UK Cop visits Detroit

[Kingpin]

Article about a UK cop that has been enthralled by the U.S. police and how different it is.  He chose recently to come to my native Detroit and live a day in the life of a Detroit Police Officer.  To say it was a culture shock is probably understating it.

http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/lo.../78913254/

[The Valkyrie]

Very interesting read.

Thanks for sharing.

[Fidel_Castronaut]

I'm in my late 20s and I saw my first ever gun about 2 years ago outside a high court where they were transporting what I presumed was a dangerous criminal.

The article speaks the truth when it says there is no appetite here for arming police, but that obviously the U.S., and poor inner cities are a different kettle of fish.

A lot of british police are armed with tazers now, though every use of a tazer is usually investigated by an indepdent police body that monitors the use of firearms called the indepdent police complaints commission. Not every murder here makes national news, that's ridiculous.

Knife crime is a problem in certain but not many areas. Most of it, like in Detroit, is contained within poor inner city areas amongst poor communities. I've lived in my current post code for 6 years and the one single reported crime committed within a mile radius of me (according to the police website) was an 'affray' (punch up).

The UK is not a crime free paradise, which I think the article sort of want to implies, but I'd agree that whilst we of course have poverty and the social issues caused as a result, we don't have anything like Detroit.

Fascinating read, though.

[Faith No More]

You can tell how bad Detroit is just by driving down some of the streets. There are large chunks where 1 out of every 4 houses is burned out and/or abandoned. It definitely looks as bad as it is.

Shit, I start wishing I had a gun when I go there.

[abaris]

The article speaks the truth when it says there is no appetite here for arming police, but that obviously the U.S., and poor inner cities are a different kettle of fish.

You know, I never got to the bottom of how the system of officers not carrying firearms came about in the UK. I ask that question for about a decade now and browsed the web intensively for some historic background, but I never found anything of value on the topic.

Do you know where it origins?

[Kingpin]

You can tell how bad Detroit is just by driving down some of the streets.  There are large chunks where 1 out of every 4 houses is burned out and/or abandoned.  It definitely looks as bad as it is.

Shit, I start wishing I had a gun when I go there.

yeah I go down once a month, sometimes more but there are some areas I will never go.  Downtown commercial district isn't bad, but the surrounding neighborhoods, are not safe at all.

[abaris]

Never been there, but by all accounts it moved from boomtown to walking corpse within 2 decades.

[Kingpin]

I'm in my late 20s and I saw my first ever gun about 2 years ago outside a high court where they were transporting what I presumed was a dangerous criminal.

The article speaks the truth when it says there is no appetite here for arming police, but that obviously the U.S., and poor inner cities are a different kettle of fish.

A lot of british police are armed with tazers now, though every use of a tazer is usually investigated by an indepdent police body that monitors the use of firearms called the indepdent police complaints commission. Not every murder here makes national news, that's ridiculous.

Knife crime is a problem in certain but not many areas. Most of it, like in Detroit, is contained within poor inner city areas amongst poor communities. I've lived in my current post code for 6 years and the one single reported crime committed within a mile radius of me (according to the police website) was an 'affray' (punch up).

The UK is not a crime free paradise, which I think the article sort of want to implies, but I'd agree that whilst we of course have poverty and the social issues caused as a result, we don't have anything like Detroit.

Fascinating read, though.

Interesting.  The article also speaks the truth in regards to murders not even being covered by local news.  There are literally so many it's hardly news anymore, more like a footnote next to a sports game.  Also the scene they described of the juvenile with a gun down his pants ready to shoot up a cop car, is literally every day.  I saw my first gun when I was 8 and it was outside my school.  Saw quite a few throughout my school years, both in school and in the neighborhoods.  The struggle is real and in some ways even worse than it's portrayed.

[Kingpin]

Never been there, but by all accounts it moved from boomtown to walking corpse within 2 decades.

Very true.  This article covers it at a high level.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_Detroit

[The Valkyrie]

Aussie cops carry guns, but most Kiwi cops don't.

It can be a bit of a culture shock, both ways.