OK, so I looked a bit rough. I haven't cut my hair in six weeks and I was wearing black jeans, a lumberjack shirt, a North Face jacket, and a rucksack for my laptop. When I came out of the tube at Liverpool Street, I noticed two cops in the main exit from the tube, but I took, as I usually do, the side exit past the shops, where there were two more cops, one black, and one white. I just had time to think this was to reassure us when the black one stopped me. Would I mind being searched under section 44 of the Prevention of Terrorism Act?
I didn't think minding had anything to do with what would happen next, so I settled down to enjoy it. The cop gave me a spiel about how I had been stopped entirely at random. They didn't discriminate at all among the people they stopped, and certainly not on grounds of ethnicity or appearance. I kept a straight face.
So -- I thought -- I was to do my bit for the war on terror by padding out the statistics, balancing all the Muslim-looking young men they stopped. It wasn't as if I had anything better to do. The next train went in 20 minutes.
Did I have any ID? Yes -- I have a driving licence, on paper, very old and fragile. Don't tear it, I said. The white, shorter one carefully copied out my details, then asked me for my date of birth -- which is on the driving licence, in easily decoded form. At the time, I thought it was because they were thick or ignorant. Now I suppose it is a trick question to catch people using stolen licences.
The black one, the leader, then looked at me carefully. Did I mind being searched? No. He was going to search me and my rucksack. Was there anything I had in it that might be terroristic?
Nope.
No maps, weapons, drugs? -- terrorists often carried drugs he explained. Did I want to say what I had before I got searched?
I didn't laugh. I didn't even ask how many terrorists he had caught who were carrying drugs. I just gave him a big innocent smile as I understood that the whole point was to use the Prevention of Terrorism Act to bust the scruffy-looking white guys for drugs, thus simultaneously improving his arrest record and his statistics for Muslim blindness. No, I said, I didn't have any drugs, weapons, or maps.
Then he searched me, quite respectfully, and very inefficiently. I've been searched by real professionals often enough -- on El Al, three times in one airport -- and I could have had anything in my socks, my laptop, and most of my laptop bag. I could have had a pistol shoved down the back of my trousers for all the cop knew. He had no clue at all. I know he thought by this stage that I was an innocent loony but that just proves he shouldn't have been searching me in the first place.
Finally, they gave me a pink copy of the report he had made when searching me. I should show this to other officers, he said, if they stopped me, and I wouldn't have any trouble. At this point I let myself go a little. Wasn't this ridiculous? I said. Just because a terrorist had been searched once with a rucksack that was innocent didn't mean that he wouldn't have important terrorist supplies, maps or even worse, the next time he passed a policeman. If he could show a pink slip and get away, wouldn't this just encourage him? The policeman looked at me without affection or enjoyment. Any other policeman, he said, would be entirely free to search me even if I had a pink slip. And so I went to catch my train, greatly reassured.
The two things they never asked me were where I was going (and coming from) and what was my business. I do regret this. I would have liked to have watched their faces when I said that I had come from the BBC studios in Millbank, where I was making a radio programme on the Government's plans to deal with Islamic extremism, and that the next person I will interview is Assistant Chief Constable Robert Beckley, a member of the ACPO Terrorism and Allied Matters team. But perhaps they will stop me again on Thursday, when I go in to see him.
This is scary :-(
Posted by: Flotsam on February 28, 2006 11:56 AMYes, they hang around Tower Hill station every so often. They haven't done me yet, but they have put a few colleagues (all blokes) through the procedure and we've concluded it's just for show - if I were the sort of chap to carry things that go bang (or bhang) on the Underground, I've long since have worked out how to keep them out of sight of that sort of search. Maps? Heavens, never seen anyone carry those around London.
And the one time I was strip-searched (at Oslo airport), the security bloke didn't even bother to give my bag a good going-over, so I concluded that was for effect too. It's like sniffer dogs, which are surprisingly often not able to smell a thing - it's the bloke at the back in plain clothes watching people's reactions who does the damage.
But you know that any form of skeptical questioning is seen as much the same light as a one way ticket stub from Kabul being used as a bookmark in Famous People And How To Blow Them Up. I think that's the most terrifying thing - large numbers of thugs being given unquestionable powers. Not that everyone in a uniform is a thug but the ones that are, are having a good time (Next time you meet a pilot, ask them about security at Manchester Airport - but don't forget to duck immediately afterwards). And of course, the next time there is a successful terrorist attack there won't be a 'Perhaps we're getting security wrong' but 'We need more. Much more. Bend over.'
R
Posted by: RupertG on February 28, 2006 04:06 PMThe only thing that scares me is the inefficiency of random searches. How many people use the tube every day? How many of those are terrorists carrying evidence of terrorism? I really think there are better uses of tax-funded resources, and trained police, than simply hanging around transport locations and having a punt.
Posted by: Small Paul on March 3, 2006 01:24 AMYou were lucky !
See what happened to former technical journalist David Mery in similar circumstances, carrying a laptop computer in a rucksack. They ended up searching his home and taking away his computers, an old RS232 breakout box which he used to use when reviewing modems, and a "suspicious" scribbled doodle.
There were Prevention of Terrorism Acts from 1974 until 2000, "emergency" legislation which was rubber stamped by Parliament every 6 months, but these were all repealed and replaced by the Terrorism Act 2000.
The Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 deals with "house arrest" Control Orders, and not with stops and searches.
Surpisingly neither the Bedfordshire Police at Luton Airport, nor those in South Wales appear to have realised this yet, and are erroneously quoting "Prevention of Terrorism Act" even in their official press releases.
Posted by: Watching Them, Watching Us on March 3, 2006 09:53 PMI know about David Mery -- people were more nervous then. But what was monstrous about the mery story, as I remember it, was that they threatened him with expulsion from the country if he made a fuss
Posted by: acb on March 4, 2006 11:44 AMAndrew,
The question "Was there anything I had in it that might be terroristic?" is very loaded, I was asked a similar question during my interview. In particular whether I had any such material on my laptop. I obviously had nothing I would construe as such, but I have no clue what the Police would consider as such (I do have work and personal interest in computer security for instance, and do have articles linked from Bruce Schneier's Cryptogram). In particular you mention you were explicitely asked if you had maps. I had a tube map which didn't interest them, but to my surprise they considered random doodles I was carrying on me as a map of the tube station. That scared me as how do you disprove that anything anyone wants to see in doodles is not there? See the "map" fopr yourself: doodles and other items
Regarding statistics, you may be interested by my article on propaganda
I was not threatened with expulsion. I was under arrest with no idea of what would be the next step for over a month (on bail). I've published all the details on my website (I keep updating it).
Not sure about "people were more nervous then" but this definitely rings true for the Police. Their presence at the tube stations and the number of cars rushing with their sirens on has reduced and was non-existant before July 7. Does that mean there was no threat in London before July 7 and it has now reduced to nearly nothing? Or does that mean that all this oppressive Police presence, stop and searches, and arrests is mostly for the show? An enquiry in the July 7 events is what we do need to have a much better understanding of the Police response. There's a petition asking for one I linked to from http://gizmonaut.net/act
br -d
Posted by: David Mery on March 4, 2006 01:54 PMAndrew,
Is this substantially different from Stop & Search? It seems that all that's happened is that it's now happening to white middle-class people as well as black middle-class people.
I'm not sure I'd be as sanguine if it happened to me, though.
Posted by: SRW on March 5, 2006 06:28 PM