Custody Sergeants
Custody Sergeants can be a right pain in the arse.
Good ones are fantastic, they can guide, advise and assist and are often a font of all knowledge and someone to turn to when dealing with prisoners. I don’t know if it’s just me, but these are the ones who seem to be getting rarer.
A Custody Sergeant is an essential cog in the wheel of the criminal justice system. They are police sergeants (usually, although more and more they are ‘acting‘ sergeants). Their role means that they are based in the cell block of any police station allowed to take prisoners (long story short, these used to be most police stations but now there are very few). Perhaps it’s because the working environment of the Custody Sergeant often means they are ensconced within the bowels of many outdated police stations, or ‘the dungeons’, that they are so bloody miserable. I actually know of one who answers the phone ‘ Hello, Dungeon Master‘.
They are there to make sure that the arrest and detention of all prisoners is lawful and proportionate. They authorise (or not) the further detention of the prisoner, this is usually to obtain further evidence by questioning the detainee or to put them on the station breath test machine in the case of drunk drivers, or to keep them from continuing their drunk and often violent antics should they be allowed free to roam the streets of the UK. Once lawfully detained, the Custody Sergeant is charged with looking after the welfare of the prisoner whilst in the care of Her Majesty’s finest. They arrange solicitors, make sure the prisoners’ rights are respected, call doctors, etc etc. They also prepare the cheeseboard and show them the wine list.
The sequence goes that you get tasked to attend a domestic, arrest the offender (usually the bloke), call Control Room and ask for a custody space. This is where the so far simple and oft-repeated procedure starts to fall down; if the Controller is a helpful one, they start to ring round the Divisional Custody Suites trying for a space. (if they’re not quite so helpful they provide the telephone extension for custody and demand that you ring Direct via your Airwave (radio) terminal).
The Custody Sergeant at the nearest police station to the arrest answers the phone and says they are full. The Controller (or you) rings the next Custody Suite who says they are full. The controller rings the next one who says they have space but decline to take the prisoner because they are keeping spaces open for prisoners from their own division. This cycle continues until all Custody Suites have been contacted. The first one then says they have a space but while the controller has been ringing round, Traffic have nicked a drink-driver and beaten you to it. The Controller rings the second Custody Suite whereupon the Custody Sergeant, who actually does have space, he just doesn’t like prisoners from outside his sub-division using his cells (it’s usually although not exclusively a ‘he’), looks up the custody display on the computer and sees that actually, the first one does have a space or two (not realising that Custody Sergeant has 3 prisoners in the yard at the nick waiting their turn to be ‘booked in’) and refuses to take your prisoner for the second time.
By now, the Operations Room Sergeant, or Inspector, is starting to suggest calling a neighbouring force and asking them to accommodate your prisoner. Eventually, after several more calls (by you because the once helpful controller is now fed up with speaking to belligerent Custody Sergeants and has definitely told you to do it yourself), you find out the first Custody Suite does actually have a cell spare (which they knew about all along but it’s nice to keep one spare ‘just in case‘).
The trouble is that by the time you get the prisoner to the cell block the Custody Sergeant is so pissed off by having to accept even more low-life scum into his cell block that any vestige of potential future assistance coming your way from him has long since flushed itself down the pan (if the toilets actually work).
And you thought your job was to arrest people and lock them up.
If only someone would tell the Custody Sergeant.
