Posts by Matthew Poole
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Muse: Hey Greg O'Connor, Krup You!, in reply to BenWilson,
For sure, but hitting an injured person right where they are injured (or indeed hitting them at all) is a fucked up idea
Indeed. Though I was left with the distinct impression that the complainant was so drunk that he didn't know he was injured.
I was surprised at the acquittal on all charges, given that other officers also testified, but I wasn't in the courtroom so I didn't hear all the evidence. So many charges against one officer definitely looks bad, however. The outcomes of the IPCA and internal inquiries will be interesting.
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Muse: Hey Greg O'Connor, Krup You!, in reply to BenWilson,
Sure doesn’t, when a cop is acquitted for kneeing a prisoner so hard in the balls that one of them resembled “mashed potatoes” to the doctor who saw him immediately afterward.
He wasn't acquitted on that count at all. The charge was dropped before the jury got the case due to some quite conflicting evidence as to when the injury may have occurred. Being kicked in the groin multiple times vs what was never described as more than a single, hefty application of knee? Yeah, I wouldn’t want to be deciding who caused what injuries with that one.
And at least a jury did get to consider the case. Once Power’s wet dream of process “improvement” legislation goes through, common assault will be judge-alone and then we’ll get to hear all about how the system protects its own – even though the public came to a conclusion in this case that will surely grate with many of the popo-hating folk who frequent parts of NZ.
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Hard News: Locking in the Future, in reply to Steve Barnes,
“Yes Sir, I am now but I was a policy analyst by training and you know how tough times are”
That's a good point. A lot of the residents of 180 Molesworth Street aren't holders of "the office of Constable", they're analysts and various other support functionaries required to keep the 10,000 sworn staff operating.
The number of sworn police officers makes Mainfreight look like a very minor suburban trucking firm, but I still can't see the Board being happy to disband all the admin functions that keep them running. -
Hard News: Locking in the Future, in reply to Graham Dunster,
When business is the only agenda in society we all suffer, eventually
You mean like when the head of Mainfreight suggests that Police National HQ should be closed down and the residents distributed to the front line? What’s scary is that the likes of Joyce listen to such men.
I would like to know, though, how they’d determine and report on the outcome improvements from putting so many more bodies on the streets (I suspect it’d work out to about two extra cops per station if they were handed out evenly) once all the useless bureaucrats were stripped of their exalted positions and sent out with the rank and file.
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Southerly: A Tsunami False Alarm at 2.00…, in reply to Dinah Dunavan,
A second aside, apparently these volunteer firebrigaders never get any trauma counseling. Even after attending a burning vehicle (driver inside), or a suicide.
It’s available to all NZFS personnel, volunteer or career. I was repeatedly reminded of the availability of trauma counselling while I was a volunteer. Every region has on-call counsellors, and the contact details should be posted in every station.
It’s hard with volunteers because they have “real” lives to get back to when they return to the station, but the resources are available. I know of volunteer officers who’ve arranged to have a counsellor waiting at the station on the crew’s return from particularly rough calls, but you cannot force people to undergo routine counselling. It’s counter-productive, for one thing.ETA: Also don't think that "proper" counselling is the only possible option. Emergency services personnel informally debrief all the time. In a vehicle leaving the job, on the side of the road, over a beer in the station bar, the ways and places are many. Volunteer brigades have strong internal connections, and they support their own. Talking with someone is a matter of picking up the phone and asking.
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Hard News: Perverse Entertainment, in reply to Steve Ballantyne,
It also led to Gordon McLauchlan outing him in the Herald in the early 2000s
Ah, yes. The wailing and gnashing of teeth was wondrous to behold.
As for nicknames, Bedwetter originated from Usenet time, did it not?
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Hard News: Perverse Entertainment, in reply to Russell Brown,
I remember Usenet before Redbaiter.
I think I do, too, but I'm not entirely certain. The trolls do tend towards a certain sameness that renders them somewhat unmemorable individually.
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Hard News: Perverse Entertainment, in reply to Leopold,
I always assumed that he was a lefty running reductio ad absurdum commentary on Mr Farrar’s posts
He's been doing it since long before blogs were the done thing. If "he" (assuming a singular male, rather than some kind of cabal) is a lefty, he's remarkably durable. Most people run out of steam after a few years of pretending to such vitriolic biliousness.
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Hard News: Perverse Entertainment, in reply to Sam F,
So it's possible these days to access Redbaiter's insanity in one central web location, rather than having to ferret it out manually from blog comments? I feel old.
Once upon a time, those of us who're really old in intertube time (I'm probably roughly Jurassic, or maybe Triassic, but some of the other dinosaurs of NZ's internet scene are more like Devonian) encountered Redbaiter through usenet. Back when he was the scourge of lefty wets throughout the nz.* space.
You kids and your blogs. It's so cute and new-fangled :P
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Southerly: A Tsunami False Alarm at 2.00…, in reply to Russell Brown,
As she said, who wants to wait five minutes to find out whether it’s a tsunami?
Five minutes could be two or three minutes too late. In Japan, that would've cut in half the length of time some people had to get to higher ground.