Talk:Police use of firearms in the United Kingdom

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Police use of firearms in the United Kingdom is within the scope of the Law Enforcement WikiProject. Please Join, Create, and Assess. Remember, the project aims for no vandalism and no conflict, if an article needs attention regarding vandalism or breaches of wikiquette, please add it to the article watch list.
Stub This article has been rated as stub-Class on the quality scale.
This article is within the scope of the WikiProject Firearms; If you would like to join us, please visit the project page where you can find a list of open tasks. If you have any questions, please consult the FAQ.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the quality scale.

[edit] Continued vandalism by anonymous editor

Apparently the same anonymous editor has continued to vandalise this page and others by repeatedly seeking skew factual statements, and introducing and giving undue prominence to irrelevant details, both here an on Jean Charles de Menezes and Menezes. The anonymous editor has sought to make this a "personal" matter, by labelling my reversion of their vandalism as "political bias", despite such reversion being in line with consensus previous reached amongst other editors. The anonymous editor also registered and used the ID of "Nick Cooper1" as part of this disruptive activity, in a gross breach of Wikipedia etiquette (ID has now been blocked indefinitely [1]). The same anonymous user is also engaged in similar disruptive editing on Hector MacDonald‎. Nick Cooper 13:33, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I was just posting a request for page protection when I noticed this so I'm going to leave it for now. Firstly, NPOV violations are not vandalism. Secondly, you both seem to be accusing each other of bias. Thirdly, anonymous users are allowed to edit here and should be encouraged as far as possible.
To me this looks like a content dispute rather than vandalism and it doesn't appear that either user is trying to impose a particularly outrageous wording on the article. Consensus may have existed in the past but that doesn't prevent later editors from making changes. Repeated reversion in such cases isn't really appropriate and it needs to stop. Nick, I wasn't aware of this user's previous behaviour and I agree that some of it is not acceptable but as a more experienced user it's up to you to set an example and assume good faith. --Lo2u (T • C) 21:08, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
Nobody disputes the right of anonymous editors to edit, but this particular anonymous editor is hardly playing the game themselves. For example, consensus was reached long ago that describing Jean Charles de Menezes as an "illegal" immigrant in the introduction to that page was not relevant to his notability and giving undue prominence to something that disputed, anyway, this being covered in detail in the main text. The anonymous editor chose to ignore the consensus reached, not only on that particular page, but others on which the subject was mentioned (e.g. Menezes). Apart from the same sort of thing on this particular page, the anonymous editor's changes can be characterised as deleting or seeking to needlessly minimise existing content. In addition they have never sought to clarify or justify such changes on the appropriate Talk pages, apart from on Hector MacDonald, the only other subject the editor seems interested in (in a similarly disruptive way). Nick Cooper 07:18, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Was Menezes an illegal immigrant or not. Yes he was. Therefore, why do you, Nick Cooper, continually vandalize the pages to remove references to this? This is a politically-motivated form of vandalism. Same with your other reversions. Your so-called "consensus" essentially = what Nick Cooper thinks and says about an issue. I don't think so. Your behaviour can be characterised as deleting or seeking to needlessly minimise existing content for POV reasons. As Lo2u says, Nicky, NPOV violations are not vandalism and anonymous users are allowed to edit here and should be encouraged as far as possible. Diddums that someone stands up to your PC agenda. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.209.105.46 (talk) 20:24, August 29, 2007 (UTC)

Alright, I pointed out that anonymous users are allowed to edit because I thought the comments about this user being "too afraid" to register seemed to be discouraging anonymous contributions. 172.209.105.46, nobody's vandalising and you've just ignored a direct request to stop revert warring. Firstly, I'm with Nick on the illegal immigrant thing - the only information that's relevant here is that he was a terrorist suspect. Secondly, you should really be able to find a compromise wording for: "The policy under which British police use firearms has resulted in controversy"; I see no harm in adding a "sometimes" to the sentence but it shouldn't create an argument. The mention of an "apparent shoot to kill policy" has a ring of original research to it. However, I believe the term is used by the police, as well as the media. The section should start by mentioning it and explaining what it is,[2] before it says that it's been criticised otherwise the article does nothing but criticise. --Lo2u (T • C) 23:43, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
I hope my comments about registering were taken like that, as they were solely aimed at this particular anonymous user, who is clearly familiar enough with Wikipedia and indeed seemed to have no trouble in registering and using User:Nick Cooper1 until it was (obviously) blocked. I don't automatically assume bad faith on the part of anonymous editors, but this one does seem to be to some extent "hiding" behind their anonymity during a sustained campaign against this page and others.
This page was originally created as at my suggestion as an alternative location for the material on controversial shootings that was on Jean Charles de Menezes, but also to cover police firearms use as a whole, and as such most of it has been migrated from other pages, namely Law enforcement in the United Kingdom‎ and Uniforms and equipment of the British police‎. The section on the alleged "shoot-to-kill" policy was from the Law enforcement in the United Kingdom‎, which had not previously drawn the attentions of the anonymous editor. It is erroneous of the anonymous editor to claim my reversions are "vandalism" since I am generally merely reverting the text back to the form it was for some time before they started their disruption. The very fact that they are labelling my reversions as "PC" says more for their motivations than mine.
I see that the anonymous editor has again altered the text. As I've said previously, consensus was reached on Jean Charles de Menezes that neither his occupation nor residency status was significant enough for the introduction to that page - and by extension shouldn't be for the précis here - not least because that latter status is disputed, rather than being as clear-cut as the anonymous editor has tried to present. "Brazilian national" is neutral in this context. Secondly, the editor seeking to qualify the extent of controversy over certain shootings smacks of trying to minimise the extent of the issue. There are, in fact, quite a few more shootings that could be included (as they have been treated as such by the press), making them a much larger proportion of the 30 fatalities over the twelve year period quoted by The Independent. The anonymous editor has previously tried to use the term "on rare occasions" (and similar phrases), yet I daresay that there will be some people who might rather see it as "on many occasions"; the text as it was originally acknowledges the controversy, but does not seek to quantify it in such POV terms. Lastly, the anonymous editor has removed the line, "The national media have often criticised the "shoot to kill" policy apparently adopted by police forces" as a whole. Given the fact that the national media has criticised the alleged policy, I am reinstating it with a minor tweak, pending additional work on this section. Nick Cooper 08:15, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
I didn't know everything of the user's history - pleased to hear the comment wasn't aimed at all users. I don't think reverting in the interests of neutrality is ever a good idea though. I agree that Menezes' immigration status is irrelevant and very prejudicial. Arguments about whether something is "controversial", "sometimes controversial", "often controversial" etc have occurred many, many times on Wikipedia. I don't want to push the matter too hard but we're really talking about maybe two or three very public controversies each decade. I wouldn't want to call it "rare" but would you not be agreeable to a "sometimes"?
When I first looked at this article, it was, as you say Nick, all about controversial police shootings. It's now been expanded and is looking rather good. It's important to ensure neutrality though and I do think there's something lacking in that respect in the "Shoot to kill" policy section. There's no separate article on the subject. This section is effectively a substitute for that and anyone tying to find out about the policy would naturally come to this page. At the moment, all the section does is say that the policy gets criticised, at least when it mentions it directly. My suggestion to the anonymous user, who clearly has objections to its current state, is that he expand and reorganise the section, which would perhaps give any criticism, which certainly deserves a mention, a little less prominence.--Lo2u (T • C) 21:32, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
Obviously the degree of controversy is subjective. The piece in The Independent details all 30 police shooting fatalities, not just the ones where they were the wrong person or unarmed, without differentiation. A similar article in The Times gives a bit more detail on some of the cases. Checking elsewhere on the small number of ones which remain unclear shows that of those 30 fatal shootings, six were unarmed, five had swords or knives, five replica firearms (two blank firers), and three air weapons. That leaves 11 that that did have "real" firearms, although a couple are disputed. Of course, my own view is anyone waving something at the police that looks like a gun is pretty much asking for it, but on the other hand, this report notes that of 24 shootings (not all fatal) investigated by the Police Complaints Authority, "11 involved individuals who may have had a death wish, two were mentally ill and five were drunk or on drugs." The actual report is here, and it's finding echo some of the apaprent patterns of police firearms use highlighted in the mainstream media (e.g. rapid escalation in seige situations due to operational failures). In one form or another, something like two-thirds of all police fatal shootings have been called into question, and there are plenty of references to show that they have been.
The "Shoot to kill" policy was transferred - pretty much unchanged - from Law enforcement in the United Kingdom‎. It's essentially about Operation Kratos, which does have it's own rather extensive article, so it could be pared down to a brief(er) outside and a link to that. Nick Cooper 02:58, 1 September 2007 (UTC)
Hi, I don't have any strong objections to the article as it stands. You've done a really, really good job with it. I'm just trying to iron out a few points that have been raised by the other user. The article's changing fast and revert wars make the history very difficult to use. I take the point - any police shooting is likely to attract controversy. It should be noted too that police shootings are extremely rare - if we're talking about 30 fatal shootings, that's far less than one per police force, though obviously non-fatal shootings could also be controversial. This means we're still really talking about occassional controversy. Whether we give any quantificiation or no quantification it's still rather subjective. Perhaps something like "There have been instances of controversy"? - perhaps a bit less sweeping than the current statement. Out of interest, when the Independent claims to list all fatal shootings, how far back are we talking? --Lo2u (T • C) 16:58, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] West Yorkshire incident

"In 2005 the botched bank robbery in West Yorkshire lead to a West Yorkshire Police Constable killed and another severly injured." - was there a (documented) wider context for this event, which makes it relevant to the police use of firearms? I'm not sure it's particularly relevant, as a standalone event. --McGeddon (talk) 09:15, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Whoops! Deleted it before seeing your above post! I would agree that it is not contextualised, and doesn't really fit where it was, although I suspect that the editor who introduced it was motivated by the poll link on the BBC page cited. There probably is a place for highlighting the (relatively) very low number of firearms fatalities amongst police officers to counter the assumption outside of the UK that criminals are running around, shooting un-armed officers with impunity. Nick Cooper (talk) 13:39, 3 March 2008 (UTC)