Police News March 05.indd - New Zealand Police Association

New Zealand Police AssociationMarch 2005Lastly, a big thanks to my old friend SteveDunn of Taupo, a truly good bastard in thePolice and my best man in ‘98 and a goodmate.Thanks everyone. See you round.Pat Tunley(Nelson)When will the Policehonour ALL their dead?In December of 2003, United States BorderPatrol Agent, James P Epling, was on dutyat the Colorado River outside of Yuma,Arizona. Epling was married, with threeyoung children.During the night, Agent Epling and otherofficers found a group of Chinese nationalswho were trying to illegally enter the UnitedStates by crossing the Colorado River. Hehelped to pull a woman from the fastmovingwater. Then he moved off intothe darkness to continue searching. Hedisappeared and his body was not found forthree days. A post-mortem revealed he diedfrom accidental drowning, and that therewas no foul play involved.So why am I telling you this story?Simply because Agent Epling’s death “inthe line of duty,” where he put his ownlife at risk to help others, and irrespectiveof the fact that he did not die through theunlawful act of another, still means thathis passing was honoured at the annuallaw enforcement memorial services inWashington, DC in May 2004 and his namewill be permanently engraved on the LawEnforcement Officers’ Memorial.If a member of the New Zealand Police diedunder similar circumstances their namewould not be memorialised on the “HonourWall” at the Royal New Zealand PoliceCollege. And I have to ask - why not?Without diminishing the supreme sacrificeof those members whose names appearon that wall, why is it that only those whodied by an unlawful act are remembered onthe wall and not also those who, absent of“unlawfulness,” still gave their lives in thelawful execution of their duty?Last year marked the 63rd anniversaryof the murder of four police officersby Eric Stanley George Graham atKowhitirangi (formerly Koiterangi) nearGreymouth. District Commander GrantO’Fee, ably assisted by staff - and withnot inconsiderable input from the PoliceAssociation - ensured their deaths are morefittingly honoured at the scene. Needless tosay, the names of Sergeant William Cooperand his staff are recorded at the College.In the USA, and in most Australian states - toname but two foreign jurisdictions - the Policehave seen fit to centrally record, and honour,all staff who die during the course of theirduty. In belatedly honouring those Hokitikamembers who were slain, why not also choose2004 as the year to honour all members ofthe New Zealand Police who have died in thelawful execution of their duty?Trevor Morley(Wellington)A little bit of commonsensegoes a long wayFunny story…about two years ago aneighbour of mine, Steve, a former policeofficer had problems with a “villain” from upthe road. Let’s call him Mr D. This particularyoung man, for whatever reason, chose togo down a long driveway to throw rocks atSteve’s house. Steve came out of his house andfollowing a confrontation; the Police arrivedand arrested Mr D for disorderly behaviour.He was subsequently bailed, with conditions,to appear at a later date.During the ensuing days Mr D attempted tointimidate Steve on a number of occasions andeventually smashed up his letterbox. He was,as a consequence, committed for assessmentpursuant to the Mental Health Act, whichsaved the local cops from binning him again.I thought I had remained somewhat distantfrom the whole thing, which seemed toresolve itself with the troubled youth gonefrom our sleepy little street...well, all untilI was contacted by Professional Standards,requesting an interview in relation to acomplaint they had received about me, fromthe boy’s mother – who at that time I hadn’t met.I learned that she worked at my localsupermarket.An investigator subsequently interviewedme [I understand the process of a PCAand the necessity to do so] and during theinterview, I learned that the boy’s motherhad complained about my behaviour at thesupermarket, whilst off duty. It transpired thatshe alleged that I had filled a shopping basketwith stuff [probably cop food…doughnuts,chocolate biscuits, chippies and beer] anddropped it aggressively on the conveyor beltat her checkout…so loudly it sounded like agunshot! She further cited the September 11terrorist action as a mitigating factor to herbeing ‘jumpy’.Allegedly, I then made various threats inrespect of getting her son.Naturally, I had no recollection of the incident asthe only fear I normally create at a supermarketis to the lollies in the pick ‘n’ mix bulk bins. Is $8on lollies too much? – …I digress.I certainly didn’t threaten Mr D’s mum – fora number of reasons, mostly because atthat time I didn’t know who she was. I alsolearned that she had complained about anumber of other police officers for variousother things as well.As for the terrorist activity with a shoppingbasket….well it’s got me stumped, but to befair, maybe there were Afghans in with thedoughnuts, beer and chippies.Anyway, following the interview, I heardnothing more until recently – two years after.Professional Standards advised that the file hadbeen reviewed in Wellington and a numberof issues still remained… such as the womanbelieving that I was a dog handler. One ofthese was whether I was a dog handler. Nowwhere would that come from – because, as amember of the CIB, it is evident I am cultured,well-mannered and can operate a knife andfork?It also seemed that the reviewing officer inWellington, was unhappy with the expressionsof concern that the original investigator hadabout this woman’s mental health. I amleft wondering what happened to applyingcommonsense in summarising an investigation- or have we become too politically correct forcommonsense?Get that man a pie!Glenn Baldwin(Auckland)Time consuming timesheetsCan someone please explain to me therelevance and necessity of filling in timesheets each day?I am sure that their mere existence keeps100 non-sworn in employment and makesfor nice bar graphs at management meetingsbut I am also sure that this time could bespent more effectively in roles that actuallysupport frontline officers and work towardsour core responsibilities.I have never seen one criminal caught, orone crash prevented by someone with hisor her nose in a timesheet book looking forsome obscure code.In this age of technical wizadry (andWanganui) everything we do and everywherewe go is recorded. With AVLs, our every movecan be recorded and with ICAD the amountof time we spend dealing with incidents isrecorded. The number of arrests we make andtickets we issue is available at the touch of abutton. The number of court files, doclocsand every other piece of paper we submit isrecorded somewhere.Why do we have to duplicate or triplicatethis information on to timesheets? The AMScode sheets, which get bigger each year,are a perfect example - there are codes foreverything under the sun. Someone who ison a deployment to the Solomon Islands hasa code. Everyone knows that the officer is inthe Solomon Islands, so why does it need tobe written down on a timesheet?Road Policing units have to note down everyvehicle that they stop and how many IONsand TONs they issue. You know how manytickets they have issued, they have to handthem in! To top it off, at the end of the month,the Road Policing officers have to complete amonthly return. This involves going throughall of their timesheets, adding up everythingthat they have already written down, andputting this onto another piece of paper. If youran a business in this fashion it would havegone bankrupt years ago.If the bosses really need to have pie chartsand bar graphs for their meetings, how abouta compromise? For a two-week period everyyear (or two) we perform time and motionstudies. We record what we have done andthis is used as a representative sample. Thissystem works perfectly well in most otherparts of the policing world.We could utilise all of the time that is freed up,for both sworn and non-sworn, by spending iton policing tasks, not administration.What is the timesheet code for ‘going insane’?Mark Fleming(Auckland)43