Prosecution of UK News Photographer Collapses After Recording Disproves Police Testimony (wordpress.com)

Slashdot reader Andy Smith writes: Slashdot reported last September how I was arrested while standing in a field near a road accident, as I photographed the scene for a newspaper. I was initially given a police warning for "obstruction", but the warning was then cancelled and I was prosecuted for resisting arrest and breach of the peace. These are serious charges and I was facing a prison sentence. Fortunately we had one very strong piece of evidence: A recording of my arrest. Not only did the recording prove that two police officers' testimony was false, but it caught one of them boasting about how he had conspired with a prosecutor to arrest and prosecute me. Yesterday the case was dropped, and now the two police officers and the prosecutor face a criminal investigation.

Comments

Lucky for you...

[Anonymous Coward]

If you were in the US instead of the UK, you may well be dead right now.

"STOP RESISTING!"

Do not talk to the police.

[Anonymous Coward]

That badge does not make them good people, but it does give them significant power over you.

Re:Do not talk to the police.

[b0s0z0ku]

The badge often makes them worse people. Look at the Stanford Prison Experiment... power and order-following corrupt.

Re:Do not talk to the police.

[Applehu Akbar]

Papers published in the Journal of Internet Manufactured Outrage are not falsifiable, cannot be retracted, and echo back and forth through blogs until the end of time. The Stanford experiment and the Wakefield anti-vax paper are examples.

Excessively Punitive

[mentil]

Resisting Arrest should be a fine, and Breaching the Peace is a catch-all law that should be used for e.g. putting a drunk in a cell overnight. Neither should have prison sentences attached.

Re:Excessively Punitive

[Anonymous Coward]

None of those points address the fundamental issue: the testimony of police is believed without corroborating evidence. If that guy didn't have video evidence to prove his innocence, he would be in prison right now, on nothing but the testimony of two corrupt cops.

Re:Excessively Punitive

[Anonymous Coward]

A police officer caught giving false testimony should be put in prison for the remainder of his life.

Re: Excessively Punitive

[Reverend Green]

Law enforcers lie all day every day. It's their culture, and the kangaroo courts encourage it.

OF COURSE I would believe a random Joe before I believe a law enforcer. Who wouldn't?

Re: Excessively Punitive

[c6gunner]

Law enforcers lie all day every day. It's their culture, and the kangaroo courts encourage it.

Whereas random internet yahoos who pretend to be reporters are bastions of truth and virtue.

Re: Excessively Punitive

[Anonymous Coward]

The ongoing Tommy Robinson episode is even more terrifying. There's a gag order which prevents journalists from even discussing his arrest. Crazy.

Re: Excessively Punitive

[Reverend Green]

Random internet yahoos are random. One doesn't know what to expect. Whereas with law enforcers, one expects duplicity.

Re: Excessively Punitive

[Jesus H Rolle]

When cops lie under oath, you must acquit. Even for murder and child porn, sadly. There can be no justice without truth.

Re: Excessively Punitive

[Xest]

I think you're tarring all police with the same brush, but not all police are like that.

I was surprised for example that a friend in Canada who is a police officer said she'd have no problem giving a friend or fellow officer a pass on a speeding fine, because that shit doesn't fly in the UK.

I was at a friends wedding and one of the guests was a police officer, I jokingly said to him my wife had got a ticket in the area he patrols and he immediately said he too had been caught by the same mobile operated camera. I asked if they ever give other officers a pass to which his response was "Do they fuck, the guys who man the cameras would happily do their own mothers for speeding".

So whilst we might accuse them of being cunts, for doing their job to the letter in fining someone for speeding who was only 5mph over the limit on a sunny day, with empty roads in good conditions which is for example less dangerous than being at the limit in poor conditions, one thing seems clear that they're at least not corrupt and treat everyone equally - something I'm well aware isn't true in Canada, and I get the impression, in the US either.

But I've also spoken to another officer in the past who ran an EFR training session I was in, and one of the things he spoke about from his own personal experience was exactly the situation of traffic accidents - he said that when you're faced with someone in a serious condition needing CPR you don't really notice what's going on around you until you stop, and realise nowadays that some twat is filming this person dying as you try and save them on their mobile phone.

So when you have a road traffic accident so serious that a number of officers are in attendance and have closed the road then it's quite possible that they've done so because someone has either suffered catastrophic injuries (such as loss of limbs, beheadings, or many other rather gross outcomes) or because someone is still alive, but dying because they're unlikely to be saved. In this case the police officer isn't saying "Please step back" because of some great coverup that they're hiding from you, but because they a) Don't want you to see it because it's quite possible it will genuinely give you PTSD which is enough to keep you awake at night, leave you distracted, and subsequently fuck up your life by causing you to lose your job as a result if you don't get councelling and sort your head out, and b) Because someone who is dying doesn't want some member of the paparazzi taking photos of them to sell to anyone wishing to buy them in their dying moments - it's about basic fucking human decency.

Now sure, the police have a limited toolset when it comes to dealing with things like that, but they do have powers to shut roads, and prevent access in the case of such things, so it's not overly surprising that when they've told someone to back off and that person ignores them and instead tries to go through a field instead saying "I'm in the field it doesn't count!" like a petulent fucking child all so they can get their traffic accident gore photos for money that the police don't take too kindly to it - it's a hard enough job clearing up such an aftermath at the best of times, much less when someone is trying to profit off the horror of it.

Remember the policing in the UK uses the system of policing by consent, officers aren't routinely armed precisely because the aim is for them to not have excessive power over the general public which people inherently do when they wield a firearm over someone. This is drilled into them from day 1 of their training, because it's a core tenet of UK policing.

Now that doesn't make it perfect, you still get plenty of bad apples - just like in every job, there are both people who are bad at their job, and people who are outright cunts in their job. But it's not a majority, most officers are just dealing with shit that most people just don't see and aren't interested in day to day, from clearing up gory traffic accidents, to saving overdosed junkies, to counselling

HTF

[Frank Burly]

How does this guy keep getting /. articles based on his uncorroborated, self-published, vaguely overwrought blog posts?

Dude, can you post the video that saved your hide?

The charging documents?

Can you have someone from the union release a statement on what they accomplished?

It sounds like you pissed off an asshole cop, and the prosecutor looked at the evidence and decided to drop the case. It's too bad you had to go through that, but is there a tech angle that I am missing?

Re:1984 was a warning, not an instruction manual.

[ChrisMaple]

Not everyone lies under oath.

It does immediately cast doubt on all other convictions in which these officials were involved, and in those cases the convictions should be re-examined and (if appropriate) further action taken.

Re:The Left thinks Only Police Should have Weapons

[Actually, I do RTFA]

And it's a good thing only the police had weapons in this situation. The photographer went through the legal process and won. If he had started a gun battle, he would have been shot dead and never vindicated.