POLICE EVIDENCE.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2636, 20 June 1877, Page 2

POLICE EVIDENCE.

A policeoian has to swear himself up iihe ladder of his profession, from a simple constable to sergeant, from a sergeant to a sub inspector, and so on. The conrictions which he has been instrumental in obtaining are good conduct marks, He counts the scalps he has taken, and goes up over the heads of comrades whose consciences hare not proved so tough as his own. Remembering this, let the reader just conceive the awful position in which those people are placed who chance to reside on a " beat " where two constable are running each other close for promotion. It is a neck-and-neck affair. One more offender captured and brought to justice will settle the matter. The offender is usually soon found, but unfortunately very often he is the wrong man, or she is the wrong woman, as the case may be. When a mistake like this occurs, the consequences are very painful, for the constable cannot, or what amounts to the same thing, will not, acknowledge, his error, of course it iq a very distressing thing for an honest women (and there are very many honest women, even ajnong the poor) to be charged with outraging public decency, or for. a man to be accused of having been drunk and disorderly, when; he has merely had an innocent fit of apoplexy or the like. Quite recently an inoffensive person wai accused of being drunk, when ike evidence clearly established that it his. foot, not his head, still lesi hit heart, that was the peccant part of him. .■ The poor man' had corns. He had been merely foolish, not criminal. He had* worn a tight boot. Perhaps even this was not so much his fault as that of his bootmaker. But the awkwardness of his gait as he wended his painful way to l:is quiet home, where the comfortable slipper awaitod him, caught the watchful eye of the police, and they " ran him in" (the poor wretch could scarcely hobble), and he did not get his slippers that night. This is a particularly striking example. But mistakes similar in kind, if not quite so outrageous in degree, are constantly occurring. If the yictim has a decent '

. coat, and can summon to aid-witnesses of good position, the mistake is usually set ' right. But a ragged collar once in the ' strong grasp of the law is comparatively > seldom set free. The mere asseveration i of innocence, unsupported by any cor- . j roborative testimony, stands put a poor < chance of being victorious over steady ' swearing of a cotay&cji poese of constables, each eager to back up his comrades, be--1 cause he knows that in their turn,.and,in i ; similar circumstances, they will back up , I him. We can quite understand that it must be very painful for an " active officer" to find day after day, perhaps for some considerable time, no opportunity of displaying his activity. We can imagine the friendly, but none the less galling, jeers which greet him, as morning after morning, he returns from his., beat empty handed. His more fortunate comrades, laughingly, no doubt, tell*him that he is one of the Queen's bad bargains, that he must have joined the force merely for the uniform, that in fact (though they probably do not put it so delicately) he is a mere carpet-knight, a squire of dames— ie., cooks. We can quite understand a man so taunted putting on his helmet to go forth with a resolution that, come what may, he.will " run in " somebody before another sun shall rise. But though the resolution is eminently natural, it is wrong. Society must, somehow or other, be protected against the natural desire which policemen feel to win their spurs. These spurs must not be won at the expense of honest men and women, who are at present too often described as thieves through no fault of theirs, .but merely because they have been so unlucky as to run against a -policeman who wants a step. As things are at present, our only security against loss of good name and liberty on groundless charges lies in the character and astuteness of the Metro- ; politan and City magistrates, whgvare all of them, we are' happy to thirik^b3& j well-fitted and well-disposed to discharge > the arduous duties of the very responsible posts which they occupy. But the i highest amount of judicial enlightenment i and acumen is often not enough to | protect innocense against baseless but craftily concocted charges. We may have magistrates whom we can thoroughly trust, but that does not absolve us from the duty of reforming our police. The 's payment by result" system, the system under" which convictions obtained are counted as marks in a man's favour, should at once be done away with, and every effort should be made, perhaps by increase of pay, certainly by increase of pensions, and by any other means which may suggest itself to the authorities to

get a good chss of men into the force. We should be very sorry indeed to say that policemen, as a rule, do not come of a good class now. Unquestionably -in most cases they do, and, usually speaking, they discharge the difficult duties imposed upon them with judgment, integrity, and temper. But unfortunately, there are not a few black sheep among them, men who enter the force with no intention of continuing in it, but merely-'to obtain* a ''character" which may help them to

other situations, 'i hese, while they remain, often, "make very "actire," but rarely very trustworthy officers.—Truth.