Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

thirdcrank
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by thirdcrank »

ratherbeintobago wrote: 17 Jun 2021, 2:31pm That's probably valid, but I don't know whether that could be as easily automated.

You will be amazed to learn there is a spectrum of views on this on Twitter.
You can probably automate anything, but in a case like this you are just adding an extra layer of admin without IMO achieving much. I suppose the system for preparing NIPs could be modified to include something to the person reporting the alleged offence at the cost of a few more trees and some postage. I'll admit my experience of this dates from the days of carbon paper and typewriters.

I don't bother with twitter.

The elephant in the room here is that by and large, the police service has given up on most traffic enforcement apart from enforcement cameras; if no action is routinely taken against drivers who collide with cyclists, it seems optimistic to expect much action against those who come close to doing so.
Spen
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by Spen »

I've only once considered send footage to the police but when I checked Northumbria Police's website it say you have to supply the actual time of the incident as the time ident on the footage may be wrong! So, having missed serious injury by inches, they expect me to make a note of the time, which assumes that my watch, if I'm wearing one, is more accurate than the time stamp and that I have the presence of mind to check! Don't know why they don't just be more honest and say they don't accept camera footage.
thirdcrank
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by thirdcrank »

I suspect that it's just to avoid the possibility of somebody using a device which zeros all the info eg when the battery is flat or removed. ie It's a matter of proving the recoded info. If it's a device with automatic (GPS?) datestamping then that should be mentioned in evidence. It's simply an example of English courts not taking things for granted.
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TrevA
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by TrevA »

Spen wrote: 26 Jun 2021, 11:05am I've only once considered send footage to the police but when I checked Northumbria Police's website it say you have to supply the actual time of the incident as the time ident on the footage may be wrong! So, having missed serious injury by inches, they expect me to make a note of the time, which assumes that my watch, if I'm wearing one, is more accurate than the time stamp and that I have the presence of mind to check! Don't know why they don't just be more honest and say they don't accept camera footage.
What I do (and I’ve noticed a few Youtubers such as CycleGaz do), is press the lap button on my Garmin if there’s an incident. This will enable you to note the exact time to within a few seconds, that the incident occurred. This does assume that you have a Garmin or similar, though.
Sherwood CC and Notts CTC.
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trinch
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by trinch »

... wrote: ....you have to supply the actual time of the incident as the time ident on the footage may be wrong! ....
On at least a couple of occasions I have added a time calibration after my two sentence description of an incident for A&S. Once for not yet having reset to BST in spring, on another occasion because the camera had rezeroed to 2015 without me noticing. They have accepted this without question. In order to tick the 'is the time stamp correct box' and continue to fill in the form I have phrased the calibration as 'The time stamp is correct with a calibration value of X applied'.

To state time separately you just either assume the video time stamp is correct, or calibrate it later.
ChrisP100
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by ChrisP100 »

From my experience, I think the uptake in use of body worn and bike mounted camera's in general has become ready made excuse for police to do nothing if a complainant/victim isn't one of the many who do have a camera.

I got dangerously cut up by a taxi when they performed a U-turn without looking right in front of a no U-turn sign. Half a second later and I'd have been under the front wheels of the taxi. There are CCTV cameras all around where the incident happened, and I'd noted the exact time of the incident, plus the colour, make, model, VRN and Taxi registration number.

Rang up the police to complain and got 'did you capture it on video'. When I said no that was pretty much as far as it went as the officer explained that effectively it was 'my word against theirs', but there was really nothing they could do apart from raise it as an incident.

Nothing they could do???

There was CCTV everywhere. Surely a simple check using the information I gave them would have been enough to confirm my story. I understand they are under resourced but expecting them to carry out basic police work shouldn't be an exception to the rule.
Darkman
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by Darkman »

ChrisP100 wrote: 6 Jul 2021, 12:40pm From my experience, I think the uptake in use of body worn and bike mounted camera's in general has become ready made excuse for police to do nothing if a complainant/victim isn't one of the many who do have a camera.
I do disagree with you, there.

I was in the car doing the school run once. A white car came zooming up behind me on a bend, almost t-boned another car waiting to pull out at a junction, then got right on my bumper as he was in such a rush he didn't realise I was turning. Came inches away from getting rear-ended.

I have front and rear facing cameras. I got GPS-marked, date/timestamped HD footage of the whole thing, the car's number plate (with LincsFM logos pasted all over it) AND a clear, close-up photo of the driver's face.

Apparently that's "not enough evidence". What the hell *is* enough evidence? A stool sample?

So I generally just throw them on Youtube/twitter now. The police, around here at least, have proven themselves to be a waste of time.
ChrisP100
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by ChrisP100 »

Darkman wrote: 6 Jul 2021, 12:52pm
ChrisP100 wrote: 6 Jul 2021, 12:40pm From my experience, I think the uptake in use of body worn and bike mounted camera's in general has become ready made excuse for police to do nothing if a complainant/victim isn't one of the many who do have a camera.
I do disagree with you, there.

I was in the car doing the school run once. A white car came zooming up behind me on a bend, almost t-boned another car waiting to pull out at a junction, then got right on my bumper as he was in such a rush he didn't realise I was turning. Came inches away from getting rear-ended.

I have front and rear facing cameras. I got GPS-marked, date/timestamped HD footage of the whole thing, the car's number plate (with LincsFM logos pasted all over it) AND a clear, close-up photo of the driver's face.

Apparently that's "not enough evidence". What the hell *is* enough evidence? A stool sample?

So I generally just throw them on Youtube/twitter now. The police, around here at least, have proven themselves to be a waste of time.
I guess it depends on the police force :?

Maybe you try and find out who the guy is insured with and send a copy to their insurer. :D
PM999
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by PM999 »

I think it very much depends on the force concerned. Police Scotland have been in the news recently for refusing to participate in Operation Snap (or similar) despite pressure from organisations such as CUK, The AA and The IAM. A quote from Chief Supt. Louise Blakelock (road safety supremo): "There is no immediate plan to expand existing online reporting mechanisms and allow digital submissions from the public in place of a crime report.” In other words, in Scotland, you have to make a "crime report" before being allowed to submit footage.

I tried it out a couple of weeks ago following an incident in the Borders that I thought worth reporting. Using the "non urgent" Police Scotland "contact us" form, I sent them the Google Drive link below, suggesting a word with the driver might be appropriate. Reply: "Sorry - we can't accept it. Do you want to make a formal complaint?". Equally depressing was when I sent the footage to the vehicle's operator, NHS Scotland. Their Complaints Tsar 'phoned me back, acknowledged it was their vehicle (from the reg. number) and asked me how I wanted to proceed. I suggested that a word with the driver might be in order while reviewing the footage. Mr Tsar told me he hadn't actually seen the footage as they weren't allowed to click through links submitted by 3rd parties. I suggested a couple of alternative ways to view the footage, but to no avail. In the end, I simply gave up.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1msKJo ... ranCRv9qcE

My take on it is that, as far as Scotland is concerned, unless there is physical injury or damage from an incident, forget it.
thirdcrank
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by thirdcrank »

One little thought from me, inspired by my link above to the police inspectorate which describes enforcement based on dashcam footage as "cost-effective." In reality, it's no such thing if talking about cost-effective enforcement rather than cost-effective conning people into believing something is being done.

Compare presence of patrolling police - which may deter offending anyway - which involves alleged offenders being dealt with immediately - be that by arrest; report for summons; issue of fixed penalty; giving advice - with dealing with dashcam/helmetcam footage, which has to be reviewed to check for evidence (reviewed several times if it looks suitable for proceedings) then it's a notice to registered keeper requiring identification of driver and on receipt of the information, possibly a further notice and then unless a prosecution needs no further evidence, it requires an officer, possibly from another force, to interview the driver.

Now, if other priorities have led to the collapse of patrols - not to be confused with the sight of panda cars dashing from call to call - it's hard to see much future in replacing them with something that involves considerably more resources
Pete Owens
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by Pete Owens »

So basically you are saying that the police should only prosecute criminals if they personally witnesss the crime being commited.

I can see that if you are only counting the police time spent on the preosecution you might consider that cost effective. However, you have to also add in the amount of time the police spend wandering about the streets waiting for a crime to be commited in front of their eyes.
thirdcrank
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by thirdcrank »

Pete Owens wrote: 8 Jul 2021, 11:45am So basically you are saying that the police should only prosecute criminals if they personally witnesss the crime being commited.

I can see that if you are only counting the police time spent on the preosecution you might consider that cost effective. However, you have to also add in the amount of time the police spend wandering about the streets waiting for a crime to be commited in front of their eyes.
One: not at all. I'm saying that with regard to traffic enforcement, police doing the enforcing is the most cost effective. A properly-trained police officer witnessing something has the evidence to hand, including knowing how reliable the witness (themselves) will be. They will generally be able to deal with identification on the spot, particularly now that driver licensing is normally online. To take any action on third-party reports, it's necessary to know the strength of the evidence, including the witness. A witness who wants something doing but isn't prepared to give evidence if necessary isn't much help with summary traffic offences.

Two: I must have posted several times before that the the Home Office decided in the twilight of the Major government (and the twilight of my career) that police patrolling was a waste of time. I had to get out of my bed early when I was on nights to trail half way across West Yorkshire to be told. There was something of a public reaction to the result so Baron Blunkett of Brightside invented PCSOs and empowered them to issue tickets for pavement cycling. It's a long, long time since the police spent time wandering about the streets dealing with traffic offences. No doubt people can point to time being wasted on all sorts of things but it's not being spent on traffic offences.

There are various arguments about the effectiveness of police patrolling but if there's one area where it seems to make a difference it's road traffic as anyone with a distant memory of seeing a police car on the motorway will know. One thing I keep coming back to is that once it's taken for granted that the police won't normally investigate collisions, it's weird to expect investigations of near misses.

I'm not suggesting the present carry on is as it should be, just that there's no point not seeing it as it is.
Grumpy-Grandad
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by Grumpy-Grandad »

thirdcrank wrote: 8 Jul 2021, 2:23pm Two: I must have posted several times before that the the Home Office decided in the twilight of the Major government (and the twilight of my career) that police patrolling was a waste of time. I had to get out of my bed early when I was on nights to trail half way across West Yorkshire to be told. There was something of a public reaction to the result so Baron Blunkett of Brightside invented PCSOs and empowered them to issue tickets for pavement cycling. It's a long, long time since the police spent time wandering about the streets dealing with traffic offences. No doubt people can point to time being wasted on all sorts of things but it's not being spent on traffic offences.

There are various arguments about the effectiveness of police patrolling but if there's one area where it seems to make a difference it's road traffic as anyone with a distant memory of seeing a police car on the motorway will know. One thing I keep coming back to is that once it's taken for granted that the police won't normally investigate collisions, it's weird to expect investigations of near misses.

I'm not suggesting the present carry on is as it should be, just that there's no point not seeing it as it is.
Reducing and/or getting rid of Traffic Police Officers has been a very very bad thing.
When CID used to moan about Traffic we could usually shut them up by reminding the shiny trouser bottom 'detective' that it was actually motorists who killed far more people than burglars did ..... and there is far more road traffic legislation than crime legislation ..... for very good reasons :)
Steve
thirdcrank
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Re: Cycle camera submissions - Police up resourcing to deal ?

Post by thirdcrank »

Perhaps the most significant change over the last few decades is the switch from prevention to detection across the board. This seems particularly significant in respect of traffic enforcement where effort is concentrated on investigating only the most serious of crashes. That sounds ok until you realise that if people can routinely drive badly without repercussions, then the accepted standard of what amounts to dangerous or careless driving continues to drop.
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Another point is that quite a lot of people up to no good use motor vehicles to get from home to where they intend to do the deed, sometimes during unsocial hours. I suspect they are unmoved by media releases about police crackdowns and police chase programmes.
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