Dog Handler Convicted over dog deaths.

A police dog handler, whose two German Shepherds died when they were left in a sweltering car, has been found guilty of animal cruelty.

Pc Mark Johnson, 39, was convicted at Nottingham Magistrates’ Court of having unnecessarily confined his dogs “in an environment that was detrimental to their well-being”.

Johnson, who denied the charge, said he was suffering from depression and obsessive compulsive disorder leading to him forgetting his dogs, 18-month-old Jay-Jay and Jet, seven, on June 30 last year.

Johnson was given a six-month conditional discharge and ordered to pay £2,500 costs.

Many people will be unhappy at the sentence, expecting a far heavier penalty.

Sentencing him, district judge Tim Devas said it was “sad and regrettable” that the two dogs had died.

He said: “This has been an extremely difficult case, not only for Pc Johnson and his family but it’s also been difficult for me up here.”Sometimes you feel you are doing society a service or providing justice, but I don’t feel any of those things. “I feel a police officer has been let down and this is for the benefit of the police: this is a dreadful error of judgment brought about by an illness way before it happened and Pc Johnson should have been given more help.”It is a terribly sad indictment on the police force where you have an officer of his standing who is embarrassed to talk about his illness. “I cannot believe that in the 21st century, depression and men crying is so abhorrent to an institution that nothing can be done about it.”

I cannot believe that this was allowed to have happened.

I cannot believe that someone who is suffering from a stress related disorder is at work, with an animal that requires care and consideration when dedication to the dogs should have been above all else. 

 I cannot believe that any dog handler, would forget to check about their dog’s welfare in those circumstances for seven, yes seven, hours.

On 30 June last year, PC Johnson drove his own car, an estate,  to Nottinghamshire Police’s HQ in Arnold, just north of Nottingham.

He arrived just before 0700 BST and had planned to transfer the dogs to a police car but it was off the road as the air conditioning system was being fixed.

He found another car but there were no mats in the back and when he went to find some he became distracted by a police briefing.

Afterwards, he told his sergeant he wanted to discuss some medical issues with him later in the day but he needed time to do his paperwork.

At about 1030 BST he planned to let his dogs out of the car, give them water and allow them to stretch their legs. But he became distracted again by a phone call about a missing person.

At noon, he had a meeting with his sergeant about his problems and it was not until nearly 1430 BST that he finally went to check on his dogs, seven hours later.

Simon Parker, from the RSPCA, summed it up when he said “Two dogs died unnecessarily.”

Public Service Sector Alliance Partnership – 2

Thanks to the changes to the Policing workplace instigated by the legions of change managers at the CTCC, the SLT are slapping themselves on the backs in blissful ignorance of the  problems they have thrust down the food chain. The joint partnership collaborative process collectively known as  the Public Service Sector Alliance Partnership  steams blindly forward, completely ignorant of the masses to who it is causing inconvenience and the huge numbers of hours wasted during the ‘smooth’ transition into the world of a single administrative and management process support tool that should have been the answer to someone’s dreams of streamlining, efficiency and career enhancing evidence. The CTCC email system is struggling to cope with the high number of problem and apology messages sent out when the latest problem is identified.  All this from a system that is supposedly fit for purpose. All this from the ready to work ‘system take off’ date.

With the projected savings forecast on paper of umpteen gazillion pounds for the partnerships involved, it claims to have extra Police officers on the streets because of administration cost savings and improved efficiency because of streamlined processes. Less admin support staff which will produce real and considerable savings that can be reinvested to support frontline officers. No one appears to have seen any real benefit from these huge projected savings. They might cover up the hole caused by the slightly dodgy and high risk Icelandic investment portfolio of recent years.  I suspect that this will be kept off the annual performance process interview or review of those who decided that this was a sound investment for tax payers money but luckily the CTCC were ahead of the game and kept their under-spend under a mattress in the training school store room..

The reality of this seems to be that you simply cannot find a free computer terminal available so you can get on, log on, input your relevant data stream and hit the street running before you could say ‘reducing the administrative burden on operational officers.’ No  matter which station you go to, all available terminals are in use with a numbered ticketing system that would well grace the provisions counter at your local supermarket.

We get weekly updates, sometime daily updates, to remind us of how successful this new and radical partnership is progressing and how we should embrace the technological marvel that is the PSSAP collaborative process. We also get regular messages stating that this new and wonderful solution to our problems appears to have several teething problems. Problems like simply use. Problems like computers crashing during input of a data stream. Problems like computers freezing because of the high numbers of interface connections and data flow between the server and the terminals. Even with our aptly named ‘cascade solution team members’ to help us through the problems we face, it is difficult to get one, if you can find one that is.

After nine months we are no further forward in delivery of the things this wonderful administration tool was going to provide when embedded into the management information support system, or MISS for short.  Where one manager can oversee the goings on from his or her own computer to see how the troops are performing, the masses cannot get access to at convenient times so have to return at alternative times in the hope of inputting the data to satisfy the bigger picture. There is even more pressure to save money and make efficiency savings to support the leadership with their objective to achieve budget reductions of their dream figure. At the same time, they will claim that we are becoming modernised, financially sustainable or whatever corporate jargon they want to spin next. After all, we have to reduce our budget, embrace workforce modernisation and ensure we are financially sustainable with a clear business case and corporate strategy.

Operational officers face having less kit, a vehicle fleet that is becoming less serviceable, less support resources,  more expectations, more micro management, more bureaucracy, higher demands and less recognition of their efforts to keep the plan afloat and cope with the demands they have. As usual, frontline officers will do their utmost to make things work by a whole raft of measures. Someone must be benefitting out of this but I can’t yet think who it is. We also have had the small additional factor of some snow. The whole world has fallen apart and given the Police another chance to embed themselves back out with the public. I suspect that the bean counters will have a few words to say about that.

In our family of Forces, the Town Constabulary, with an establishment of a thousand or so appear to love the new system. They have tried it and the management think it is the way forward. The County Constabulary also see this as radical and support the partnership alliance.  Those at the sharp end seem to find it inconvenient and time-consuming because it keeps crashing, is slow and time intensive to use and, and, and, they don’t have anywhere near enough computers to make it flexible and convenient. Our system does seem to be alone and could be less better off than others across the country, even though our projected savings are still awaiting confirmation. A good job that other systems are globally proven.

In June 2008 – SAP UK  announced that Britannia Building Society has gone live with employee self service, building on the success of its previous SAP HR and Payroll implementation. Britannia selected SAP in order to increase employee satisfaction – something they see as essential to delivering long term benefits to their customers. A reduction in paper-based processes will also make the organisation more environmentally friendly and support its commitment to being socially responsible.

I wonder if they still have it ? I wonder who else has it ?

Public Service Sector Alliance Partnership…………………………….. oh dear.