cracked:
Over the first eight months of 2015, American police killed 776 people, while British police killed exactly one. American police are eight times as likely to kill a citizen, and ten times as likely to die on the job, as their essentially unarmed British counterparts.
We wanted to get an idea of just why this was, so we spoke to Charley Clark, who spent nearly a decade as a police constable and a detective constable in Hackney, one of the most deprived and dangerous boroughs in London. Naturally, as we were writing about how much safer the UK is with its lack of guns, despite having a commensurate percentage of unstable potential criminals, this happened. But the fact that the attacker is alive to face trial is a testament to the police involved and to how long it takes Trojan, the British Police armed response teams, to arrive. The suspect was armed – the arresting officers were not. Welcome to policing, British-style.
WARNING: TONS OF BRITISH SLANG AHEAD.
DID PETER GRANT WRITE THIS
Also this is classic Vimes-level de-escalation:
“The conversation went something like this:
Him: Well go on, fucking search me, then! I know you want to.
Me: Not really, squire. I was pretty much hoping not to have to take my hands out of my pockets today.
Him: You wot?
Me: You got anything naughty on you?
Him: Fucking search me, fed. Find out.
Me: Nah, your word’s good enough for me. Got some folks here worried about you, John.
Him: Ain’t you going to cuff me up?
Me: Hadn’t planned to. You want to do anything that’ll need cuffing?
Him: No.
Me: Well then. All settled. Let’s get you to a hospital, shall we?
“And basically, that was that. No handcuffs, no shouting, and, most critically, no guns. John got treatment at the local mental health wing and was fine until the next time he went off his meds.”
(I didn’t realise that the US police forces were so different from the UK. Peter Grant/Sam Vimes talking about ‘policing by consent’ didn’t seem so far from the Australian approach, but I’d have to talk to a cop mate of mine to find out if Australia uses Peel’s approach. She did clap her hands in gleeful recognition when I read her chapter one of Rivers of London, though.)
