Last night this came in the form of someone who was turning up at a Shepherd's Bush drinks thing that a bunch of us who live locally went along to. This person, on the way to the Raving Buddha pub on Goldhawk Road witnessed a violent and unprovoked assault by one woman on another. The woman doing the assaulting was carrying the ubiquitous can of lager sold by one of the off licences who keep applying for ever later alcohol licenses, and took place at the bus stop where this bottling took place - the inevitable result of those sales.
Bad? Yes, but it was made worse by the racial abuse that was heard to be directed at the victim before her headscarf was violently ripped off and she was assailed by punches until passers by intervened. But it was even worse because at least two people called the local police - and they didn't come. Witnesses drifted away as people who had hung around to try to help the victim tried to flag down at least 3 passing police cars - who ignored them and carried on driving.
Around half an hour later we did from the pub see a police van arrive, lights flashing, and then drive away again. Because nobody was there anymore. Who knows how that will be measured in their statistics, and frankly who cares.
I have a huge respect for the police here, who routinely face horrendous situations on our behalf such as this incident involving a man carrying a bottle full of what was suspected to be acid or ammonia just this week. But failing to turn up at a report of a woman being battered in an alcohol fuelled racially aggravated incident?
Perhaps that is what these cuts to police numbers are going to look like then.
This kind of stuff happens all the time with police, they regularly screw up. I tried reporting serious and prolonged harassment against me by a neighbour in Westminster once. The police at Paddington station literally did not want to know and made any excuse they could not to get involved, as was the same with the station on Harrow Road.
ReplyDeleteOnce I was in a private consultation with a surgeon on Harley Street concerning possible surgery. After 15 minutes the consultation was over. The surgeon said not only could he not help me but he wanted 220 pounds for the consultation. I told him I wasn't prepared to pay that. He looked furious, grabbed the phone on his desk and said to his secretary, "call the police, please". I told him it was a civil matter, and he replied "we'll see about that", wandered over to me and grabbed me in a headlock. Then two other male staff and the secretary ran in. The two male staff pinned me against the wall and punched me in the body as the surgeon bent my arm behind my back until it almost broke. When the police arrived they arrested me and took me to Marylebone station. The police didn't interview all the witnesses on the scene, and the CPS ignored ridiculous lies and irregularites in the doctor and staff statements, but I was charged with common assault against the surgeon. I wasn't guilty and that is how I plead. A year later, two days before the court hearing and after tens of thousands of public money had been spent, the doctor pulled out of the case and that was it - no questions asked about the doctor. I didn't waste my time taking him to the GMC.
My fiancée once rang 999 about something fairly serious happening on Uxbridge Road. Despite the location of the incident being outside the police station (and telling them this), the 999 operative kept asking for the postcode... which she obviously didn't know...
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