Armed Police - Casually strolling

[Derek Flint]

7 hours ago, Albert Tatlock said:

99% of the very difficult stuff here can be dealt with by a taser.

Indeed it can.

Prepare and train for the 1% as they say

7 hours ago, Maugholdmafia said:

I will tell you what is laughable, that the police thought it necessary to have armed police patrolling the comis for todays event. 
 

Presumably in case of a chance of an attack happening. Absolutely mad

That is odd, I agree

6 hours ago, Andy Onchan said:

I don't think anyone on here is saying that violent crime doesn't exist on the Island, of course it does. It's reported in the media for all to read/hear. Is the violence any worse than it was say 40 years ago? Probably not. Thankfully.

Or are you suggesting that the Island is now not safe to the extent that firearms need to be carried? If that's the case then something has gone horribly, horribly wrong.

Nothing has changed other than preparedness and professionalisation 

6 hours ago, A fool and his money..... said:

Of course there's violent crime here. Nobody has suggested there isn't and it's not a new thing either. Drunken scraps and domestic violence have been around here for as long as I can remember - i've even cited examples on this thread 

None of it requires the police to shoot anyone though, we don't have gun crime*

And here's the thing. There's absolutely no point in carrying a gun, unless you're going to shoot it. No point at all. 

* I seem to remember the proprietor of an Indian restaurant in the Viking Hotel in Ramsey getting shot in the ass probably around the late 80's if I recall correctly. As far as I know the culprit was arrested without being shot.

 

If you are going to shoot someone? Really?

5 hours ago, A fool and his money..... said:

I work with someone who used to be a civilian police employee. He told me there's at least a couple of the trained firearms officers here who couldn't hit a donkey's ass with a banjo, but there's a limited pool to choose from and they seem to think we need a lot of armed officers.

Well, they have to pass a course lasting months and pass regular requalification shoots, so he may well be talking rubbish, and I'm not sure how they would have access to that data in any case. Certainly wouldn't be on the range during live fire.

The APSTRA identifies how many armed officers is optimum. Part of that is based on isolation.

[Tinpot]

6 hours ago, A fool and his money..... said:

Several things.

Cost - the headline speech at the same event mentioned £10million in government savings, kind of ironic really.

Quality of life - I like living in a place where crime is virtually non existent. Armed coppers everywhere will alter the vibe, completely unnecessarily.

Safety. I know a few coppers and ex coppers. Few of them are particularly level headed, some of them go out of their way to wind people up. All of them are human and therefore prone to making mistakes, as we all are. I'm not sure arming them is a good idea, unless absolutely necessary. It isn't.

Detrimental to tourism. We want to grow our tourist industry. The IOM is a nice place to visit. Visitors often remark on the friendliness of the locals and the welcome they receive. Having armed police walking around is not friendly, nor welcoming, and it gives a totally false impression of the crime situation on the island.

Above all it's completely unnecessary. It would be difficult to dream up a precaution that was less necessary. It's totally disproportionate to the risk and is nothing more than an ego trip for all involved.

Have you even read the thread?

There is no additional cost.

Not all police will be armed.  It’s like 2 a day and they have had specialist training.  Most police will never be qualified to carry a gun.

Why am I even replying to someone who doesn’t seem to have understood any of what has been posted?

Edited yesterday at 04:54 AM by Tinpot

[Dirty Buggane]

So the two armed police officers are strolling down Strand Street, popping into shops to pick up hemorrhoid cream and a coffee.(not the same shop) and the shout goes out there is a potential threat in Ramsey. A man/women is seen brandishing a vegetable knife in her kitchen and she also has a glass of rosey in hand. Your telling me it is not viable to have the firearms and kit in the lockbox as the time it takes to don it is critical. What about the 20 minutes traveling time. And if they can not manage to get dressed without the risk of shooting themselves and party's around them would suggest they need extra training or are not suitable for fire arm duty. Your analogy would suggest we have a chopper with a sharpshooter up in the air 24/7 just to be tactically ready, we could have a extra pair of officers who could rapel into the situation Mogadishu style if the need arose. 

Edited yesterday at 06:25 AM by Dirty Buggane

[Shake me up Judy]

Didn't one of our past chief constables put in a request for a chopper, just in case one was needed ?

[Derek Flint]

38 minutes ago, Dirty Buggane said:

So the two armed police officers are strolling down Strand Street, popping into shops to pick up hemorrhoid cream and a coffee.(not the same shop) and the shout goes out there is a potential threat in Ramsey. A man/women is seen brandishing a vegetable knife in her kitchen and she also has a glass of rosey in hand. Your telling me it is not viable to have the firearms and kit in the lockbox as the time it takes to don it is critical. What about the 20 minutes traveling time. And if they can not manage to get dressed without the risk of shooting themselves and party's around them would suggest they need extra training or are not suitable for fire arm duty. Your analogy would suggest we have a chopper with a sharpshooter up in the air 24/7 just to be tactically ready, we could have a extra pair of officers who could rapel into the situation Mogadishu style if the need arose. 

I've done the lockbox thing. And the standing authority. The first is fraught, the second is much better. In situations involving deployment of armed officers it needs to be swift, lacking complication and allowing time for effective en route briefing by the Tactical Firearms Commander.

[Dirty Buggane]

10 minutes ago, Derek Flint said:

 lacking complication and allowing time for effective en route briefing by the Tactical Firearms Commander.

So not that urgent then allowing a brief by the "Tactical Firearms Commander" who is disjointed from the Tactical Response unit. To be effective response unit you would of thought they would be joined at the hip, as time is always quoted as the reason for walking around in armed tactical gear.

[WTF]

7 hours ago, Derek Flint said:

There will likely be two of them on duty routinely.

Out of 236.

 

there are never 236 on duty though are there..  2 out of 236 sounds better than 2 out of 50 when you want to make the percentage look lower i guess.

[Tinpot]

28 minutes ago, Dirty Buggane said:

So not that urgent then allowing a brief by the "Tactical Firearms Commander" who is disjointed from the Tactical Response unit. To be effective response unit you would have thought they would be joined at the hip, as time is always quoted as the reason for walking around in armed tactical gear.

Are you even reading the posts you are replying to?  

[Derek Flint]

24 minutes ago, Dirty Buggane said:

So not that urgent then allowing a brief by the "Tactical Firearms Commander" who is disjointed from the Tactical Response unit. To be effective response unit you would of thought they would be joined at the hip, as time is always quoted as the reason for walking around in armed tactical gear.

 

Commanded many spontaneous incidents, have you?

 

Without any knowledge whatsoever of how operational command is structured it might be sensible just to bow out at this stage.

15 minutes ago, WTF said:

there are never 236 on duty though are there..  2 out of 236 sounds better than 2 out of 50 when you want to make the percentage look lower i guess.

Fifty? 

Wow!

 

1 hour ago, Shake me up Judy said:

Didn't one of our past chief constables put in a request for a chopper, just in case one was needed ?

No.

We did examine it as an option around TT 2007 when we were trying to work out how to effectively manage the one way transitions after racing, and some issues where potentially the North of the island could have been cut off in the event of back up being required. But full time? No. 

[Steve_Christian]

16 hours ago, HeliX said:

Over-arming the police isn't a zero-consequence game. The people they end up overzealously shooting are also "children of somebody".

https://abc11.com/post/brooklyn-nypd-subway-shooting-cop-2-bystanders-suspect-shot-police-train-what-began-nyc-mta-fare-evasion-incident/15310039/

I for one am sick of the IOM police killing everyone with their guns on a daily basis. 

[Steve_Christian]

17 hours ago, RecklessAbandon said:

Last I checked, soldiers were part of the armed forces.

And soldiers is a bit of a generic term - RAF Regiment, Royal Marines, etc are "soldiers" but not in the Army.

You’ve never actually served with the RAF Regt then 😂

[HeliX]

47 minutes ago, Steve_Christian said:

I for one am sick of the IOM police killing everyone with their guns on a daily basis. 

It's a risk every time they're deployed. The more often they're deployed, the closer to inevitable it becomes. As can be seen in every country that deploys armed police. Any increase in the armament level of "beat" cops or the number of deployments of the armed response unit must be exceptionally well justified due to this risk.

[Derek Flint]

3 minutes ago, HeliX said:

It's a risk every time they're deployed. The more often they're deployed, the closer to inevitable it becomes. As can be seen in every country that deploys armed police. Any increase in the armament level of "beat" cops or the number of deployments of the armed response unit must be exceptionally well justified due to this risk.

They aren't beat cops

[Gladys]

3 minutes ago, Derek Flint said:

They aren't beat cops

Garage or house then? 

[P.K.]

4 minutes ago, Derek Flint said:

They aren't beat cops

It's clear from the furore on here that far from being reassuring having overtly armed officers mingling with the Manx public is a PR disaster.

Someone needs to put the guns away and then put their testicles on a trowel...