4 February (Part 2) - Police engagement
There was a meeting of the Bexley Community Policing Engagement Group last
night which has very little to do with Bexley council except that they rent out
the Civic Chamber for the hundred or so predominantly elderly people who are
interested in what is going on.
Chief Superintendent (he’s been promoted already) Peter Ayling was there to let them know.
In a nutshell, burglaries have been up quite steeply over the past few months
especially in areas which offer a quick escape route to the A2 and the A20. This
was said to be due to a combination of the time of year and the release of too
many local criminals from prison all at the same time and Romanian gangs. Mr. Ayling said that the
very latest statistics showed improvement and some of the crooks were already back inside.
Several questions were asked from the floor but almost all of them were of the
‘why have you never answered my letter’ variety. On each occasion the Borough
Commander offered to take details and look into it.
Readers with long memories may recall that a year ago the Crown Prosecution
Service told Elwyn Bryant that they had offered Bexley police an Action Plan for
their Obscene Blog suspect, councillor Peter Craske, but according to the CPS,
the police ignored it and instead wrapped the case up. Elwyn asked CS Ayling
“Why should the local police be allowed to ignore the CPS when giving charging
advice”. In reply Ayling said there were circumstances in which the police could
charge a suspect without the benefit of CPS advice but he was “not aware of circumstances
where we can simply ignore their advice”.
After the meeting, the police said that they would check where that CPS advice
went but were unsure whether or not they would be able to tell Elwyn. I think I
have a pretty good idea of where it went already. On 1st March last year, I asked Chief
Superintendent Victor Olisa why he ignored the CPS advice and while he accepted
the letter had been received asserted he was unaware it contained an Action
Plan. As a Bexley police officer said last night, someone must be fibbing , but
whether it is the CPS of the police we might never know.
Former Bexley Police Commanders Chief Superintendents Stringer and Olisa now
stand accused of
Misconduct in Public Office having failed to recognise that saving the political
career of a Bexley councillor is not worth jeopardising their own. The present Commander,
Peter Ayling, is in no way whatever implicated but some of his officers are those who
tried, through ignorance or otherwise, to pin Olly Cromwell’s blog on me.