go to court to give evidence for the prosecution because I actually give a shit about getting justice for the victim, and I understand that it takes a hell of a lot of guts for someone who has been the victim of that sort of offence to get the courage and willpower together to accuse their attacker in the first place. It then takes even more courage and willpower to survive through the court process. The person who can do that deserves vindication, and deserves the support of any evidence I can give.

How is it justice for the victim when, after two years of waiting, the trial is cancelled five days before it is due to start.

And let me be clear right now: I don't even actually know who the victim is. I know who I think it is, but there were any number of children it might actually have been. I object to this on general principles, not because of a personal investment in any of the people involved.

Well fucking done, CPS. Well. Fucking. Done.

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