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Not much of a haul for the risk then.
 
no

but as the officer just said its not the first time its happened, dont know if he meant in town or some where else, like i said i dont know much at the moment.

i just feel bad now that i didnt do more to stop it, but i like him was convinced they were real, how hard is it to get hold of a police uniform?
 
So was it in Southampton? in the main highstreet or somewhere else?
 
At least if they do get caught impersonating a copper is jail time I believe.
 
Bernie174 said:
Firstly, though, I do wish people would do some research. I have no idea why S43 is being quoted, its not really relevant, perhaps you should be looking at S.76.
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do you mean me? as you can see in my post it is taken directly from the Met police website - the link is there.

section 43 Terrorism Act 2000

section 76 counter terrorism act 2008


two different things - section 43 is about stop and search and section 76 is about 'Eliciting, publishing or communicating information about members of armed forces etc'
 
One hell of a scram,but I guess if they hit 3/4 photographer a day,it make it worthwhile,feel for your mate.

Watch out they maybe coming to a city near you.
 
Yes Sturisoma I did mean you.
S43 is a power to stop search and detain for the reasons of search.
It's irrelevant, and doesn't matter where you got it from.
It isn't the only power to stop someone is one of a number. It's often misquoted by photograpghers, assuming its the power always used.
The second section, S76 is about taking photos of members of the armed forces OR a Constable.
All Police officers are constables which is why I made my point, and why I suggested you do some research.
The prohibition is however conditional, in that it is of use to a terrorist. It does not mean you have to be a terrorist, for example if you took a photo of an anti terrorist squad officer and published it as such, then it could be seen as you being guilty of that offence.
However, thats for a court to decide, hence why you could be prevented, and if you persisted arrested. Chances of conviction would be on the low side for most Police Officers and nil for say a PC wandering the beat. That however does not prevent arrest.

See this link
http://www.bjp-online.com/british-journal-of-photography/news/1644048/jail-photographing-police

Now before you start, I don't agree with this bit of legislation, I think that common sense should prevail in most circumstances and that if it's going to exist, then it really should only be used when there is absolutely no option.

Matty

You said you'd been told by your friend, not were there. You are therefore a witness to nothing at all, accept hearsay which is inadmissible.
 
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Bernie174 said:
Yes Sturisoma I did mean you.
S43 is a power to stop search and detain for the reasons of search.
It's irrelevant, and doesn't matter where you got it from.
It isn't the only power to stop someone is one of a number. It's often misquoted by photograpghers, assuming its the power always used.
The second section, S76 is about taking photos of members of the armed forces OR a Constable.
All Police officers are constables which is why I made my point, and why I suggested you do some research.
The prohibition is however conditional, in that it is of use to a terrorist. It does not mean you have to be a terrorist, for example if you took a photo of an anti terrorist squad officer and published it as such, then it could be seen as you being guilty of that offence.
However, thats for a court to decide, hence why you could be prevented, and if you persisted arrested. Chances of conviction would be on the low side for most Police Officers and nil for say a PC wandering the beat. That however does not prevent arrest.

Matty

You said you'd been told by your friend, not were there. You are therefore a witness to nothing at all, accept hearsay which is inadmissible.
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sorry i did say i wasnt there when it all started but i was there when the police took his camera, it is more obvious to us now why they didnt arrest him when we questioned it
 
matty198111 said:
it was in southampton
but not the high street it was by the shops at the bottom,,,,, i think there is a staple there
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This is West Quay, full of CCTV. Chances of this incident not being recorded is pretty slim. just a case of whether the local plod are keen to follow it up.
 
spaniel said:
This is West Quay, full of CCTV. Chances of this incident not being recorded is pretty slim. just a case of whether the local plod are keen to follow it up.
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according to what my friend says, they are very keen and very worried about this incident, as so many people would trust them

they did say about cctv and they are investigating into, i have to make an appointment tomorrow after work to go and answer questions and there also going to speak to the security guard
 
I'm afraid it looks like your friend may never see their camera again:thumbsdown:

How about you post us the model & serial number etc so we can keep em peeled as Shaw Taylor used to say (showing my age now)
 
matty198111 said:
there also going to speak to the security guard
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See now surely the security gaurd must of been fake also, as you would assume he was the one who called the fake police to your friends whereabouts. :shrug:

Who knows perhaps they were scanning some form of communication though & picked up on a genuine call:thinking::shrug:
 
spaniel said:
This is West Quay, full of CCTV. Chances of this incident not being recorded is pretty slim. just a case of whether the local plod are keen to follow it up.
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I suspect they will be very keen to nab scammers impersonating police officers.
 
Personally.. I would be having a word with the employer of the security guard pushing the line, "If he hadn't called over the two fake police officers on a spurious and false misunderstanding of basic points of the law, then I wouldn't be in this position and missing £600 worth of camera equipment"

He had to have called them over, otherwise how did they know of his complaint/concerns?

It might not get you anywhere, but as it stands there is no good press angle for them when you go public (for the benefit of alerting others to the scam).

I'd also be contacting AP and BJP to circulate the story, providing them with the details of the genuine police officers you are now helping so that they can confirm the story.
 
This whole episode sounds very peculiar to me

Security guard that might be involved, but back working in a shop, people impersonating old bill, member of the public handing over their brand new camera watched by a regular from here who must have seen much talk about the legalities of photography in a public place

Not disputing anyones word, but just seems very strange goings on and all under the spotlight of CCTV
 
ukglyn said:
........so we can keep em peeled as Shaw Taylor used to say (showing my age now)
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Apologies in advance for going off topic, but it's a good time to make a confession concerning a 'faux pas' (sufficient time has passed, I hope :naughty:). My job was to cover a presentation hosted by Shaw Taylor, all went well. Until the end :eek:, I was asked to do some extra shots outside a pub with ST. So we did the shoot with no film in the camera :exit:
 
i used to work in shopwatch and before confronting a member of the public we always contacted cctv so they could film the interaction in case allegations were made or it kicked off
 
spaniel said:
Apologies in advance for going off topic, but it's a good time to make a confession concerning a 'faux pas' (sufficient time has passed, I hope :naughty:). My job was to cover a presentation hosted by Shaw Taylor, all went well. Until the end :eek:, I was asked to do some extra shots outside a pub with ST. So we did the shoot with no film in the camera :exit:
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Reminds me of the story about Brian Duffy shooting the composer Otto Klemperer on his first assignment for Vogue..
 
I know Southampton very well and I can assure you that very street corner has twenty CCTV cameras.

Shouldn't take long for the Real Police to
sort this one out.
 
Impersonating a Police Officer, sadly, isn't as serious an offence as you might think. It's a summary-only offence (so will be dealt with at the Magistrates' Courts), and only carries a maximum 6 months imprisonment. To those who asked "how hard is it to get police uniform?", just take a look on eBay. They are very poor at responding to reports from us that "obsolete" police gear is usually genuine, current-issue kit, and sadly quite a bit of stuff gets stolen throughout the supply chain. It also doesn't help that a number of manufacturers freely sell police uniform on the internet, minus the force crest usually - and understandably, 90% of the public would probably struggle to recognise fake from real most of the time.

As an indication of the sort of sentence that can be had for this crime, I charged a Romanian man the other week with 2 counts of Theft and one of Impersonating Police - him & his mates were scamming tourists for their wallets in fake "drug busts" in the streets, and stole a total of £4000. He was jailed for 13 months on 28/11/2011 after pleading guilty.
 
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:thinking:

Wasn't a version of this "scam" featured on the The Real Hustle? I don't mean the lens-stealing nonsense, but the fake-police-confiscate-counterfeit money one :cautious:
 
Bernie174 said:
Yes Sturisoma I did mean you.
S43 is a power to stop search and detain for the reasons of search.
It's irrelevant, and doesn't matter where you got it from.
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if you meant me then why didn't you say that? this thread was about a policeman searching someone and confiscating their camera - section 43 - it wasn't about taking photos of a policeman (section 76)

so the photography section of the met police's own website is irrelevant?

don't make assumptions about my levels of research

at first I wondered why you would be so rude but then I realised you might be suffering from hypoxia caused by the thinner air which is often the case at greater elevations
 
Lets all take a breath and relax........................

Now, wheres the OP with an update on this somewhat "strange" incident.
 
ukglyn said:
See now surely the security gaurd must of been fake also, as you would assume he was the one who called the fake police to your friends whereabouts. :shrug:

Who knows perhaps they were scanning some form of communication though & picked up on a genuine call:thinking::shrug:
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Too risky, what happens if real plod turns up. No for my money the guard would have to be a part of it to work safely.
 
I think this whole thing has been made up.
 
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