Law enforcement

Judith Collins talks about an article in The New Republic about crime in New York:

This is worth reading. The New York experience is mirrored in New Zealand over the last 3 years. Policing turned around and the crime rate has dropped to 1982 levels. The prison population, despite our increased penalties for violent, recidivist offenders, has fallen. South Auckland, which was known as “the mean streets” by the media, has turned around. It’s not because of the Lefties, it’s because of the Police and the fact that they stopped having to apologise for doing their jobs. Prevention First in Policing and Policing Excellence are making a lasting difference to many families and communities.

Now that Judith has fixed the Police perhaps she might like to undo the liberal damage in the Courts system.

Looks like we have yet another violent incident involving Vitamin P.

The man shot by police in South Auckland after pepper spray and tasers failed to stop him yesterday is in a stable condition in hospital today.

Willy Smith was taken to Middlemore Hospital with non-life threatening injuries after being shot in both legs following a domestic incident in Clendon Park

Shrugging off pepper spray and a taser…very highly likely Vitamin P involved.

Wouldn’t it be better just to have a law that says that Police should empty their magazine if they have to fire so we make sure bad guys go down and stay down.

Yesterday I looked at the pay differential between Teachers and the lazy, overpaid wharfies. Some pointed out that wharfies have extremely dangerous jobs and hence the larger pay. They clearly haven’t taught year one in a South Auckland primary school let alone Year 10. However since danger is now the bench mark you couldn’t really get a more dangerous job than as a Police Officer.

CareersNZ tells me that Police pay rates are:

Pay varies, but during training police officer recruits earn $32,619 a year (total package $36,149). New graduates from Police College earn $47,600 a year, plus other benefits (total package $53,305). Salaries increase over time and police in higher ranks, such as sergeants, earn more than this.
According to the 2006 Census, police officers earned an average of $55,900 a year and worked an average of 43 hours per week. This includes full and part-time workers.

For that amount of pay they too also work rosters and are on call pretty their entire working lives. For the privilege of $55,900 per annum they get assaulted, stabbed, shot at, and sometimes run over and killed.

Wharfies on the other hand get full medical insurance benefits for their entire family, $91,000 per annum and only have to work 28 hours in every 40 hours rostered. They get to drive cranes and trucks and forklifts and hoists…but no one shoots at them, no one stabs them, no one bites them, no one bashes them for tuning up to sort  a domestic. There really is no comparison is there.

The people we rely on to protect us the most earn about half what a wharfie earns, I don’t think that is acceptable do you?

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The cops are going to crack down on slow drivers:

They’re tough on speeding, drunk and cellphone-using motorists – now police are turning their attention to those below the speed limit.

Officers will aim to keep busy holiday roads moving by keeping an eye on slow drivers, and say those caught holding up traffic could face fines.

National road safety adviser Superintendent Paula Rose said people were welcome to drive slowly but they needed to be courteous by allowing other road-users to pass safely.

“We are acutely aware of how slow drivers can cause frustration and impatience with other drivers, and sometimes people make bad choices to overtake in a bad spot because the person in front has a queue of traffic behind them,” she said.

“When you’ve got car after car behind a driver going 60km, 30km or 20km below the speed limit, all we’re saying is when there’s an safe opportunity to pull over to the side of the road, please, please do so.”

In some cases, slow driving could amount to careless driving, which could lead to fines or licence disqualification, Ms Rose said.

If I was dictator for life I would pass road safety laws that prohibit people with boats, caravans and trailers from travelling in the holiday season, public holidays etc at any times other than between 2am and 6am.

Well not quite. The Police Association want a gun on every Police Officer’s hip, and I support them:

The Police Association says a gun on every constable’s hip could have prevented high-profile shootings of officers, including the death of Senior Constable Len Snee in Napier in 2009.

Mr Snee was shot by Jan Molenaar during a routine search for cannabis that led to a shootout and a siege that lasted more than 24 hours.

Association president Greg O’Connor said that if the officers had been armed, the siege could have been avoided.

“I’ll never be convinced Molenaar would have acted the way he did, had he known the officers were armed.

“With Jeremy Snow [shot four times in December 2009], he couldn’t defend himself and his partner couldn’t defend him either.

“And then the incident in Christchurch [in July last year] with Constable Mitchel Alatalo and Senior Constable Bruce Lamb. Once the shots were fired they had no ability to fight back,” Mr O’Connor said.

In its law and order policy, revealed yesterday, the association called for general arming and more training for the inevitable greater use of firearms.

But if we are to allow this then can we please also look at the right to carry in New Zealand, because if it is dangerous for Police ont eh streets then it is sure as hell more dangerous for the ordinary citizenry.

The streets would become an awful lot safer if we allowed Open Carry for suitably and comprehensively trained citizens.

Judith Collins has introduced legislation to increase the amount that Corrections can dock prisoners pay and apply it to the direct costs of their incarceration:

Currently Corrections can take 30 per cent of a paycheck from a prisoner’s work-to-release programme, up to $269 a week.

“This law change, should it go through, would enable Corrections to charge any prisoner who is earning income in the same way, whether it be through self-employment or an interest in farms or commercial property,” Corrections Minister Judith Collins said.

The bill would not be passed until the next parliamentary term, she said.

“It would be an irresponsible Parliament that didn’t think that prisoners in those situations should be contributing to the vast expense in keeping them locked up.

“If they’re using time in prison to make money, why wouldn’t we expect the taxpayer to be reimbursed? They get a free office, free board, free food.”

Ms Collins said she was not against prisoners working because it helped rehabilitation.

The bill would leave it in the hands of the prison manager and chief executive to decide if the work was appropriate.

“Clearly it would have to be something that was legal,” Ms Collins said.

The Inland Revenue Department would also be able to deduct money from prisoners’ wages for child support bills.

The Police are moving guns from the station to their cars:

A project to make firearms more readily available to frontline police is a step towards “general arming”, the Police Association says.

The project will see existing stocks of Glock pistols and Bushmaster rifles moved from storage in police stations to response vehicles.

Police Association representative Craig Prior, of Christchurch, said the project was a “step forward”.

“It’s a natural progression to what we would prefer – general arming at some stage in the future,” he said.

Prior said the move would make policing safer.

“It gives a tactical option which most officers don’t have access to. They’re entitled to use firearms and trained and qualified to do so, but now they will have access to them should the need arise, which is a good thing,” he said.

Farrar of course has gone all limp-wristed over this. I’d much rather have the guns on the cop’s hips in holsters than sitting in cars. The criminals are already armed, even a slight delay for the Police in protecting themselves is a delay that could get a cop killed.

The problem the Police will have now is providing suitable training for their officers. With pistols especially rounds down range is the key to accuracy.

Police I speak to seem to think so and is it any wonder when you see the turn around happening in the police and the support their minister gives them.

The single biggest thing though that has raised moral was the removal of the two top cops from the bullshit castle and appointing popular and competent senior police into those roles.

Peter Marshall has made an immediate impact by backing his troops and calling for better protection of them and Mike Bush has got proven results in Counties-Manukau by going back to good solid policing tactics. Both men are well respected by their officers and lead from the front not from behind a desk.

Judith Collins is backing them too with her support for the new Commissioner’s comments yesterday.

The minister is backing new Police Commissioner Peter Marshall, who yesterday revealed he intended to grant frontline police greater access to tasers and firearms, as well as relaxing the restrictions on when officers can use tasers.

He wanted lock-boxes in each of 2700-odd frontline police vehicles, each containing a Glock, a rifle, ballistic armour and a taser.

He also wanted police officers to be able to take a taser into a situation, such as a domestic violence, without the current restriction of needing approval from a supervisor via the communications centre.

Ms Collins said Commissioner Marshall had her full support.

“I think he’s absolutely right. I’ve been out with the frontlines a lot. It’s harder to get a taser out than it is to get a Glock out, and frankly that doesn’t make sense to me.

“A taser is a non-lethal option and it should be easier for police officers to be able to take it with them when they go into situations, without necessarily having encountered a threat.

“They should be able to use their discretion and we should be backing them to use their discretion … The public are very aware that the police are not misusing them at all, and that they do save lives, not only members of the public but also offenders.”

It was a ridiculous situation where the Police had to jump through too many hops to deploy a non-lethal devices and very few to deploy a Glock. I know what I’d rather be hit with and that is a taser rather than having a 9mm hole drilled in me.

What we now have with our Police force is a return to confident, competent police chiefs and a minister willing to back them. No wonder there is a huge turn around in moral within the ranks and no wonder that crime over all is dropping with more cops on the street and crims being banged up for longer. Only the truly sad liberal panty-waists are complaining about locking up our crims in jail. most New Zealanders simply want to live in peace and quiet without the predations of the criminal class.

It is little wonder that Judith Collins appears to be the most popular police minister ever.

I see the Government is moving to licence bouncers.

I wonder what the Olympian who is afraid of his own name will do when that law comes in?

He surely can’t be a fit and proper person to hold such a licence.

This law will have a bit of an impact on the current muscle bound gorillas in the pay of gangs frequenting some establishments. A good move I think.

A lot of the current bouncers though already work for security companies and so are already licenced.

Given Phil Goff’s new found love for tough justice like shooting looters and shackling them to shovels for 18 hours a day, I wonder what he proposes for the 15 gang members arrested today in police raids?

a. Put them in stocks
b. Brand them
c. Cut off their hands
d. Stone them
e: The aforementioned summary execution or shackling to shovels