Why people get disillusioned with the police
I had the opportunity of representing a young man before a Court in West Yorkshire today who faced allegations of aggravated vehicle taking and driving under the influence of drugs. I had met the young man’s parents some months ago when his case first came before the Magistrates and the father was quite proud of the fact that he had brought his children up to respect the police. He told me that if his son had committed an offence he must plead guilty and take the consequences.
On that previous occasion I had the opportunity of going through the advance information with him and this began to change his outlook of the police. He had thought that the police were upstanding members of the community and would write truthful and correct statements for Court. Having been present when his son was arrested he found it incredulous that the police officer wrote two paragraphs in his statement about how difficult it was to raise the young man from his slumbers and then that he was incredibly unsteady on his feet and was unable to dress himself before being escorted to the police van for transportation to the Custody Office.
Having read that the father who had seen his son simply get up, get dressed and be taken out with the police began to question whether or not there was validity in the whole case.
As a result of this I told him to enter a not guilty plea and we would thoroughly investigate. We appeared at Court back in October and were told that he was facing charges of driving while unfit through drugs because the police had found cocaine in his system. The Prosecution papers contained reference to cocaine but when this matter was further investigated the Prosecution had to accept that there was no cocaine in the gentleman’s system and that their field test had been inaccurate. Having secured the services of an expert to challenge the Prosecution in relation to their driving whilst unfit through drugs bearing in mind there was no cocaine, the Prosecution had to discontinue the case against the young man because there was quite simply no evidence.
He had provided a reading of under 35 when taken to the police station and because the police did not like this they did charge him with the driving whilst under the influence of drugs which was a case that could never have been pursued against him. As a result of this the Defendant was awarded his costs back from the Court and the case was discontinued against him.
The father who had been a supporter of the police for 50 years indicated that he was disillusioned with the way police are prepared to manipulate evidence to simply secure a conviction.
I told him it pays everybody to challenge what police officers say in their statement.
