The Climate Camp returns to the City

Some will be pleased and others will groan at the news that the Climate Camp, which set up on Bishopsgate at the same time as the G20 protests earlier this year, will be returning to an undisclosed location in the City in the “Summer Swoop”. It’s all due to happen between the 27th of August and the 2nd of September, August Bank Holiday to you and me, and they’re being coy about the arrangements other than to follow them online.

Check your diary. Book the week off work. Whether you come for the whole camp, or can only come for a day, make sure you don’t miss it! This year we will set up the camp together, with a mass swoop of people taking the site. Get down to London on the day before camp on 26 August and be ready for the action to start at any time. Join us on facebook and sign up to twitter and text updates to make sure you stay informed about plans.

I’m sure we’ll be hearing more about this before the day so check back for updates as I’ll be keeping my ear to the ground.

Climate Camp
http://climatecamp.org.uk

Friday Round-up

Earlier in the week I brought you the police request to identify the man who jumped from the building near Bank and since then the press has been full of the tragic story of Anjool “Jools” Malde who had been asked by Deutsche Bank to leave work early last Friday while they investigated an “IT matter”. The general consensus seems to be that the fear of losing his job may have driven him to it although there are witness statements suggesting that he seemed fine only a couple of hours beforehand., and today the Daily Mail has suggested that the whole situation could have been caused by an internet prank that went wrong. Exactly what could have caused him to take his own life hopefully the coroner will discover.

It seems like the Metropolitan Police have been stung by events where Police officers and PCSOs have asked members of the public to delete photos from their cameras and the Met have responded with an official policy stating that all photography is permitted and that police should be involved if there is enough evidence to suspect a link to terrorist activity:
“Members of the public and the media do not need a permit to film or photograph in public places and police have no power to stop them filming or photographing incidents or police personnel.”

In my coverage of the G20 riots back in May I had no queries from police about my taking photos, even at the times when I was in between police lines, but I know some photographers did. With all my previous photos online (see Flickr gallery to the right) myself and thecity.co.uk owner Rob have been bantering about what kind of photo I’d have to take to get myself arrested but it seems as though the Met have taken that particular form of excitement away now.

Lastly I’d recommend you have a look at Leadenhall Market’s upcoming Jazz Festival, called “Sax in the City”, particularly the evening event on the 30th
July featuring Steve Gregory, former sax player for George Michael (“Careless Whisper” anyone?), Van Morrison and Georgie Fame amongst many others. I played guitar with Steve a few times in different bands over the years and more recently he played at my birthday party while I sang Sinatra numbers, though you’ll no doubt be pleased to know that I won’t be reprising those at the market… they couldn’t afford me

Police Guidance to Photograpers
http://www.met.police.uk/about/photography.htm

Leadenhall Market – Sax in the City
http://www.leadenhallmarket.co.uk

Under Pressure

“Green shoots, no roots”  is one saying going around the office and with the City under prolonged pressure some of the individuals under strain have found the going too hard to bear.

Recently the former CFO of ABN-AMRO went missing with a pair of shotguns the other week having left ABN in March 2008 for personal reasons and was later found dead in woodland near Windsor. While it’s not known what the other circumstances behind his tragic death are there may be some who believe that it was suicide, the same way that former Freddie Mac CFO David Kellerman met his end.

Here in the City there was an incident yesterday where a well-dressed man in a Hugo Boss suit fell from a tall City building and Police are asking for assistance in finding out who he was:

City of London Police is asking for help to identify a man who fell to his death from a building near Bank junction this Sunday, July 5th.

The man wasn’t carrying any form of ID and inquiries since the incident at approx 12.10 yesterday have failed to establish who he was.

He is described as a dark skinned, and may have been Asian or Middle Eastern. He is believed to have been in his late 20′s to early 30′s, and had short black/dark brown hair and was clean-shaven. He was well dressed, in a Hugo Boss suit, white striped shirt, blue Gucci tie, black Gucci belt and wore black slip on shoes.

He had a silver coloured band on the third finger of his right hand and silver coloured oblong cufflinks with a black stone in middle. He had a Gucci key ring with three Yale type keys and one Chubb type key.

Anyone who believes they may have information about his identity is asked to contact Bishopsgate CID on 020 7601 2670 or 020 7601 2606

There’s no indication whether he was a City worker at this point but it has be somewhat likely, given the location of his fall. Hopefully one of you will be able to help.

City Police Launch Clickable Map

The City of London Police have proudly announced a new clickable map that shows you the wards of the City, with useful information such as what landmarks are in the particular ward and contact details for local community policing.

Sound good? Well, don’t bother with it if you want real information about policing. The contact details for ward by ward local policing appears to give the same phone number and email address for every ward.

As a policing tool, I’m struggling to see the point. As a clickable tourist information guide to local landmarks, it’s great – but is that really what the police should be producing?  More useful, I think, is the crime map which lets you move around the City and see local crime figures for this year and last year.

So I worked with a murderer – part 2

You may want to read part 1 before reading this

I looked up the phone number for the local police station in the area where the murder had taken place and cautiously called it, convinced in my own mind that I was just going to give them a couple of names and then ring off. Eventually I got through to the team who were doing the investigating and and blurted out the information before trying to make my excuses and hang up.
“We’d like to come and see you” said the voice on the other end,
“Really?” I said, surprised that they were that interested,
“There are some things you’ve mentioned that nobody else has been able to tell us”,
“Oh crap” I thought, but didn’t say.

After a quick battle of conscience I agreed to their request and so it was on a Saturday morning that two friendly policemen turned up on my doorstep having driven over 100 miles to get to my house. They stayed for about an hour, probably only fifteen minutes of which was talking about the case and the rest writing up my statement and talking “Police stories”, and also discovering that one of them had gone for an interview in a building that I was working in at the time. They left seemingly quite happy and it was a few weeks after that I heard that Simon had denied murder and that it was going to go to trial. That meant a long drive, a day off work and potentially ending up with my name in the papers, which was not really what I’d had in mind when I’d volunteered the information, but when I though of how much the murdered girl’s family had already lost it seemed trivial in comparison.

As the weeks went by the court date loomed closer and closer and I got more nervous and more nervous, then I received a phone call.
“It’s all over” said a friendly policeman,
“What?” I replied,
“He’s confessed”

I was so relieved I wanted to dance and skip and shout but instead felt the stress of the months of waiting roll off me as I settled down to a glass of very nice white wine, which seemed to get lost on the way down so I had to send at least two or three more after it to find out what had happened.

It turned out he’d held out until his very last court appearance before the full trial and then confessed, which was only a half-decent thing to do as he should have owned up earlier and saved the stress and expense all round. It was across the national papers for a couple of days as the details came out, but thankfully not my name, though some of the evidence quoted in the paper seemed awfully familiar. It was odd seeing his face on the London papers having been so used to seeing it across a desk.

At sentencing he got 16 years for the murder and I got a letter offering me counselling, which I thought was more appropriate for the family than me but I appreciated the offer. Would I do it again? I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Police Appeal for Witnesses to Bus Accident

City of London Police have appealed for witnesses to come forward after a pedestrian received life threatening injuries after being hit by a bus at the junction of Old Broad Street and Liverpool Street.

The pedestrian was struck at about 1.45pm on Monday 1st June.

Sgt Bill Holder said: “The collision happened outside the busy train station at a time when many City workers and visitors will have been on their lunch breaks. We need to hear from anyone who saw the incident.”

Anyone with information about the incident is asked to contact the investigating officers by calling 020 7601 2222 or call Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.

So I worked with a murderer

A few years ago we used to have someone in our team who I will call Simon and he was, shall we say, a bit of a lad. Not a cheeky and cheerful Artful Dodger kind of lad, though there was a certain amount of that about him, but more of a Essex-boy-with-an-XR3-and-an-attiude sort of lad. He was in fact a genuine Essex lad, rather than just a metaphorical one, and his neighbours described him as “a lovely lad”…. much later… to the Police…

Simon worked in my team for a couple of years but had the habit of going AWOL and it was mostly to his girlfriend’s place in Bristol which meant that he’d have to get up at 4am to get back to London for work and then be useless all day long. I never got to speak to his girlfriend, who I’ll call Lucy, though she seemed quite normal and pleasant from the photos and what he said about her, though quite what a lovely 19-year old could see in a rotund 33-year old who was in the throes of a messy divorce I never did figure. He, however, had worked out that he was onto a good thing but was also given over to a jealous nature so if he was speaking to her on the phone and heard a man’s voice in the background that she couldn’t adequately account for without drawing breathe his response was “I’m coming down” at which point he used to go AWOL and drive down to Bristol.

Obviously this was affecting his performance at work and he was eventually persuaded to seek other opportunities and he was later replaced by someone equally useless but for different reasons.

It was a surprise therefore, some eighteen months later, for someone in our department to receive a phone call from a supplier to say “Didn’t Simon work for you? You need to check the news”. I went to the website of the local newspaper in the area where he’d lived and there was his face splashed all over the front page with the headline being that he’d murdered his girlfriend. Not the girl he’d been going out with when he’d worked with us but another 18-year old that he must have hooked up with later. It transpired that she’d moved in with him but then found him too jealous and possessive and when she said that she was going to move out it turned into an argument, he stabbed her to death and then fled but gave himself up a few days later after being persuaded by his brother. The Police were keen to speak to anyone who knew Simon to build their case so I was torn between wanting to put them in contact with his previous girlfriend, who I knew had had a similar experience, but not wanting to draw attention to where I worked as it wouldn’t be fair on them to get drawn into it.

To be continued…

Second Arrest Over Pudding Lane Deaths

City of London Police have made a second arrest following the incident which saw two pedestrians killed in broad daylight in the City.

An unattended van hurtled down Pudding Lane killing Dave Smith, an IT worker with Lloyd TSB, and Claudia Kauert, a 33 year old female from Germany.

A 51 year old man was arrested at the time on a charge of manslaughter, and now police have arrested a second man, aged 61, also on suspicion on manslaughter.

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“Changing Places” event for Cyclists

Cyclists are being invited by City of London Police to “change places” with HGV drivers, and learn more about how they use the road. The event is being held at Finsbury Circus from 7.30am to 11.30am on Wednesday 20th May, and will allow cyclists to take the drivers seat in a heavy good vehicle and get a better understanding of a driver’s experience on the road, including learning about blind spots. It’s hope that the session will improve the safety of cyclists who share road space with HGVs.

‘Changing Places’ is a joint initiative between the City of London Police force’s Road Policing Unit and the Metropolitan Police Traffic Partnership Unit.

Business Policing Team Launched

The City of London Police have launched a new Business Policing Team. The new unit will be based at 4 Broadgate and are intented to “provide business-focused policing to the 60,000 people working within the Broadgate estate”.

Specialists within the team will be able to assist with:

• Economic crime
• Counter-terrorism
• Business continuity
• Physical security
• Crime prevention and personal safety

Find out more about the new Business Policing Team here.

Also, you may like to know that the City of London Police Surgery is held at no 4 Broadgate Circle on the last Tuesday of every month. The next one is scheduled to take place on Tuesday 26 May at 8.30am – 9.30am and gives residents and businesses the chance meet the local police to discuss matters of concern.

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