What is going on with policing?

Why do police continue investigating "non crime"?

Some four years ago now, a former police constable by the name of Harry Miller won his case against the college of policing and Humberside constabulary. This case achieved considerable note back then as it was about free speech on the internet and a piece of engendered madness invented by the college of policing called a “non crime hate incident.”

The case revolved around a tweet sent to the world by Mr Miller which included a bawdy limerick regarding the ersatz vagina of a trans woman and its eventual destination. The tweet was not directed at anyone in particular, (just as my writing is not), but an individual was offended and contacted Humberside police who sent around one of their best to “have a word” with Mr Miller.

History records that Mr Miller was unimpressed by PC Umar Gul who told him he had “come to check his thinking.” Mr Miller quite rightly challenged this approach. Humberside constabulary subsequently registered a “non crime hate incident” against him. Let us be clear about this. Essentially the rozzer dropped in to Mr Miller’s workplace, waggled his elbows and presumably said something like “Ello, ello, ello! You’ve been a naughty boy then!!” and informed Mr Miller that he hadn’t broken the law but, all the same the constabulary were going to register the fact that he hadn’t broken the law in a data base.

These days in this country, if you decide to utter what someone might see as “hurty words” on the internet, you may also win this lottery. You may never get to hear about it because the local plod are under no obligation to actually inform you of their action, (this is important later). Your presence on this data base will appear on an enhanced DBS check and seems to mean that not breaking the law has some similar consequences to having (for example) taken an old ladies’ pension. Being on this database may mean that you can’t teach, or work with children. You might not be able to make a living as a result of not breaking the law.

I think we can say that Harry Miller was incensed by the iniquity of all this and, at considerable financial risk to himself, decided to pursue a case regarding the legality of the NCHI, (non crime hate incident) in the high court. The judge, Mr Justice Knowles, who ruled on the case was quite unequivocal in his ruling stating (amongst other things) that he didn’t feel that Mr Miller’s tweet should have been recorded as a non crime hate incident at all.

He also said:

“The effect of the police turning up at [the Claimant's] place of work because of his political opinions must not be underestimated. To do so would be to undervalue a cardinal democratic freedom. In this country we have never had a Cheka, a Gestapo or a Stasi. We have never lived in an Orwellian society.”

Effectively, Mr Justice Knowles declared that the action of Humberside Constabulary was unlawful, but stopped short of saying the same about the College of Policing, who issued the guidance upon which Humberside Constabulary acted. You might wonder why he did this and it is open to question, but it seems odd to suggest that the action of a constabulary was not acceptable, but the guidance upon which they are thought to have acted was.

Not content with this, Mr Miller appealed the case and won the remainder of his claim, (that is- against the College of Policing) in the appeal court around one year later.

Harry Miller now speaks regularly on the matter of freedom of speech and runs a web site called “Fair Cop.”

This piece is about apparent over- reach on the part of the police. It is also about what has changed since the Miller ruling in 2020. I write it because it looks like nothing at all has changed. Since that time, we have seen several notable cases come and go including two that I will make reference to now.

The first centres around a journalist called Allison Pearson who writes for the Daily Telegraph. She uses twit-link (I think it’s called that) to publish her work and to express herself beyond the Telegraph column she writes. Around 18 months ago she “retweeted” a photograph on said social media site relating to a protest which she quickly redacted as it turned out that the attribution she had given it was not correct. She was visited by Essex police one year later in relation to this on the basis that her (deleted) tweet incited racial hatred. The visit was on Remembrance Sunday and Ms. Pearson was preparing to leave to attend a church service. You might spot the irony of this.

Thames valley police’s constables apparently invited her to attend a “voluntary interview,” but refused to state which tweet was being referred to or who the complainant was. It turns out that this complaint was passed around to three different police forces before landing on the Essex doorstep. Suffice to say that they thoroughly embarrassed themselves in their dealings with it and were advised by the CPS to drop the case. This means that there was no case to answer. We can argue that the police should have been able to work this out for themselves before ever getting in touch with Ms Pearson.

This is an example of someone making a mistake. A silly mistake certainly, but a mistake nevertheless. The police investigation into “non crime” seemed to morph into a hate crime, which perhaps might have something to do with Essex police wanting to try and make something out of the case in order to justify their actions. The effect on Ms Pearson was, according to her, significant. Much of the reportage around her case deployed words like “racist” in proximity to her name, which might lead some to conclude that she was herself that which the word implied. Such a conclusion would be entirely erroneous. We can debate the usefulness of such low quality reporting elsewhere.

I gather that, in order to prosecute for hate crime, the CPS needs to prove “intent.” That seems to be a high bar- good luck doing that when the person in question made an error.

Our next case revolves around a lady called Helen Jones who lives in Manchester and who wrote her opinions on the facebook. She referred to a local councillor, (a fellow called Sedgewick I gather) who, it would appear, was possibly on the same whatsup page as the disreputable (now independent) MP Andrew Gwynne. It seems that Sedgwick himself had made one or two questionable comments on the same group so the story goes. It would appear that the Manchester lady’s grievous sin was to indicate that she thought that the councillor should himself resign- inflammatory stuff indeed.

Ms Jones was visited by two detectives from Greater Manchester Police who had a conversation with her, apparently via her “ring doorbell.” Quite correctly in my view, she enquired if she was accused of a crime and was told that she was not. Showing some grit, she then asked what the constables were doing at her door. She further asked who the complainant was and received the same response from the Manchester constables as we have seen previously from Essex constabulary. There appears to have been a clear implication that if Ms Jones was to continue making such statements, another visit might be made at which point the intent would not be quite so, shall we call it, friendly.

The lady herself decided to speak to a newspaper about the matter and the resulting article has achieved some traction. I understand that she has said that she was frightened by the encounter and felt that she would be disinclined to make political statements in future. I am inclined towards the thought that the senior constables at the Greater Manchester constabulary probably think that this therefore is “mission accomplished.”

So, we have two examples of police action but what can be made of them? It would appear in the second case that the police were supporting a political entity in attempting to intimidate a critical voice. The complainant seems to have been a local councillor, something of an important figure we are led to believe. It seems quite clear to me that he was none too fond of members of his electorate holding him to account and may perhaps have reasoned that he could weaponise the police to shut down further criticism of his actions. None of the previous comments about the circumstances may be factual, but it is not hard to see why people might think this way given what can be observed.

GMP’s media response to the matter of the Helen Jones case indicated that they were merely informing her that a complaint had been made. I’m afraid that don’t believe that for a second. In the case of NCHIs, the police are under no obligation to speak to the individual they register and, it would appear, quite often do not. This matter doesn’t appear to rise above the level required for an NCHI and yet off they trot to intimidate and bully. When the excuse looks like it, sounds like and smells like it you call it what it is.

One is also forced to wonder how many other people are placed in the same situation as Harry Miller, Allison Pearson and Helen Jones. A constable visits with powers of arrest and uses this power to intimidate and frighten people into silence. The constabulary then forces its opinions (via the visiting PC and with no policing purpose) onto those undertaking lawful activities.

It turns out that the number of non crime incidents recorded runs into thousands and that the rate of recording hasn’t much slowed since 2020 when Mr Miller won his case. There was much support at the time for the removal of the NCHI. Instead, the college of policing and constabularies around the country have simply ignored the subsequent guidance and doubled down.

Let me be very clear about this. In order to prosecute a crime police must have evidence. That is to say artefacts and physical, examinable facts and information that, in a court, will point to an individual. It is this presented data that the accused will defend against. In the case of an NCHI all the police need is a perception which in my view is a rather vague descriptor. Someone says that “they feel like… (insert description of nebulous lawful comment here) caused them harm,” for a so called “non crime” to have occurred. There is no appeal against the registration of a non crime hate incident. Unlike the law itself, you have no options at all but to wear your badge.

The HCOG, (hate crime operational guidance) states that in order for an NCHI to be recorded, there must be a real prospect of escalation on the part of the subject. The logic of this seems to be grounded in the so called “pyramid of hate,” which has several levels starting with “biased attitudes” and ending with “genocide.” I have done some research on this supposed link and there appears to be no evidence to support the assertion that someone starting at level one is going to move to level five via the other steps if not stopped by someone like PC Gul.

In a court, there is also a presumption of innocence for the accused which, it seems, is completely unlike the methodology of dealing with an NCHI where it appears that the complete opposite is the case.

It now turns out that Allison Pearson will take legal action against Essex police. Good for her I say, but what about the thousands of people who cannot do this? What about the additional cost to the taxpayer in defending this action? What about the people whose lives will be altered in significant ways by a “non crime hate incident” registered against them? What about the simple stigma attached to having the plod turning up at your door when you haven’t done anything wrong?

It is up to right thinking people to stand up and be counted when they are given the chance. Harry Miller, Allison Pearson and folk like them have done (and are doing) the public a massive service in holding constabularies (and the college of policing in particular) to account for the over reach of their senior constables.

I say senior constables because it seems very likely that many, many rank and file constables are heartily fed up with the regime of hysterical screeching wokery they are both being compelled to police and being managed under. I suspect that, like most normal people, they want to find burglars and catch shoplifters, both things that it would appear that constabularies up and down the country are currently very bad at. Like the general public, I suspect that they would like to get back to ordinary thief- taking activities rather than policing “hurty feelings.”

Lord Jonathan Sumption was once asked about the idea of a police state. He said that a police state is not one where the police enforce draconian laws, but one in which the police make up the laws as they go along. We now find ourselves in virtually this exact situation and it is generated by the almost entirely hopeless college of policing. In the cases I mention above we see that perfectly innocent people have been terrorised by their local police, probably into silence in the case of the Jones incident and as a result of guidance issued by a bunch of woke lunatics who are part of a quango, (and I say that word in the same way I might say “dog turd” which is to say with undisguised distaste).

I have no doubt that the college of policing will say that police have a difficult job, but that is not a trump argument and it doesn’t make the problem of their over-reach go away. However, the COP can make things much easier for the services they advise up and down the country by thinking a little about the implications of what they do. I have no doubt that senior police constables will suggest that they must remain neutral and so they must but that doesn’t make the growing arguments against the NCHI go away. Investigating cases where no crime was committed and appearing to represent a party political noise maker doesn’t seem all that neutral if you ask me and it is in situations like this that the name of good policing is dragged through the mud.

At a recent House of Lords parliamentary committee the college of policing, in response to questions about HCOG and NCHI, said that the public are confused by the underlying principles behind recording non crime. Their suggestion was to change the name of the NCHI. No, that is not the answer and it is retarded to think that it is. This is because the newly named “non offence” would simply ape the sins of the old and we would be no further forward. It is insulting to the public to think that this is a suitable answer to a parliamentary committee question.

My own view is that the whole NCHI nonsense is driven by the college of policing who, it would appear are unable admit to themselves that the recording of “non crime” is a useless and counter productive activity. It seems to the be the case that the COP haven’t ever even evaluated the statistics that years of this “work” has produced. That is to say nothing of the chilling effect that “non crime” has on the freedom to speak which, as any sensible person knows, is the freedom to think. They don’t seem to even care about that.

I say, get rid of the ludicrous and poorly thought out NCHI. Get back to policing actions, not feelings.

It may be that someone will be offended by this writing. I would direct that individual to the words of Mr Justice Sedley:

“Free speech includes not only the inoffensive, but the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative provided it does not tend to promote violence. Freedom only to speak inoffensively is not worth having.”