Police story #1: Burglary suspects on scene

Good evening guys,

As I said in my intro I'd post some real life stories from my five and a half years working for the police on the front line and in the 999 call centres so here's my first one. Of course I will not be mentioning names, borough etc but I'm sure this will not detract anything from the post. This particular story is about someone who suffered with mental health so I've decided to give you a bit of background on it. If however you want to skip to the actual story then by all means. I've noted where the story starts in capitals so you won't miss it.

It never dawned on me how much of an issue mental health is in London. I'd completed a twelve week training course at Hendon and then moved on and completed a five week coaching course at the same location but that was with favourable shifts as you might imagine with very little night duty so although it's very helpful to newbies it's not a true reflexion on what you deal with in my opinion. Alternatively I could've just had a very quiet five weeks, who knows.

After my first week on the phones independently it really opened my eyes and changed the way I carry myself in the street and act towards people I don't know to a certain extent. This is in all boroughs not just one in particular I might add.

Almost every other call I would get would be someone who was suffering with either schizophrenia, depression, personality disorder or a mixture of the above. This is particularly bad whilst on night duty where we have less staff on so you can imagine the strain in puts on all three call centres. It was always really frustrating to me as there was nothing I could do to help other than a chat. To be honest that's what a lot of people would call up to do for various reasons but the main reason I found from experience is simply because they had no one to turn to. Their families may have given up on them and stopped connecting with them for whatever reason or they've been sectioned and hadn't made any friend's in the hospital or no one was prepared to acknowledge them as a human being and have a proper conversation with them.

I'll be completely honest, of course I wouldn't be sitting there on 999 chatting to someone who is clearly ill on the phone whilst there are calls waiting from someone who could be in need of serious help. My job was to assess the call asap, make a decision on wether it's a police matter or not and deploy a unit to the location if one is required, if not I end the call and move on the next one. Yes I have had to clear the line on a lot of these callers but it pained me to do so each time. The best I could do was to flag it up to a dedicated team to review and they would then liaise with various agencies outside of the police to get someone to make contact with the person and assist where possible. Better than nothing eh.

Upon doing some research I found a report from 2014 which states thats 1 in 4 people in the country does or will suffer with some form of mental health problems during their lifetime. The latest update on London's population I found was in late 2016 which states there were 8.63 million people living in London at the time. That means that roughly 2.15 million people would suffer from mental health issues at some point in their lives. Wow, just wow!

You can read the full report here if you wish.

https://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/gla_migrate_files_destination/Mental%20health%20report.pdf

Eventually, I found the role on the phones and radio too frustrating and not hands on enough so I successfully passed my officer training and am proud to be a response officer now. You can't help everyone but I now have the ability to really have a positive affect on someone's life. I've come across some very sick people who I've had to section and take to a place of safety and then the some really lovely people who you wouldn't even know were remotely sick who have randomly switched on myself and my colleagues at the time and tried to really harm us or the public. I think the thing I enjoy the most about my job is that I can look at someone who is in the worst place imaginable in their life, look him/her in the eye and says "it's going to be alright... here's what I'm going to do for you" and list all the different options I have at my disposal to help rather then just put the phone down. Their aren't many professions out there which give you that feeling. I love my job...... yes and driving fast cars with the blue lights and sirens too lol

I'll put up some helpful links at the end of the post if you want some help with mental health. It's nothing to be ashamed of and there are loads of people out there who can help. Do not suffer in silence.

.......STORY BEGINS......

Just a shot of my warrant card badge to confirm I am what I say I am. I'm not going to post the full image for obvious reasons but if you have any doubts I'm very sure a long standing, valued member of Steemit in the shape of @colosuss39 will vouch for me :)

So it was approximately 2am in the morning on a Thursday night I think. It was pretty quiet, not many calls coming in and my team and I were just talking rubbish and killing time as best we could. I suddenly got a buzz in my ear to indicate a call had just been transferred through to me. I greeted it the normal way, was it was on 999 I said, "Hello police, what is your emergency?".

In a quiet calm voice a woman spoke. She sounded approximately fifty years old to me and had quite a posh tone to her voice. She was well spoken. He said "I've been burgled. I have just been woken up by a man in my house."

I quickly set up the relevant fields on our call handling systems to indicate the crime of burglary and as she had called from her home phone I already had her address so I asked her confirm the address and that it was there where the offence took place etc. She replied yes so off we go.

I next asked her how long ago this happened. She said just now and the man was still in the house. I immediately passed the incident through to our dispatch department on what we call an "I grade". This indicates that I have graded the call for immediate deployment and if the dispatcher who acknowledges the incident agrees with me then he/she will put the call out over the radio and look for a unit to attend on blue lights and sirens. With regards to this call the dispatcher did agree with me and it was put out. A unit was assigned within seconds. (FYI, an I grade call must be reached within 15 minutes of the call coming in to me)

I then asked her to describe the man to me so I could send that over to dispatch and get them to circulate it to the units attending in case he does a runner. We have system whereby I can send and receive messages to and from dispatch whilst I'm on a live call incase you wondered.

The lady provided me with a pretty amazing description and I sent that over. At the same time I tagged in a couple of extra requests on my screen. I asked for a dog unit to attend and also a helicopter given it was early morning and pitch black. Both requests were granted and I think there were about four units now assigned to the call, so eight officers in total deployed plus the dog van and helicopter.

I then asked her what was going on and if she could hear anything etc to which she replied no. I asked her if she was ok and needed an ambulance or anything to which she again said no but she said something like "I need you to get here quick as this man has a gun, he showed me it!"

Instantly I let the firearms boys know and they also deployed a unit. CID were made aware and of course forensics. Almost half of the borough were going to this call now and most of my team had my incident up on the screens to see what I was up to etc.

My job here was almost done, There was nothing further to do other than stay on the call until the unit arrives. I was getting updates all the time and one of the officers put up a radio message saying they were about two minutes out.

I relayed the above information to the lady who instantly sounded relieved and thanked me for my efforts, said how the police are amazing etc but then she dropped a one liner right at the end which made my ears prick. She said "It's a shame you'll never catch him".

I asked her why she thought that given she has told me he's still in the house and officers were very close to now.
She said the following and I remember it word for word. "You won't catch him as he's just gone through my adjoining wall and I think he wants to rape my neighbour!".

I asked how he went through the wall, if he had a tool on him or if she had a door which joined the two properties together like some really old houses in that area do. She said no to all of the above and then the moment the penny dropped. She said "he's gone through my wall. He's some kind of ghost whose managed to take his gun there too. I'm sure my neighbour's dead now. Thank you for your help today, I'll check on her in the morning!" then she hung up!

No word of a lie, The poor lady suffered with dementia and had never come to police notice before so there wasn't any intelligence on her or her address, rest assured there is now!!

I updated dispatch who scaled down all of the units and the additional resources other than the closest one so that they conduct a welfare check on her. She was perfectly fine in her bed and her neighbour wasn't even in the country at the time. Needless to say I took a ribbing for a few days after that one but honestly the lady sounded so ridiculously "normal" it's untrue. I wish I could access and post the 999 recording of it for you guys but obviously that's not going to happen.

That is just one of many. This kind of thing happens all the time. My next story is a cracker which I am to put up around the end of the week. I'm calling in Karma and it's funny unless you're the guy in it! I'm wanting to add a lot more pictures to help with the read so is going to take a little longer than this one did.

Mental Health Assistance Links:

https://turn2me.org/onlinecounselling/details?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIssmAuNz72QIVZbXtCh2fvweeEAAYAyAAEgKugfD_BwE
https://www.lookahead.org.uk/our-services/services-we-provide/mental-health/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIssmAuNz72QIVZbXtCh2fvweeEAAYBCAAEgLumfD_BwE
https://www.anxietyuk.org.uk
https://www.thecalmzone.net - aimed at males between the age of 15-35
https://www.depressionalliance.org
https://www.menshealthforum.org.uk
https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk
https://www.nopanic.org.uk - great for panic attack sufferers
https://www.samaritans.org.uk
https://www.sane.org.uk/support - They offer support to sufferers and their families too!

I'd just like to say I'm sure there are many more out sources of help out there but the ones about the just the ones I have come across in the past, mainly through work and some in my private life assisting friends etc.

I hope you've enjoyed this post and if not then I'm sure this photo of my breakfast is worth an upvote all on it's own lol

Until next time guys!

Over and out.