Policeman
by
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One corner of the car park gave access to an alleyway at the back of a parade of shops. It was a jumble of rubbish bins and discarded cardboard boxes of all shapes and sizes. I moved forward quietly and decided not to switch my torch on. When it is dark the light from a torch can be seen miles away. At the same time, the alleyway was the sort of place that a health and safety officer would have nightmares about. So, I switched my torch on. Then, I stopped suddenly. There was a slight sound of movement up ahead. At night, there are always things that can make you jump. Darkness can conjure up all sorts of strange sights and innocent shapes and shadows can appear to be sinister and threatening. I took a few steps forward and my torch picked up the face of a man in the darkness. He was hiding in an alcove, two or three metres from me and partially covered by a large cardboard box. It was not easy to see him. The man was dressed in dark coloured clothes, black or dark blue. He was holding a torch in his right hand and using his left hand to try and cover his face. The beam of my torch picked up the glint of a large knife lying on the top of a cardboard box next to him. Suddenly, he stood up and at the same time I reached for my truncheon. There are situations in boxing where both parties spend a lot of time on defensive moves, ducking and diving, weaving and bobbing but do not get around to actually landing any punches. Anybody who had been watching us would guess that we were doing some sort of strange ritual dance around each other. My first thought was that he was going to attack me but it appeared that he was more scared than me. ‘Don’t hit me,’ he said in a frightened voice. ‘What are you doing here?’ I asked. He said nothing and the two of us circled one another like gladiators for a few more seconds. Something told me that this might be a good time to grab the knife so I moved forward quickly, picked it up and dropped it into my raincoat pocket. It went through my mind that he might not be on his own. The beam from my torch picked up a hole in the door at the back of the shop but there was no sign of anyone else. I grabbed his left arm and told him that he was under arrest. Something made me think about the Judges’ Rules so I quickly babbled out a caution and he said ‘There is no need to grab hold of me. I won’t give you no trouble.’ While walking him back to the station in the Broadway, I asked him for his name and address. He told me that his name was William Edwards and he lived in Eastleigh. My main worry was that he might suddenly break loose and run for it but he made no attempt to escape. At the station I spoke to the station sergeant, Sergeant Hunter, showed him the knife and gave him a brief account of the arrest. The sergeant told me to search Edwards and put him in a cell. It seemed to me that if we could not prove a burglary we could charge him with Possession of Housebreaking Implements by Night. The offence then known as HBI by Night for short was a useful piece of preventative legislation and unusual under English Law because the legal onus was on defendants to prove that they were in possession of the implements for a lawful purpose. Sergeant Hunter wrote up the custody record for Edwards and told me that he wanted to have a look at the shop. At that point, I could not even put a name to it. ‘Peter Swift, Shoe Repair Shop.’ We checked the front of the shop and could see that it had not been touched. We then went to look at the back of the shop. The sergeant took a look at the hole in the back door. There was a window near the door and this gave access to a toilet inside the shop. Looking closely, we could see a large number of putty fragments scattered all around and we realised that Edwards had been using the knife to scrape away the putty from the window pane. By removing the pane intact he would have avoided smashing the glass and making a noise. This was a variation on another trick by burglars. There were others who preferred to ‘paper’ the glass and then hit it. After our visit to the scene, it was time to interview Edwards. I asked him whether he would like to make a written statement. He agreed to make a statement and told me that he wanted to confess to a second break-in at a company office in the centre of Winchester. By this time, I had become quite confident at recording written confessions. So, I started writing.
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About the Book
The story starts with a terrorist bomb at Chelsea Barracks. Then the author takes us back to his first days as a trainee constable, learning the basics: Do the trainees know the legal definitions of the crimes that they will be faced with? Do they know whether there is a power of arrest? This is a fascinating story of the world of policing, which starts in the 1960s and jumps forward to the twenty-first century. Working in urban and rural parts of Hampshire, Richard Ramsay does his best to prove himself as a young constable. He soon finds that police work can be a place of high drama and that police officers can be pitched into situations of danger. There is plenty of humour, but horror and tragedy also make frequent appearances. Although Britain has a high crime rate, its police officers patrol the streets unarmed, something that usually surprises visitors from abroad. There is some historical perspective, with politics and social change in the background. After nearly six years in Hampshire, the author transferred to the Metropolitan Police, and in central London, he was destined to face a whole new series of challenges. This would include working in plain clothes combating street crime, facing major urban rioting, and keeping the capital safe from terrorists. Later, as an experienced inspector, he worked at Scotland Yard, carrying out projects aimed at improving policing methods in the Met. Towards the end of the book, there is some ‘catching up’ to be done when Richard Ramsay meets up with two of his classmates from the class of ’64 and adds some of their experiences to the story. This is an accurate account of events through the eyes of someone who was there when things happened.
About the Author
Richard Ramsay was working in a London bank when he decided to do something different. From his first day in the Hampshire Police as a new recruit, he realised that he had started doing a job that would be unlike anything that he had experienced before. This was a world where he and his fellow probationers would be continually tested and would need to prove themselves. It was also a place where they might face danger or high drama in the middle of a mundane, routine patrol. Horror, humour, and tragedy all made frequent appearances. The author describes the process of learning how the world of policing works, which he describes as a giant jigsaw puzzle. As time goes on, a picture emerges as the pieces of the jigsaw start fitting together. People seem to have an insatiable curiosity and interest in police fiction in written form, radio, television, and cinema. However, the author believes that, overall, the portrayal of police work in the media is not authentic. After six years in Hampshire, the writer transferred to London and spent the rest of his service in the Metropolitan Police. In central London he faced a whole new series of challenges, including plain-clothes work combating street crime, dealing with urban rioting, and keeping the capital safe from terrorists. Later, he spent four years at Scotland Yard, where he worked on a number of projects that examined policing methods and researched more effective ways of doing things. He retired from the police service in 1994. The author has a wife and two daughters and lives in the London area.