Maybe additionally video recordings by the public are far more commonplace, particularly as whilst smartphones have had video capability for some time, things like Tick-tock mean people are familiar to quick start recording something they see (might be postable and get clicks on their Social Media account) plus private CCTV is cheap these days (with the easy to use online home monitoring systems ...).slowster wrote: ↑29 May 2023, 1:18pm In the 1970s great weight was placed on the evidence of police officers in court, and their integrity was very rarely questioned. That made the work of the police (and the prosecution sevice) a lot easier in getting convictions, but it probably lead to a lot of wrongful convictions. The very high profile miscarriages of justice such as the Guildford Four were probably just the tip of an iceberg. The tip itself received a lot of media and public attention, but the rest of the iceberg went largely undetected.
To give some idea of the degree of faith that the courts had in police witness evidence, the year after the convictions of the Guildford Four were quashed, Lord Denning said in an interview that 'if the Guildford Four had been hanged "They'd probably have hanged the right men. Just not proved against them, that's all".'
The police officers responsible for falsifying and deliberately suppressing evidence in high profile miscarriages of justice in the 1970s and 1980s were not prosecuted or even kicked off the force. The West Midlands Serious Crime Squad, whose officers had been responsible for the Birmingham Six miscarriage of justice, was disbanded but the officers went unpunished. The Met, in particular the CID, had an appalling reputation for corruption, referring to which the commissioner at the time, Sir Robert Mark, said "a good police force is one that catches more crooks than it employs".
Juries are now much less willing to convict solely on police witness evidence, and it is much more likely that a defence barrister will attack the credibility and the honesty of a police officer. Moreover, if there is information that would undermine the credibility of the officer, e.g. serious past misconduct, the prosecution must disclose that to the defence (which probably did not happen in the 1970s and 1980s). Consequently, compared with the 1970s, the police have to do a lot more work recording and gathering evidence and preparing a case for the CPS, and that probably accounts for a significant percentage of the increase in the number of officers.
This means that where previously the Officer's story would have had to be accepted by press and courts, these days when Police make claims about their actions it isn't long before it transpires some observer turns-up with a recording. Police seem to have not yet appreciated this.
Ian