Port of Tilbury-Police Constable

[Fedster + 1,307]

Essex Police is encouraging volunteer officers to join CID. Ian Weinfass spoke to two of those who have joined up to see what they think so far.

Special constables Michelle Hill and Luke Howard

Date - 7th September 2018
By - Ian Weinfass - Police Oracle

 

Two specials recruited into CID teams are providing a valuable contribution, their force says.

As reported earlier this year, Essex Police is encouraging volunteer officers to become detectives.

It has recruited two specials to the roles so far, though it was aiming for six, but says both investigators are doing well.

A force spokesman said: “We will continue to recruit to the remaining posts and hope that the positive experience of our two current special detectives will help us attract others to the role.”

The idea is the detectives undertake investigation work, attend incidents, take statements, become officer in the case, and eventually take the national investigators’ exam.

Special Constable Michelle Hill started with CID in Southend in April, having first become a special in 2008. She had previously had a spell with detectives in nearby Grays from 2014, and hopes to take her NIE in November.

She told Police Oracle: “What I particularly enjoy about working in CID is that as a special generally we stop at the point of handover.

“When we’ve been at an incident, we arrest somebody and take them into custody and we never hear about it unless it goes to court. You don’t get the conclusion you only get part of the story.

“I think the benefits of being a special in CID is you see the start of it and then you see it all the way through to charge to court as well, the whole process.”

SC Luke Howard, a train driver in his full time job, has been a special for four years and started as a detective in Harlow in July.

“It’s great being out on the street but I never saw what was going on in the background and processing people through and seeing it through to the end,” he said. “I’ll go out there and nick people, that’s great but I want to take ownership of it. I want to see real bad people taken off the streets and that’s the reason why I joined.”

He is learning for his PIP1 accreditation.

Both detectives remain warranted officers and keep up with their accreditation in different uniformed specialisms too.

The special detectives do juggle their duties with full time jobs, but SC Hill, a consultant in strategy and commissioning for vulnerable adults points out that her day job is flexible and enables her to come in even when her shift.

How do they think the regular detectives in their teams have taken to them?

“They had a lot of questions,” said SC Hill. “I think going up the chain the DSs and DIs realised that with resources reducing having extra resources to add resilience to the team was a good thing.

“We also bring in outside skills as well, fresh in with a different set of eyes. We had another special in [2014] from an IT background, I come from a vulnerable adults and strategic background and we could use those skills in our work.”

SC Wilson added: “The team I’m with are brilliant. Other teams [in the building] have asked questions: they don’t know and they want to know."

But overall: “They know it’s an extra body for them, they know I’m not there to take their job away they know I’m there to support them.”

I View On Police Oracle

[Radman + 2,163]

Quote

“I think the benefits of being a special in CID is you see the start of it and then you see it all the way through to charge to court as well, the whole process.”

Specials should be doing this anyway when time is available.

All the Specials I've tutored over the years and have gone out with me deal with incidents from start to finish, arresting, house searches, suspect interviews, seeking charging decisions etc.

I don't understand how this can be promoted as some new or innovative idea, Specials should be actively involved in investigations and processes.

Edited September 7, 2018 by Fedster
odd formatting removed

[Billy Blue Tac 170]

Interesting that it only says SC Hill is taking the NIE but no mention is made of ICIDP which I thought would be the logical progression.

[Buck + 293]

1 hour ago, Radman said:

Specials should be doing this anyway when time is available.

All the Specials I've tutored over the years and have gone out with me deal with incidents from start to finish, arresting, house searches, suspect interviews, seeking charging decisions etc.

I don't understand how this can be promoted as some new or innovative idea, Specials should be actively involved in investigations and processes.

They should but aren't. It is just not common practice in my current force for SCs to get involved past handover. There's nothing explicitly stopping it but the defacto standard is they don't for whatever historical reason and no-one is pushing anything to change on that side. I personally find it odd coming from Cheshire where i used to carry a case load and occasionally held files all the way through if my shift frequency sufficed at the time. Neither force trained me in interviews although I did a few in Cheshire after BTP trained me, but that is no longer recognised so i can't interview again... 

[Indiana Jones + 1,082]

Interesting that it only says SC Hill is taking the NIE but no mention is made of ICIDP which I thought would be the logical progression.

One thing at a time. Let's get the NIE done first.

[Zulu 22 + 4,571]

And when the going gets tough the Special can just walk away, so it has been throughout the ages and always will be.

[Indiana Jones + 1,082]

Because no regular officer ever did that eh?
You never know; they might surprise you.