The Omitted Knee Strikes
You are six months into your probation and crewed with PC Danvers, a 14-year officer who has offered to mentor you towards your probation board. At 01:20 you attend a street assault and arrest a man outside a pub. In the van he is in earshot when Danvers describes him as 'one of them from the estate - they're all the same'. At the station Danvers drafts the use-of-force form and omits the two knee strikes he used to the man's thigh, saying 'it just invites paperwork and it was nothing'. The man has a reddened knee. The custody sergeant glances at the form and asks whether the account is 'all there'. Danvers slides it across to you to countersign as the second officer present.
1. Danvers hands you the form and a pen. What do you do in the next ten minutes, and what do you deliberately avoid doing?
Read the worked answer
Do not countersign. A second officer's signature certifies that the account is accurate, not merely that you were present. Signing would make you party to a false record - gross misconduct, and potentially a criminal offence, whatever your probation status.
Before the end of the shift:
- Tell Danvers plainly what you are going to do and why: 'I saw two knee strikes and I am going to record that.' Factual, not a lecture; it also gives him the chance to correct the form himself, which is the least damaging outcome for everyone.
- Submit your own account in your own words, contemporaneously, including the strikes you observed and the reddened knee.
- If he does not amend it, tell the custody sergeant you cannot verify the form as drafted.
- Note the conversation in your pocket book - time, words used, who was present.
Avoid: editing or deleting his entry, raising it in a group chat, or mentioning it to the detainee. The record can surface in a complaint, a civil claim or an IOPC referral, and the earlier it is accurate the more defensible it is. Danvers' willingness to mentor you is irrelevant to that decision.
2. Two days later Danvers tells you that if you 'shop' him you will be managed out before your probation board. How do you handle the threat and the working relationship?
Read the worked answer
Separate the two problems: the integrity issue, which is already being addressed, and the threat, which is new misconduct in its own right.
- Record it now - date, time, exact words, anyone in earshot. Your note of the wording is the evidence.
- Do not withdraw the correction. Retracting now and re-raising it later is the worst position: it looks like concealment under pressure and leaves the record false.
- Report the threat to a sergeant or inspector you trust - not necessarily someone in Danvers' circle - or to Professional Standards directly if the line management chain is compromised. Intimidating a junior officer is a discipline matter regardless of the underlying issue.
- Keep working normally. Refusing to crew with him, cold-shouldering him or briefing others against him will make you look like the problem.
- Get support - federation representative, and ideally a mentor outside the crew.
Probation boards are decided on evidence and reports, not one officer's opinion of you. That is an argument for documenting carefully, not for staying quiet.
3. The man complains of a knee injury and a formal complaint lands. Your statement is requested. What do you provide, and what would damage you?
Read the worked answer
Give a full, honest statement from your own memory, and do not read or discuss Danvers' account first. Officers aligning their accounts before statements is exactly what turns an error into an allegation of collusion.
- Say what you saw, what you did, and what you cannot now recall. An honest 'I do not remember' is worth more than a confident detail you are unsure of.
- Note that you raised the omission at the time; if the form went in unamended, that corroborates your account.
- Address the factual points the complaint raises: whether the man complained of pain, whether first aid was offered, whether he was seen by the FME.
- Do not apologise for the force used and do not defend it - justification is not your role and comment either way may prejudice the investigation.
- Cooperate with Professional Standards and tell them you had already flagged the concern, so you are not seen as being honest only once challenged.
Expect your probation to be tested by this. Being the officer who corrected the record early is defensible; being the second name on a false form is not.