User talk:User 070

Police use of firearms in the United Kingdom
I'm seeking ways to make the police use of firearms in the United kingdom article look somewhat more objective, any suggestions? I ask because you made some valid points on the talkpage, and from my reading of it(the article), seems to be a defense of the policy; highlighting shootings by the police while downplaying danger to them;only giving fatal shootings stats etc. I know where the controversial shootings list came from, Im in the process of going through the rest of the history. I'm thinking that some statistics of the ratio of armed cops to unarmed cops that were both shot at and injured/killed, the success rate of unarmed officers in stopping violent crimes/apprehending suspects compared to armed officers, response time of armed officers to violent crime calls vs. general response, might help the article out. The Home Office website might help with some of these stats, maybe you could suggest other places to look. User 070 (talk) 04:12, 15 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Hi 070, welcome to Wikipedia. I agree with you that the article still presents a rather one-sided view. The situation is much better than previously, when the article Police use of firearms in the United Kingdom was devoted entirely to controversial shootings. My thoughts are as follows: at the moment I think the list of controversial shootings gives rather too much prominence to some long-forgotten incidents and takes up an unduly large portion of the article. It may be a violation of WP:WEIGHT. One solution might be to shorten the section to a single paragraph that mentions extremely well-known cases like the de Menezes shooting, as well as important general information. The section ends with this conclusion: "According to an October 2005 article in The Independent, in the preceding 12 years, 30 people had been shot dead by police, and no officers had been convicted in connection with any of them. [34] However, in the absence of any criminal proceedings against most of these officers following independent investigation, and the acquittal of the rest by juries, this supports the premise that the use of firearms by British police is proportionate to the threat involved." I can make no sense of this, either grammatically, logically or semantically and I suspect at the very least its a case of original research. Finally, I don't think the article should talk about an "apparent shoot to kill" policy because it's not clear that such a policy exists but it might justifiably talk about an "alleged shoot to kill policy".
 * I'm not sure I'm well placed to point to new information but I wish you luch with your efforts. Do be careful not to appear to carry out original research: you should report the statistics but avoid drawing your own conclusions from them. Let me know if I can help. --Lo2u (T • C) 00:35, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Hi Lo2U, thanks for your response, I don't know if I should reply here or on your page but it probably doesn't matter. I agree with you about the controversial shootings section, actually I believe it was even longer when it was on the main Law enforcement in the United Kingdom article which was an even less appropriate place for it to be. I take your cautioning about original research to heart, I also agree that the reader should draw his/her own conclusions. It would probably me more trouble than it's worth finding some of these statistics; but I'll try to find the stats on the proportion of armed officers to unarmed officers that were shot in the past ten years or so, I think that would add alot of value to the article, it shouldn't be all that difficult either.

The name of this article lead me to believe it was about the uniqueness of the firearms policy of police forces in the UK compared to most of the world, but now I'm wondering if it's simply about incidents where British police discharged their weapons, either way alot more can be done to balance it. User 070 (talk) 03:26, 19 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Hi, I copied this discussion to your page so you'd notice it - I'm afraid I took rather a long time to reply. I agree, a lot more could be said about the proportion of officers that carry guns, how many incidents they attend, how often they point their weapons (I think I recall seeing that statistic a long time ago) and how often they use their weapons. It is precisely because British police discharge their weapons so rarely that it is possible to list almost every case in recent years. Unfortunately such a list gives the opposite impression - that it is fairly common. --Lo2u (T • C) 16:00, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Does this apply to Prison guards also? What's the policy regarding the circumstances under which lethal force may be used against escaping prisoners, or during a riot? For the life of me I can't seem to wrap my mind around the thinking that goes into policy making when it comes to firearms and the authorities in Britain. User 07016:09, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Prison officers would be able to use firearms under the same exemption as police constables, but would never do so. For the legality of the use of firearms, see Template:Police use of firearms in the United Kingdom. Killing an escaping prisoner would not be 'reasonable force', unless possibly that prisoner was armed and threatening to shoot someone. ninetyone 16:16, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Would the actions of the officer be judged differently if one shot simply wounded the escaping prisoner rather than killing them? What powers do prison officers have to prevent prisoners from escaping? It seems rather strange to me that a prison guard will keep his gun idle while a prisoner is escaping, I mean what's the point of being armed then. User 070 17:01, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Prison officers of Her Majesty's Prison Service do not carry firearms. I think Ninetyone was just giving an example, so you could understand the difference. Police,Mad,Jack☺ 17:34, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Maybe I should've made a distinction between "Prison officer" as opposed to prison guard. I don't live in Britain, but I think it would be fair to assume(and would be very surprised if I'm wrong) that there are atleast some personnel authorised to use and issued firearms, guarding prisoners. Are you telling me there aren't any armed personnel located at the prison site? If prisoners are rioting or trying to organize an escape the "real police" has to be called? User 07018:09, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

In England, Prison Officers are prison guards. Prison officers are not authorised nor trained in the use of firearms, I'm afraid you are wrong. If prisoners are rioting or trying to escape, with the former the Prison Service has it's own public order teams which deal with that, but in the case of rioting the police would be called. With the latter, that is what prison officers are trained to deal with, no need to resort to the use of firearms. Police,Mad,Jack☺ 14:06, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

I think you're failing to understand the point of my question. Whether it be the police or members of Her Majesty's Prison Service, are they not armed personnel controlling access onto and out of the prison grounds? I am surprised to learn that prison officers aren't issued any firearms whatsoever, but logically I'm assuming that this function is performed by the police then who would be located at the prison and would not have to be called from a station somewhere within the community. Or do I have it completely wrong, and no one at the prison has any guns? It makes little sense if any at all, that armed officers guard prisoners when transporting them to and from jail, but no one is armed at the prison itself to prevent them from escaping. Or am I too quick to jump to conclusions again in assuming that armed officers guard convicts on their way to prison? Surely in this post 9/11 7/7 era officers that transport prisoners are armed, arent they? User 070 17:15, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Why would we have armed personnel on a standard basis? We aren't stupid enough to let people have guns in the UK ;). A small number of prisoner escorts are conducted by armed officers, where there is specific intelligence that a risk is posed to the escort and that risk involves the use of firearms. An equally small number of Category A Prisons have static armed protection. ninetyone 18:41, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Only very high-risk prisoners (terrorists, some armed robbers, etc.) would receive an armed police escort during the court process and - if convicted - subsequent transportation to a Category A (maximum security) prison, but there would generally be no routine armed presence (either police or prison staff) at the latter facility once they were incarcerated. This practice pre-dates 9/11 & 7/7, but was obviously in place during the years the IRA was most active. Escapes from Category A prisons are exceptionally rare, even in the absence of armed guards. Nick Cooper ( 18:55, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

I understand that some of the questions I posed may have come across as though I was making judgments, although I do have a particular point of view, I didn't want it to seem as if I was simply attacking you guys' system/culture. So no need to be defensive on your part either. I take the "we aren't stupid enough to let people have guns in the UK" comment in gest as I believe it was meant to be, but I did detect some defensiveness in the "tone", maybe I'm wrong. It's good to know the information you provided, I suspected that not ALL prison officers were armed in Britain, as they aren't all armed here in the US either, nor do they need to be. But I'm still having some difficulty seeing the logic in not having armed guards at the gates, prison officers or otherwise. An escape no matter how rare it is, is absolutely unnecessary if the prisoner escapes for no reason other than he/she is capable of outrunning the guards chasing them or defeated the attempts to subdue them. Anyway, before anyone feels the need to censure me for having turned this into a message board, I'll end this now because I know that this has no effect on the article. User 070 14:59, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh no, it's fine. (And you know us Brits, we love a bit of sarcasm!) But I fail to see how killing someone just because they are running away is anyway sensible... was that what you were saying? ninetyone 21:53, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

I see from your userpage that you favor strong gun control, you may be surprised that I don't have the polar opposite point of view. That being said, I'm not "anti-gun" either, pragmatism appeals to me more than ideology. However, I don't quite get gun control when it comes to the authorities. Does the wider British public not feel as though the authorities serve their collective interests? You asked where's the sense in shooting someone who's simply running away. Why do you identify with the interests of the person running way, rather than with the interests the authorities are serving - the public's; keeping the convicted criminal separated from it? Why are the interests of the former more legitimate than the latter? User 070 00:11, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

I just don't get the need to defang the cops(authorities in general) by keeping them unarmed over there. What accounts for the inherent suspicion towards authority in the culture? Britain is a grown up society, the second oldest democracy if I remember right, it doesn't make sense. Is it a hang-up with guns in general, or is it a resentment of the authority the police represent, who knows. Okay that's the end of the opining on my part. User 070 00:34, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

You're looking at it from the wrong perspective - it's not that British police have been "defanged," but rather they were never "fanged" in any meaningful sense in the first place. The British population - including the criminal subset - have all been born into and lived with the situation that has created, in that armed crime is incredibly rare. You should take a look at Police use of firearms in the United Kingdom and in particular the section on the numbers of police officers shot dead on duty, which is a tangible reflection of the degree to which criminals are prepared resort to firearms even to resist arrest, i.e. hardly ever. To clarify, Ian Broadhurst in 2003 was the first officer shot dead in over eight years, and Sharon Beshenivsky is the only one since then; the killers of both were not native to the UK. People outside of the UK may think that because the police generally do no carry firearms, then criminals can run around with guns with impunity, but it just does not work like that.

Research has shown that the vast majority of British criminals do not carry guns because they do not think they need to, mainly because most police do not carry them. Criminals generally only carry guns when there is a specific need for them, and in many cases will actually "settle" for an imitation firearm as being "sufficient," even if they have access to real firearms. They're not armed with real guns 24/7, even if they could be. This is particularly true of street robbery and burglary, because the chances of the victim being armed are virtually zero. That might sound horrendous to non-UK ears, but the reality is that only some 3% or street robberies are carried out with a firearm, but the logical implication is that if there was a significant chance of victims being armed, then more criminals would use firearms, and would also be less inclined to settle for using an imitation, in which case the risk of serious injury to victims increases. Nick Cooper 08:07, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm aware of the Police Use of Firearms in the UK article, infact I'm currently thinking of ways to make it appear more balanced. We had a discussion on the talkpage there a few months ago. I'm also aware that British cops have never been routinely issued guns, but there have been instances in the past when the ratio of armed to unarmed police have been higher than what it currently is, in the case of the Metropolitan Police for instance. After deaths of officers in the 50's and the 60's a higher proportion of officers were issued firearms. So while it may be true that the cops(as a whole) in Britain have never had much of any fangs to speak of, the lowered ratio of armed officers to unarmed officers currently, is a result of a need to make them seem even less intimidating or allay whatever fears the public apparently has.

You speak of the "criminal subset" as though people who commit crimes are somehow homogeneous in their motivations. I would caution you against making such broad generalizations, criminals aren't monolithic. And I suppose statistics are only as valuable as the process the person drawing the conclusions uses. By the way how could you know who's armed with guns "24/7" and who's not or the circumstances the individuals are dealing with? A person robbing the upstanding law-abiding citizen may very well not feel the need to resort to too much violence, but a person robbing a drug dealer would tend to take the necessary precautions. Criminals would be armed whether or not the police are armed, criminals were armed before any such thing as a police force existed; or its immediate predecessors.

I don't see what the nationality of the killers of Ian Broadhurst and Sharon Beshenivsky have to do with the danger presented to officers that aren't armed. Yes they were from a different culture that exists in the UK, but so what? Nothing is being done to preserve British society from the influences of other cultures, not with the immigration policy in place there. And the public doesn't seem to want any big changes either. What I think is the people who may be inclined to commit violent acts, especially if they aren't from Britain originally wouldn't take the police there too seriously. Unless you're implying that there are some unique qualities of British society that cause the good folks there to be less predisposed towards violence than in other parts of Western Europe for instance, I don't see the point you were making. British criminals are kindler and gentler than other countries' criminals, is that it? User 070 16:41, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

The reason there are generally less armed officers now than there were in the past isn't quite as you suggest. Previously there were more officers authorised to use firearms, but they received virtually no training or practice, which arguably led to situations such as the Stephen Waldorf shooting. The active policy decision was to have less authorised officers, but for those that there were to receive more and better training and practice. This is covered very well in London's Armed Police by Robert W Gould & Michael J Waldren (1986) and its revised version, Armed Police by Michael J Waldren (2007).

No, all criminals are not the same, and some are more violent than others, but they are still part of the wider society. This Home Office research study - although it should be considered in conjunction with these comments - includes some interesting details on the patterns of firearms use by British criminals, some of which may not conform with your assumptions. Yes, some criminals will be armed regardless, but the bottom line is that only a tiny percentage of crimes in Britain involve firearms.

Obviously the nationality/origin of the Killers of Broadhurst and Beshenivsky are pertinent in relation to what I said about most of the population - including criminals - growing up in a certain culture, and any non-UK criminal would have to be very fresh off the boat, though, to have the sort of blasé attitude you suggest. It's fairly evident that anyone brandishing anything looking like a firearm is going to attract the attention of an Armed Response Unit pretty quickly, so the fact that the rank and file of the police "only" have pepper spray or Tasers isn't going to give them (the criminals) such a false sense of security.

As to your last point, perhaps you should read this study (click on the "Full text: PDF" link) of armed robbery. You will note the majority of armed robbers did not use real guns, and even those that did did not always have them loaded. Of those who used replicas, 90% said they would still have used on in preference to a real weapon, and that 75% of them did indeed have access to them. Now, whether you want to look at that as the robbers genuinely not wanting to hurt anyone, or to avoid going down for murder as well as armed robbery, it still has the same end result - less potential risk to victims and any police they might run into. In the last reported year, only 11% of homicides in England and Wales involved firearms, and numbered "just" 53, out of a population of over 50 million. Nick Cooper 20:14, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Don't you think you're overexaggerating a little with the "virtually no training or practice" comment? Surely times had changed by the 70's and 80's from the getting 3 hits out of six shots anecdote about training during the war that's mentioned in the Police use of firearms in the United Kingdom article. And you continue to imply that arming the police is tied to the amount of gun crime that exists in the UK. As you stated the police were never armed as a whole, even when more were armed than currently, it was always a minority. So exactly how are the two connected? Would you care to give some statics to support this? I'd like to see evidence showing the ratio of cops at any given time in a British police force that are issued guns rose and fell with the number of reported cases of firearms offenses.

You mention that anyone brandishing a gun is going to attract the attention of an "Armed Response Unit", what would lead you to believe that this is something unique to Britain, other than the fact that "armed response unit" = regular police in most other countries? But what is exceptional about Britain is that unarmed officers show up too, and the results can be tragic as in the case of Sharon Beshenivsky and her partner.

As to why someone committing robbery with a gun may or not load them or may even be using a fake one, can be because of a multitude of reasons. One of them might be because guns are tightly restricted in Britain ammunition isn't readily available, especially for handguns. So while someone may be using a gun that was in existence before the ban was put in place, the ammo might not exist. Secondly I think that not only in Britain but in most of the world, the average robber is less interested in firing his or her weapon than in acquiring what they're after. Why those that discharge their weapons do so has alot to do with the co-operation of the victim and the risk of being identified or being captured by the police. As far as the statistics of those people who used replicas but had access to real guns is concerned, 90% and 75% of what number? I'll need sometime to look at the information you provided by the links. User 070 16:11, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

No, it's not an exaggeration, and neither is the "three shots out of six" annecdote - try reading either of the books I've suggested, which document the changing practices within the police. You will find that most commentators on the issue are very much of the opinion that most police not being armed is linked to the relatively low level of armed crime, not least the police themselves, who consistently resist suggestions that they should be routinely armed. Add into that mix the opinions of criminals themselves, and the reality of the situation is fairly obviously.

I never suggested that a quick UK ARU response is "unique," so please stop putting words into my mouth. I noted that this was a likely outcome of someone brandishing a gun in response to your suggestion that, "people who may be inclined to commit violent acts, especially if they aren't from Britain originally wouldn't take the police there too seriously." Clearly you haven't read the report I linked above, if you think the reason criminals use replicas is mostly because they can't get real guns. As I summarised above: "Almost 90% of those who had used a replica firearm stated that if given a free choice between a replica and a real gun, they would still have opted for the replica. Indeed, three-quarters of those who used a replica firearm claimed that they could have obtained a real gun but decided not to."

The sample of 88 robbers interviewed was broken down thus: 17% (14 persons) said they used a real pistol, all loaded with live ammunition. 24% (20 persons) said they used a real sawn-off shotgun, 14 loaded and six unloaded. 37% (31 persons) said they used a replica (30 handguns, 1 shotgun) 23% (19 persons) said they carried neither a real nor a replica firearm, but used subterfuge to suggest that they did Out of the 31 robbers who used replicas, then, only three of them would have used a real firearm if they could have, but that there were 8 who did not have such access. The logical implication is that there were five criminals who didn't have access to real firearms, but wouldn't have used one, even if they did have, while there were 20 who had such access, but still chose to use a replica. It's also the case that only 28 of the 88 (32%) used a real firearm that was actually loaded. Of the robbers who used subterfuge, most carried out their crime on the spur of the moment, but three-quarters of them - i.e. 14 persons - could have obtained a real gun if they had wanted to, and in fact one had a loaded pistol at home, but chose not to use it. Overall, then, this means that out of all 88, real guns were used by 34 of them (though six unloaded), and could have been used by another 37, but they chose not to. This leaves only 17 (19%) with no access to real firearms, but again at least five of them wouldn't have used them even if they could have.

Home Office Research Study 298 supports the implication that criminal access to firearms is widespread and unaffected by restrictions on legal ownership, and Greenwood clarifies the ammunition situation. Frankly, the idea that newly manufactured firearms are easily available, but the bullets are not is ludicrous. In particular Greenwood notes that 220 million shotgun cartridges are used in the UK every year, yet shotguns - sawn-off or otherwise - are used in only a minority of firearms-enabled crimes. You suggest that the move to replicas is because of the ban on handguns, yet if that were the case logically one would have instead expected an increase in the use of shotguns, which remained less restricted than handguns were before the ban, but this has not happened. Over the last decade the use of sawn-off shotguns had fallen slightly, while the use of long-barrelled shotguns has risen slightly; overall the trend is a slight fall.

It seems that a lot of "advice" about what Britain should do in relation to firearms comes from the United States, but considering that - when adjusted for population - the US has rates of firearms-enabled robberies and assaults that are 47 and 31 times those of England & Wales, we can be forgiven for not being convinced. The bottom line is that in the UK we have a status quo, and few people will be swayed into seeking to change it just to prove some other country's internal ideological disputes. Nick Cooper 18:15, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm having some trouble with my Acrobat Reader at the moment so I’m unable to view the pdfs from the Home Office website, but I did read the critique on the Davel site. I don't doubt that police just as everyonelse is affected by the culture which has existed for over a century in Britain, infact it was the Metropolitan Police's idea not to be armed - or atleast display weapons that they may be carrying - in the first place. And even if the police were unique in their view, this may simply be a result of the culture within the police forces. They have a certain culture they're accustomed to, which is perfectly understandable.

Violent crime being low is a good thing, and kudos to the British for having a far less violent society than exists here. But to suggest that gun crime being low is the reason why the overwhelming majority of cops there aren't armed is wrong. This may be a reason as to why some think they don't need to be armed, but this isn't why they weren't armed in the first place or why they are at the numbers they currently are. It remains primarily a public perception issue, and a cultural one also; police and the larger society. If the police being armed would have helped to prevent the deaths of several officers who were killed in the line of duty, I don't see how this is a bad or non-desirable thing.

Also I don’t know why you and others continue to imply that cops having guns is mainly an American phenomenon. This isn't the only country that you can look at, Britain may have a low murder and gun crime rate, but it isn't in a class of its own. There are other countries that arm the police, and yet don't represent the specter of armed police running around wildly shooting people; or a very violent society in general, that the US apparently does to you. You may want to take a look at some statistics in a Sweden of a Norway, for instance, or even Canada and Australia; countries with whom the UK has more in common.User 070 15:58, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

The reason why the Metropolitan police was ostensibly unarmed (except for a truncheon) from its inception in 1829 was, of course, a political decision, but the reality was that the force has always had access to firearms and - initially - bladed weapons. Cutlasses were routinely carried for night duties, and before the force was a year old, 50 pairs of new flintlock pocket pistols had been bought, whilst various other weapons were acquired either as direct purchases or through amalgamation with other previously-armed patrol and watch organisations.

It may very well be that British police officers being armed could have prevented the deaths of some of their number, but it would be naive to think that it wouldn't also result in an increase in the number of people shot dead by the police, or an increase in the use of real firearms by criminals. Both would generally be seen as a "bad thing."

I don't where you get the idea that I and others think that "cops having guns is mainly an American phenomenon," since it is well-established than un-armed forces are very much in the minority worldwide: Britain, Ireland, New Zealand, Norway, Malta, and that's about it. No doubt there are countries with armed police that are more peaceful than some or all of them, but there are a lot more that aren't. Despite the impression the sensationalist media may give, the levels of general let alone armed crime in Britain simply does not merit the vast and inherently irreversible experiment that arming the police would represent. It could well be that some types of crime might remain static or diminish, but there is no guarantee that others would not increase, and it would be unlikely that subsequently de-arming the police would undo that damage. After all, the chaos which resulted from the opening of Pandora's Box could not be reversed merely by shutting the lid. Nick Cooper 12:57, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

As for the study you're quoting from, several issues arise. First of the all, the sample of individuals isn't necessarily representative of armed criminals in general. They were from only four "police areas", between 18-30, and dangerous offenders in high security prisons were excluded. Then there's the question of some assumptions that were made by the authors, most importantly simply taking the words of the inmates as to how they got their weapons and what weapons were available to them. Your characterization of my suggestion that pistol ammunition isn't as available as the pistols themselves as ludicrous, is not a rebuttal. You went on to speak about shotgun ammunition, which is readily accessible to anyone with said gun license, yet ignoring the important difference. 220 million shotgun cartridges is an impressive number, but good luck trying to fire(or even fit) one from a pistol. User 070 16:26, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

No doubt the sample is not representative of armed criminals as a whole, but by definition the more "danegrous offenders" are a much smaller subset, while those at the other end of the scale are less of a public threat. The survey sample, then, represents a useful corss-section of the centre "average" position. No dout some people would doubt the truthfulness of those actually questioned, but the sample was selected thus:

"Anyone who had been convicted of an armed robbery or attempted armed robbery which was recorded in the MPD in 1990, and who was still in custody between October 1992 and June 1993 when the fieldwork for this study was being carried out, was traced and spoken to in person by one of the authors. Eventually, exactly 100 prisoners were approached. Nine of these interviews were later discarded, usually because the interviewee maintained that he had been wrongly convicted or because he appeared to be suffering from psychiatric problems and was unable to offer any useful information. Only five robbers refused to participate in the study, although in two of these cases it was possible to substitute an alternative member of the same robbery team who consented to the interview. This resulted in a final sample of 88 completed interviews and a successful response rate of 95%."

Since these were prisoners still serving sentences two to three years after the crime, there will have been little to gain by downplaying or even - for the sake of bravado - exaggerating the nature of their crime in an anonymous interview with an academic researcher, especially one who will have been party to the details of their conviction via the initial selection process. In English law, there is little distinction in the sentencing potential between a crime commited with a real and loaded weapon as with an unloaded or even a replica one.

My comment about ammunition is a valid one. You said: "As to why someone committing robbery with a gun may or not load them or may even be using a fake one, can be because of a multitude of reasons. One of them might be because guns are tightly restricted in Britain ammunition isn't readily available, especially for handguns. So while someone may be using a gun that was in existence before the ban was put in place, the ammo might not exist." You seem to think that the only guns in criminal circulation are the pre-ban ones, with a similar diminishing illicit ammunition supply. In his critque of Home Office Research Study 298, Campbell does indeed note that: "It must be noted that, on the evidence of the Report, criminals rarely fire their guns so that a small number of cartridges will last for a long time. It is suggested that ammunition has a limited shelf-life, but that is simply not so if the ammunition has been kept even moderately well. Ammunition used in crime is often found to be very old and may predate... 1988." [Para 56]

However, it is clear that brand-new firearms are still entering the criminal circulation, and Campbell notes that the black market price of a new 9mm pistol is only a "modest mark-up" on the legitimate market price. It would indeed be ludicrous to believe that the new firearms are available, but not new ammunition. If a criminal can smuggle in a pistol from outside the UK, why not the ammunition to go with it? In fact, Cambell refers to the then-recent case of teargas pistols converted to fire live rounds in Lithuania, smuggled into the UK by a clothing importer and then: "distributed to criminals complete with a silencer and forty rounds of ammunition. A Lithuanian who has a criminal record was arrested in North London in May 2006 when he had 18 of the pistols complete with silencers, and 748 rounds of ammunition in a hold-all." The bottom line seems to be than while old ammunition is still be used, new supplies are clearly not a problem. Drugs are smuggled into the UK on a massive scale, so why not ammunition?

You are missing the point in relation to shotguns. You seemed to suggest that the ban on handguns resulted in a shortage of ammunition for them, and hence robbers would use a replica instead. However, shotgun ownership and cartridge consumption was always more widespread and less restricted than that for handguns ever was, and remains so. If a handgun ban did really affect the criminal availability of handgun ammunition, logically one would expect to see at least some shift to the use of sawn-off shotguns due to their "uninterrupted" amunition supply, but this has simply not happened. The idea that a significant number of criminals wouldn't turn to sawn-off shotguns if they couldn't use real handguns, but would only use replicas instaed is ludicrous.Nick Cooper 12:57, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

I'll address the ammunition issue first, I implied that handgun ammuntion might not be as available after the handgun ban than before, I never said it was impossible to get. Therefore people who use handguns to commit crimes wouldn't have access as readily to ammunition. And handguns are the primary weapon that are used in robberies. Even before the ban, replicas were used more frequently than the real thing, simply because they were more readily available. But since the ban was put in place, the numbers of replicas being used most likely rose.

There's no need for shotgun usage by criminals to rise because ammunition for handguns are less available. A pressumption is being made that most people committing crimes with guns intend to fire them, I never implied that. The question might be asked whether shotguns are used more frequently in the deaths and injuries of victims now, after the ban, or if it hasn't had any effect. But I'm not here to debate the handgun ban, although I believe it wasn't necessary and hasn't helped much in reducing gun crime in the UK.

As to how criminals gain access to weapons, there are several ways. Once again I never implied that criminals had NO access to handguns, I said they had less than before. Now several issues can be raised, exactly what type of individual has access and what does access mean; ownership, borrowing, stealing, smuggling etc. In Greenwood's critique, he said that many criminals from the study got their weapons in a closed market, meaning that the person selling/loaning the weapon knew the person it was given to, or the person that set up the transaction. Surely you can see that this has a big impact on exactly how many weapons are available, and to whom. This is why I try to avoid speaking about criminals in general terms, a gang-member or drug dealer's access to weapons isn't the same as someone who simply wants to rob a convenient store or a person in a parking lot at night.

As for the smuggling of drugs into Britain; there isn't nor ever was the market for handguns, let alone ammunition in the UK, that there is for narcotics. The comparison isn't appropiate, a global network for smuggling handguns and ammunition into Western Europe on the scale of the global narco-trafficking network doesn't exist. The Lithuanian's operation was pathetic in comparison to Jamaican drug-gangs for example. User 070 (talk) 16:31, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

The comment about "advice" on Britain's firearms policies coming mainly from the US, and then your quoting of American crime statistics and your defending of the "status quo" there, gave the impression that you viewed a change to the policy of not arming the police in the UK as somewhat American.

I must take issue with your characterization of giving all cops guns as opening a "pandora's box", that seems completely unfounded, all you presented were fears that certain types of crime might increase - without even specifying which types. If you think that more criminals will carry guns in order to be better matched with the police, then you got to give some stats on the rise of criminals carrying pepper spray and tasers since these were introduced to the police. Statistically speaking more cops having weapons increases the likelihood of them being discharged, but it isn't like the dangers presented can't be mitigated with training. Because the police shoot more people doesn't mean that there will be more unjustified shootings. Do you have some statistics that show a higher rate of unjustified shootings in areas that have a higher portion of police officers carrying guns than in communities where a lower ratio of officers carry guns?User 070 17:17, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Hi, just to let you know, I left a reply on my talk page. --Lo2u (T • C) 00:35, 6 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Actually, I don't think I have quoted any "American crime statistics" in this particular discussion, or in any previous one with you. You have to remember, however, that the whole issue of reversing the handgun bans is a debate that is simply not happening in the UK, and the idea of going beyond that and having wider access to firearms than there was before 1997 is even less remote. The idea of arming the police more widely does occasionally get aired, but is never taken even remotely seriously, not least by the police themselves. What there is a plethora of, however, is - I'm sorry to confirm - "advice" largely emenating from the United States - and no other English-speaking country - telling us how to run our own country, which actually comes from both sides of the gun debate over there, and the anti-gun faction is as guilty of mis-reporting and spin to their own end as the pro-gun faction is. We are simply not interested in being someone else's ideological battleground.
 * The use of pepper spray and tasers can't be equated with firearms. A criminal may fear being caught through the use of either, but clearly the risk of being shot by an armed police officer is of a different magnitude altogether. Most criminals view capture and incarceration as an occasional occupational hazard, but the chance of being shot dead is either going to make them not commit a crime, or to level the odds by being armed more often themselves, which obvious increases the risk to both public and police. Even you admit that more police guns would mean more police shootings, but your blasé attitude that this would not necessarily mean an increase in "injustified" ones really demonstrates the cultural gulf between our two countries. Public outrage over various fatal police - and even non-police - shootings in the UK repeatedly demonstrates that the population as a whole does not view shooting suspects as being a good idea in anything but the most exceptional circumstances. Most people don't want to have their house burgled or their car stolen, but most would baulk at the idea that the perpetrator could or should be shot whilst doing so. Nick Cooper (talk) 16:29, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Hi. This is in response to the message left on my talk page but I think it's relevant here. My real problem, and its not something I've been able to rectify, is that the article seems to focus a little too much on those shootings that are controversial, giving the impression that the arming of police has been a general failre. It would be nice to have some statistics about the number of (non-fatal) deployments of armed response units and more detail about the non-controversial shootings. As far as I know, no officer has ever been prosecuted, and enquiries have generally absolved officers who have used their weapons. At the moment the article seems to be hinting that the small number of lawless armed police officers is going around indiscriminately shooting people - and nobody's bothering to prosecute them. On what you say about the article not focusing on the effectiveness of the policy, I tend to agree, but how would you deal with that? I'd be interested to know if you have suggestions. In answer to your last question, no I wouldn't say people who want the police to be armed are marginalised and not taken seriously but I doubt there is a majority and the matter isn't widely discussed, except perhaps when a police officer is killed. This page has some (old) information on officers' opinions: interestingly, although 79% don't want to carry weapons, 40% want to see a more widespread arming of police and 43% would be prepared to carry weapons. I seem to remember seeing a more recent survey suggesting wider support but I couldn't find it. Hope that's some help. --Lo2u (T • C) 18:23, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Well, I believe that there should be information showing the proportion of armed officers to unarmed officers that were shot. This would help shed light on the dangers presented to the unarmed officers. Also, maybe it can help to counter the claim I often hear; that arming the police would only increase the number of criminals who arm themselves in response, and  therefore the number of shootouts and the danger this presents for the public, this is absolutely inane btw. I'll have to do the research but I'm pretty sure that proportionately more unarmed cops are shot at than armed ones. I'll also love to see a comparative analysis of the apprehension rates of armed criminals in the UK with those of some other European countries that arm all their officers.

It isn't surprising that most of the police don't want to be armed since most aren't currently armed. That's the culture that they're accustomed to, people are resistant to change, simply because it's a change, not to mention that being armed would increase the responsibility and pressure on the individual officer.

I'm not British so my perception on the culture in the UK is limited, but speaking as an outsider, there seems to be an "Us versus them" mentality when it comes to the police in Britain. I think this is reflected in the edits to several articles dealing with Law enforcement, hence the disproportionate focus on controversial shootings and other misdeeds by various officers. And it's interesting to note that in the Police Use of firearms in the United Kingdom article, people describe such and such a police force's officers as doing this or that thing, and rarely name officers or personalize the incident. The articles on the deaths of Jean Charles Menzes and Ian Tomlinson; tragic as these incidents were, seem to demonstrate this anti-police sentiment also. First of all the lengths of these articles don't compare to those on the deaths of Sharon Beshsenivsky or Ian Broadhurst(who doesn't even have his own article btw, but instead the focus is on his killer). This may account for the slant of certain articles, which probably is overlooked by most British eyes, but stands out to someone like me, who isn't from that culture. Don't get me wrong I'm not a cheerleader for the police where I live in the US, however bias is bias, and it should atleast be acknowleged. User 070 (talk) 01:03, 8 May 2009 (UTC)


 * The number of officers killed or injured by the criminal use of firearms (exclusing air weapons) has been (slight injury + serious injury* + fatal injury):
 * 1991 - 7 (2 + 5 + 0)
 * 1992 - 10 (6 + 3 + 1)
 * 1993 - 10 (6 + 3 + 1)
 * 1994 - 21 (9 + 12 + 0)
 * 1995 - 15 (5 + 9 + 1)
 * 1996 - 9 (5 + 4 + 0)
 * 1997 - 6 (4 + 2 + 0)
 * 1997/98 - 6 (3 + 3 + 0)
 * 1998/99 - 11 (11 + 0 + 0)
 * 1999/00 - 10 (10 + 0 + 0)
 * 2000/01 - 7 (2 + 5 + 0)
 * 2001/02 - 10 (10 + 0 + 0)
 * 2002/03 - 12 (11 + 1 + 0)
 * 2003/04 - 14 (10 + 3 + 1)
 * 2004/05 - 23 (21 + 2 + 0)
 * 2005/06 - 23 (16 + 6 + 1)
 * 2006/07 - 21 (18 + 3 + 0)
 * 2007/08 - 24 (20 + 3 + 1)
 * * Defined as: "A serious injury is one that required a stay in hospital or involved fractures, concussion, severe general shock,penetration by a bullet or multiple shot wounds."
 * The fatal injuries were:
 * 1992 Special Constable Glen Goodman - unarmed, shot by IRA terrorists during routine traffic stop
 * 1993 Constable Patrick Dunne - unarmed local beat officer shot when investigating gunshots while attending an unrelated incident nearby
 * 1995 Constable Philip Walters - unarmed, shot whilst investigating disturbance
 * 2003 Constable Ian Broadhurst - unarmed, shot during routine traffic stop
 * 2005 Constable Sharon Beshenivsky - unarmed, shot whilst investigating robbery
 * 2007 Constable Richard Gray - armed, attending incident after unarmed officers had been threatened with a rifle
 * There doesn't appear to be a ready source of whether the officers who were injured were armed or not, other than trawling through news reports. A search for likely shootings of armed police only brought up this one (2009). Of course, numerically unarmed officers are more likely to be shot, simply because there are so many more of them than unarmed officers, and most shootings are of unarmed "first responders". Nick Cooper (talk) 10:56, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

So Nick, it seems that these statistics do not show that there is a greater risk of criminals discharging their weapons at armed officers than unarmed ones. If the vast majority of officers that were killed were unarmed, how is your argument that more armed officers = greater risk of shootouts with criminals supported? Armed criminals don't show any inclination to spare the lives of unarmed police, and instead open fire on the armed ones. You implied earlier that having all officers armed would mean more criminals will carry weapons too, in order to be better matched, hence more shootouts. Where's the evidence for this? User 070 (talk) 22:38, 9 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Actually, one armed officer and five unarmed officers being shot dead would be a greater percentage risk for the former, given that the number of armed officers is a lot less than one in six. I think you have to recognise that those criminals who carry firearms do so in the context of most officers being unarmed, as indeed do those criminal who currently chose not to carry fireams. Both types of criminal make that choice on the basis that most officers they encounter will not be armed. It seems very naive of you to suggest that radically changing the practices and behaviour of the police is somehow not going to affect the practice and behaviour of criminals, as well. As I have said previously, it may very well make some criminals less inclined to commit crimes or to carry firearms when doing so, but it would be very foolish to think that it would not have the opposite effect on others. Arming all or substantially more police officers would be a huge change to law enforecent practices, as radical as dis-arming a current armed police force would be. What do you think would be the result if the latter happened in your country? Nick Cooper (talk) 12:19, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

The number of shootings are very low, so one has to be careful in how they come to their conclusions from these statitics. Yes, I know that one in six British police officers aren't armed, I believe the number of "Authorised Firearms Officers" in 2007/08 was 6,780, and there's something like 140,000(or thereabouts) cops in the 43 police forces in England and Wales. It really would be helpful if the number of officers that were shot could be broken down into armed and unarmed categories. There are larger numbers to work with. Incidentally the one armed police officer that was killed out of the six was shot by someone who was intoxicated and arguably had mental issues, because he killed himself after shooting the cop. So he doesn't fit the bill of the criminal simply using their weapon to get out of a sticky situation. He held two unarmed officers hostage and then shot the armed one when he showed up before killing himself.

I think it's a bit of a stretch for you to assert why criminals arm themselves or not, as I've mentioned earlier, criminals aren't monolithic. One becomes a criminal by breaking the law, they are many sub-categories of criminals and various reasons for why it is that people do the things they do. The police are not necessarily the dominant factor in why it is that someone committing a crime may choose to arm themselves or not, infact it would be preferrable not to encounter the police at all, armed or unarmed. If the police here had their guns taken away overnight, no doubt the consequences would be disastrous, however I think the comparison you're trying to make isn't appropiate. You see, there is no such thing as an unarmed police officer here in America(well not that I know of anyway, this is a pretty big country), however there are cops in most if not all police forces in the UK that have guns, there are a small minority but they still exist. There are also other very important differences between Britain and America, namely the level of gun ownership, over a quarter billion, and that's just the legal ones. User 070 (talk) 22:37, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Btw, what's the source for these statistics? I've been trying to find British police shooting statistics online and I haven't had much success, most hits are about a particular shooting and usually by the police. User 070 (talk) 17:10, 10 May 2009 (UTC)


 * They're usually included in the Home Office's annual supplementary bulletin on homicide and firearms offences, available here. Nick Cooper (talk) 12:19, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm familiar with the link you provided, however I was inquiring about the specific report or study that was the source of the statistics on shootings of police officers. Do you have a link for that? The link you gave has many reports, I've read a few of them, the ones that I've read don't catolog police shootings over any significant amount of time. A report on the Homeoffice police website deals with assaults on police officers, some of these were fatal, but this was only for one year. User 070 (talk) 21:53, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

May 2009
Welcome to Wikipedia. The recent edit you made to the page Template:TB has been reverted, as it appears to be unconstructive. Use the sandbox for testing; if you believe the edit was constructive, please ensure that you provide an informative edit summary. You may also wish to read the introduction to editing. Thank you. Fieldday-sunday (talk) 23:24, 21 May 2009 (UTC)