Posted on 12/03/2010 5:49:51 PM PST by naturalman1975
SENIOR police have endorsed the actions of an armed officer filmed riding a BMX bike in a city skate park as dozens of teenagers cheer him on.
Footage of the BMX-riding officer has emerged on You Tube. It shows the officer "dropping in" at the skate park on North Terrace and riding around the park for a short while before heading back on the beat.
With his gun in its holster, the officer uses a teenager's bike to negotiate parts of the concrete skate park but pulls up short of doing tricks on the two wheeler.
Throughout the display, the officer ignores the calls of teenagers to put a helmet on.
His ride, in May 2009, was captured on camera and posted on You Tube.
Children using the park can be heard saying the police officer was not wearing a helmet and calling out to him to put one on.
The officer's young fans also surround him and chat with him, and several can be heard saying it is "heaps cool" the officer is being a "good bloke".
No one appears to have been endangered by the officer's unique take on community-style policing.
Senior Sergeant First Class Ken Jaensch, manager of the Adelaide Crime Prevention Section, said the You Tube video captured positive community policing.
He commended the officer's down-to-earth approach to interacting with teenagers.
(Excerpt) Read more at adelaidenow.com.au ...
“Hey, where’s your helmet?”
bicycle cops ride every day with the same duty holster that i’m issued. why should anybody have a problem about being armed?
Twenty years ago, this would have just been another friendly cop. And no one would have worried about his helmet.
South Australian police on community relations jobs apparently don’t carry sidearms. So the fact he is armed attracted attention when the footage was posted, because it means he was on patrol. Some people seem to think that means he shouldn’t have done this. South Australian Police command though says that part of a beat officers job is to form relationships with the people on his beat, and so a few minutes doing something like this is not inappropriate. These kids are now much more likely to come to him if they need to, or listen to him if he tells them to behave themselves. I think it’s a great thing.
That’s the first thing I noticed too. Good on the kids for letting him have it on the no-helmet thing. I used to think helmets were for wussies. Until one probably saved my son.
Good for the cop. It would look better to some if he had worn a helmet, oh well, big deal.
BTW, I take it you are a police officer? If so, thank you for what you do everyday when you go to work. As a veteran, I’ve noticed a lot of people here treat my service with respect (and I don’t have a problem with that) but some of them seem to lack that respect for the police. I’ve got nothing but admiration for those that choose a career upholding the law and protecting people.
thank you naturalman1975!! and thank you for your service as well!!
yeah, looks like a bunch of anti-police types looking for something to gripe about. the guy did nothing wrong.
Absolutely! That’s good police work.
Stories are much too easy to find in which cops do neither. (How many cops would arrest someone for simple gun possession, absent any other evidence? Do those that would "uphold the law?" By doing so are they "protecting people?")
I also oppose the caste-like system that seems to have emerged, in which cops are held to a very different standard than we citizens are. That breeds resentment, which I share. Peace Officers, I admire. LEOs, I fear. I'm afraid that with every passing year, there become fewer of the former and more of the latter. I'd like to see that trend reverse.
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