Greater Manchester Police (GMP) have today erected a temporary “knife arch”, consisting of a metal detector and sniffer dogs, in Piccadilly Gardens for pedestrians to walk through.
The arch is part of Operation Portcullis, which is supposedly aimed at encouraging responsible drinking in the city centre and clamping down on drink-fuelled violence. According to a GMP statement the operation “involves a range of agencies, such as Manchester City Council, Greater Manchester Public Health Network and British Transport Police.”
When MULE editor Siobhan McGuirk was walking through the area she noticed the police-surrounded detector and decided to avoid walking through it. Instead she walked past it as the barrier covered only the paved walkway and was only a few meters wide.
When she saw two young black men being stopped and searched nearby she returned to ask what was going on. She asked one of six officers standing by the decetor what was happening and whether people had to walk through the arch. The officer said, “No, but it might look suspicious if you tried to avoid it.” Ms McGuirk then told the officer that she had purposefully avoided the “safety arch”. The officer replied, “To be honest, you don’t fit the profile we’re looking for.”
We asked a GMP press officer why it might seem suspicious for anyone to want to avoid walking through a metal detector surrounded by uniformed police and have their crotch sniffed, on a public walkway. He responded that you didn’t have to “if you don’t want to go to the location”. The police are not “pulling people off the street”, he continued, and there is no law to make anyone subject themselves to the process. He went on to say that people “should have no objection to do it really, if they’ve got no weapons.” Ms McGuirk had chosen to walk around the “safety arch” because she thought “it looked ridiculous, and intimidating”.
When asked whether there was a profile of person they were looking for the press officer responded “no not really” and stressed that the ethnicity of the two men being searched nearby was “irrelevant”. Furthermore he warned that any implication otherwise would result in GMP coming down on MULE “like a tonne of bricks, put it that way.”
Friday 19 February
http://manchestermule.com/article/piccadilly-knife-arch
When MULE editor Siobhan McGuirk was walking through the area she noticed the police-surrounded detector and decided to avoid walking through it. Instead she walked past it as the barrier covered only the paved walkway and was only a few meters wide.
When she saw two young black men being stopped and searched nearby she returned to ask what was going on. She asked one of six officers standing by the decetor what was happening and whether people had to walk through the arch. The officer said, “No, but it might look suspicious if you tried to avoid it.” Ms McGuirk then told the officer that she had purposefully avoided the “safety arch”. The officer replied, “To be honest, you don’t fit the profile we’re looking for.”
We asked a GMP press officer why it might seem suspicious for anyone to want to avoid walking through a metal detector surrounded by uniformed police and have their crotch sniffed, on a public walkway. He responded that you didn’t have to “if you don’t want to go to the location”. The police are not “pulling people off the street”, he continued, and there is no law to make anyone subject themselves to the process. He went on to say that people “should have no objection to do it really, if they’ve got no weapons.” Ms McGuirk had chosen to walk around the “safety arch” because she thought “it looked ridiculous, and intimidating”.
When asked whether there was a profile of person they were looking for the press officer responded “no not really” and stressed that the ethnicity of the two men being searched nearby was “irrelevant”. Furthermore he warned that any implication otherwise would result in GMP coming down on MULE “like a tonne of bricks, put it that way.”
Friday 19 February
http://manchestermule.com/article/piccadilly-knife-arch
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I would always avoid one
21.02.2010 19:15
Pinkolady
Help the police!
21.02.2010 23:02
If you see any one carrying out these perfectly legal activities, please call 999 and report it, if you believe that they may have a knife. (they may be in breach of 139 of the criminal justice act 1988
Offense of having article with blade or point in public place
(1)Subject to subsections (4) and (5) below, any person who has an article to which this section applies with him in a public place shall be guilty of an offense.
(2)Subject to subsection (3) below, this section applies to any article which has a blade or is sharply pointed except a folding pocketknife.
(3)This section applies to a folding pocketknife if the cutting edge of its blade exceeds 3 inches.
(4)It shall be a defense for a person charged with an offense under this section to prove that he had good reason or lawful authority for having the article with him in a public place.
(5)Without prejudice to the generality of subsection (4) above, it shall be a defense for a person charged with an offense under this section to prove that he had the article with him—
(a)for use at work;
(b)for religious reasons; or
(c)as part of any national costume.
(6)A person guilty of an offense under subsection (1) above shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale.
(7)In this section “public place” includes any place to which at the material time the public have or are permitted access, whether on payment or otherwise.
(8)This section shall not have effect in relation to anything done before it comes into force.
Notice section (4).
This is the bit the pigs and magistrates have a problem with. It requires common sense.
139 CJA 1988 is an either way offense if you are accused of it, it is your choice wether you accept a magistrate of jury, but in my experience it is advisable to reject all 'professional advise' remember all solicitors are establishment twats, where as the jury will most probably be reasonable common people like us. If you can't explain to a jury why you have a knife you probably should be locked up!
the man who always takes a lock knife camping
or
22.02.2010 23:36
You might get all huffy about this but wind your neck in, they are at least trying to address the problems rather than just whinging and wringing your hands.
What have YOU done to get violence off the streets? pamphlets, smashed a few windows....or as normal just bleated.
Where are the human rights for the children dieing in gutters?
anon