Torchlight in the container row
You are patrolling a 4-hectare freight yard alone at 01:30. From the corner of the amenities block you see a torch moving between two stacks of shipping containers about 60 m away, near the eastern fence. Two figures are passing boxes from a container down to a white van backed up to the container doors. The van has no visible rear plate. You have a torch, a two-way radio with coverage across the yard, a mobile phone, and a notebook. You have no baton, no handcuffs and no dog. The site's standing instructions say 'observe and report \u2014 do not confront'. The gate camera covers the main entrance only; the container row is a blind spot. Your control room is 20 minutes away and the nearest police station is 12 minutes away. The yard stores whiteware, not cash or pharmaceuticals.
1. What do you do in the first 60 seconds, and what do you deliberately not do?
Read the worked answer
Observe, report, stay alive.
Do:
- Get behind solid cover \u2014 a container corner or the amenities wall \u2014 and stay low. Put steel between you and them.
- Turn your torch off and put your phone on silent, using the earpiece only.
- Move away from your own vehicle if it identifies your position; note where you can withdraw to.
- Ring 111. Give the yard address, which gate you are near, the number of people, that a van is backed up to a container, that you cannot see whether they are armed, and your own description and position so police do not mistake you for one of them.
- Give a running commentary if it is safe to do so, and notify your control room.
- Pick a fixed observation point that also has a clear exit route.
Deliberately do not:
- Approach or challenge them. Two on one, unknown weapons, 60 m from help, 4 hectares of yard, no handcuffs, no baton, no dog, no police powers.
- Shine your torch at them \u2014 you have just told them where you are and how many of you there are.
- Try to block the van with your body or your vehicle.
- Go into the container row alone to check what has been taken while they are still on site.
The property is insured; whiteware is replaceable and you are not. Your value at that moment is as a reliable witness and a safe scene, not as a deterrent.
2. Write what your notebook entry should contain, and what you do about the CCTV.
Read the worked answer
Notebook \u2014 structured so nothing important is missing:
- When: 24-hour times for every event, and the source of the time (your watch, the radio log).
- Where: exact position, distance and direction to the subjects, lighting and weather.
- Who: each figure separately \u2014 sex, approximate age, height and build, clothing head to toe, footwear, gloves, masks, gait, voice or accent if heard, anything distinctive.
- What they did: in sequence, not summarised. Who carried what, what tools you saw (bolt cutters, grinder, crowbar), which container number, whether they touched the fence.
- Vehicle: registration if any part was visible, make, model, colour, damage, roof racks, occupants, direction of travel and time.
- What you did: police call time and reference, control room notification, your movements and withdrawal.
- What you did not see: write the gaps as clearly as the facts. 'I could not see his face' is a valuable entry.
Sign, date and time it. Initial any correction; never rewrite the page later.
CCTV: the container row is a blind spot \u2014 say so plainly in the report, because it matters to the police and to the site's review. For the gate camera, request preservation in writing the same shift, record the time range, note the camera-clock offset, log who exported it, and store it securely. Do not put it on your phone.
3. Three weeks later you are asked to give a statement and to identify a suspect from a photo montage. You only glimpsed one man's face. What do you do?
Read the worked answer
Say exactly what you saw, including the limits \u2014 especially the limits.
- Use the notebook, not refreshed memory. Read your original entry before the interview, and tell the officer when you are relying on the notebook rather than recollection.
- Separate observation from inference. 'I saw a man of about 180 cm in a dark hooded top' is observation. 'He looked like he was the boss' is inference. Say which is which.
- Do not guess to be helpful. A confident wrong identification is a miscarriage of justice and it destroys your credibility on everything else in the statement. 'I only saw the side of his face for a second and I cannot identify him' is a proper answer.
- Flag contamination. If you have seen a photo of the suspect before \u2014 on Facebook, in a briefing, in the montage itself \u2014 tell the officer before you look. If the montage is presented in a way that suggests one image, say so.
- Do not discuss the case with other witnesses before you give your statement, and do not compare notes with your control room operator.
- Read the statement before you sign it and correct anything that overstates what you saw. If you are asked to say you saw more than you did, refuse and record the request and the date.
Keep the notebook safe \u2014 you can be subpoenaed, and the original contemporaneous note is worth more than any later reconstruction.