Weekly reviews by a student officer

Week 4

Tue, 30 Jul 2019 19:54:18 +0000

Week 4 was certainly an interesting one. It saw my first arrest for drink driving, once again looking for a missing person who was allowed to walk out of where she was being cared and also saw me attend a nasty domestic between a mother and son. I am now confident is how to deal with missing people and compact, I feel confident in dealing with drink drivers but I am still a little unsure on domestics. I have been to a few now but there is something about them that I just cannot seem to grasp. Perhaps it is the pure desperation that these people are experiencing and I am the only person that they can turn to to sort out their lives when they are at rock bottom. Hopefully I will be able to get the hang of them and deliver the service that those victims expect of me. The excitement and thrill of being a police officer was not wearing thin as it is a job like no other however I was becoming mentally and physically exhausted and the demand on the body and brain was one I had never imagined. Despite this it is such an exciting job that you just forget about how drained you are and get on with it, leaving work knowing that you might have made a difference to someone’s life is enough for me. You most certainly get dunked in the deep end on your 10 weeks but the excitement of it all leaves me itching for the next shift.

Week 3

Tue, 30 Jul 2019 19:34:08 +0000

Week 3 saw me grow in confidence at jobs and experience my first bit of confrontation although not physical just a heated exchange of words. I have never really been a very confrontational person and coming into the job I was a little worried about how I would react in those situations however I felt that I managed the situation well and with a little help from Alan all was resolved and the suspect taken to custody. This week saw me experience Berrywood for the very first time and I am sure it will not be the last. The woman we were looking for just walked straight out of the hospital even though she was sectioned, I cannot understand how this was allowed to happen however that is not for me to worry about it is for me to find them, make sure they are safe and well and return them to the hospital. Week 3 saw my first foot chase although running 50 meters after a very drunk 14 year old who had sprung out of the police car, I am not sure it really counts. Dealing with her was a challenging job. There was absolutely no reasoning with her which was tough and trying to make her see sense was just falling on deaf ears. Eventually Alan and I left her with her mother and advised that if she had any more problems to call us. I visited my first prison which was an exciting job and one that I will certainly not forget. What I have realised this week is that being a police officer entails so much more than fighting and solving crime; I feel like I am a counsellor, a metal health nurse, an ear for those who have no one else among other things but the thing that I am enjoying most about this job is how varied it is from day to day. I've been worried about the massive pressure to get everything right but I've had so much advice and support from everyone in my team already that even after 3 weeks I feel part of the furniture.

Week 2

Tue, 30 Jul 2019 19:32:40 +0000

This week saw me work my first ever night shifts, something that I was certainly not looking forward to when I became operational and was not sure how I would cope with them. It is safe to say that although they are a shock to the system it is the early shifts that are the worst! I was still at the stage where I was more comfortable watching and learning from Alan as this is how I have always best learnt however towards the end of the week I was a lot more confident on being the first one into the incident. Two weeks in and already two sudden deaths down. I knew that this was part of the job but certainly didn’t think they would come around like this! Having taken the lead on my second I now feel confident in what to do at sudden deaths. This week also saw my first domestic assault which proved very difficult to handle as not only was it at 0600 and I was extremely tired but also the IP being hysterical I found it hard to cope. Nonetheless I coped well and onto the next. I nicked my second drug driver which was very satisfying and again confident in the drug drive procedure. All round a pretty good week and looking forward to the next.

Week 1

Tue, 30 Jul 2019 19:29:37 +0000

Week 1 of being an operational police officer certainly saw me out of my depth and struggling to come to terms with the position I was now in, however, it was also the most exhilarating and interesting week. It was an uphill battle from the very beginning, trying to remember the training we had been given but also trying to bring the human being element into it as well. Week 1 involved my first arrest, a warrant on a shipping container, first domestic, a hate crime, a sudden death and a high risk missing person enquiry.

My first arrest was a terrifying experience however it was something that will stay with me forever. I feel that it went well and I was able to remember all my training and the correct processes whilst dealing with the arrested male. When I was called to attend a sudden death I was terrified about how I was going to deal with it as I had never seen someone dead before. Looking back on it I will admit that I was verging on being in shock when we arrived and although the family dealt with it well I did not really know what to say to them. It was a massive learning curve and feel ready to lead on the next.

The main struggle for me this week has been getting to grips with the computer systems. Having had our training on this before Christmas and completely forgetting how to use it, it has been extremely difficult and almost embarrassing having to keep asking people how to work it. I do feel a little more comfortable on it however still have a long way to go to figuring it all out.

It is a massive emotional and physical drain dealing with so many different people day in day out, most of whom are at rock bottom, however what I have certainly learnt from this week is that the main skill in becoming a good police officer is your ability to talk and engage with people.