Catch The Criminals Yourself, Urge Police

[ChillDoubt]

You couldn't make it up:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-29053978

From link:
Victims of crime are being "encouraged" to investigate offences themselves, an inspection of police forces in England and Wales has found.

HM Inspectorate of Constabulary said criminal damage and car crime were "on the verge of being decriminalised" because forces had "almost given up".

In some cases victims were asked to check for CCTV or fingerprints.

The Association of Chief Police Officers said austerity meant forces had to set priorities.


Brilliant! The first step down the road toward all out vigilantism. I've often said that if I caught a burglar on my property I'd be judge and jury, looks like it'll be legal for me in a few years!

[jomifl]

I remember hearing about a couple of bikers catching a burgler in their garage so they locked him in it for a day. They were banged up for a few months for unlawful imprisonment whilst the burgar went free because he hadn't managed to steal anything(obviously). Something wrong here?

[EDDIE51]

jomfil Yes I had a card cloned and £600 removed from my account. The police would not even give me a crime number. Just said it was up to the Bank to sort it out.
Perhaps I ought to take up card fraud as a 'job' it makes a lot of money and apparently is not even a crime! , sure beats working for a living!

[jomifl]

Eddie, what was truly bizarre about my identity theft was that the card provider (citibank) allowed the fraudster to rack up an enormous debt (which I could not have done) and seemed to be unable to close the account.

[EDDIE51]

In my case someone used my card in Cyprus just a minutes after I had used it in my local post office. The card issuer did not pick that up, I had to point out that I could hardly have got to Cyprus in 2 minutes so it had to be a fraud.