A personal perspective on safety: asking for help to keep myself safe.

I was fortunate enough to have a nice, protected and safe upbringing throughout my time at school, college and university and I went from this to joining the police, as a frontline officer aged 23. It was then that I started to see the real world – suddenly keeping myself safe became more of a priority and more of a challenge. At this age, like many people, I thought I knew it all, but I was naïve and, it turned out, clueless to the realities of policing.

I’ve now been a police officer for nearly 20 years and have learnt several things about keeping myself safe. This blog is about two experiences I’ve had, how I dealt with the situations I found myself in, the lessons I’ve learnt, and how they’ve impacted me going forward.

Experience: Scene preservation at a large house fire.

Ten weeks after joining the police, I was deemed capable of going out on my own – on this particular occasion, that was a night shift covering scene preservation after a large house fire. The main house had been completely gutted by the fire, but before this had happened the firefighters had managed to recover a lot of expensive items and pictures into a barn next door.

I was dropped off and shown the barn, as well as around the house. It was dark and the house was still smouldering. I was told that every 30 minutes or so I was to take regular patrols around the house and barn to ensure its integrity for the investigation the following morning. I was then left in a police van to keep warm in between. After 30 minutes in the van, it was time for my first patrol – as I was getting out of the van there were noises all around – the house was in the middle of a large country estate with lots of wildlife around and it was a windy night.

I approached the barn feeling scared and alone. The house was creaking and fizzing, I was way out of my comfort zone. As I went around the front of the barn the main door was now open but it had been closed before. This was my worst nightmare – I was there to keep the recovered property safe and now something may have happened to it. Not only that, but I now had to go and see what had happened and confront anyone in there.

What did I do? I went back to the van. After contemplating my options, I called my sergeant, explained what I’d seen and that I felt out of my depth going to check the barn. I was honest about my fear, asked for help and didn’t leave the van until my sergeant arrived ten minutes later.

Together we checked the barn. All was fine – nothing was stolen and in all likelihood the wind had blown the door open. My sergeant then took me around again, explaining how to notice key things, taking note of what was where, to look for shapes in what I could see and to use this as my baseline. The scene was safe, so using this as my starting point, he showed me how to look and notice things that were amiss.

I was reminded that our torches could also be used as a weapon and that a person can’t see past torchlight when it’s in their face. Feeling braver and more comfortable, I was again left alone to keep my scene safe. That night I did my patrols as ordered and managed my fear, calling my sergeant each time to say I was about to do it and calling them again when I’d completed it. This made me feel comfortable that if something went wrong, I’d be missed and help would be on the way.

Through asking for help, I was given the tools to keep myself safe and to feel safe. I kept repeating the advice I’d been given and as the day dawned, I was more confident and pleased with what I’d overcome. I wasn’t afraid to identify my fear and ask for help in overcoming it.

Incident: Arrested male getting up.

Before I took this role, I was working on a night duty in Northampton town centre. I was with another female officer on foot patrol, when our attention was drawn to a male who was causing issues outside a pub, refusing to leave the area and generally behaving badly.

We approached and reminded him he wouldn’t be able talk his way back into the venue and invited him several times to walk away.

We spoke to him for several minutes to persuade him to go home, but for some reason when people have been thrown out of a pub, they seem to think hanging around and verbally abusing people is preferable to going home. Eventually he walked off, but then started coming back towards the venue, so we escorted him away and then watched to see if he would go home. We’d been patient with him, but in my experience this situation only gets finally resolved by the person being arrested.

Unsurprisingly he came back – we’d tried to resolve the situation verbally, but it was clearly not going to be effective. As he went to go past me, I moved forward and arrested him for public order offences. He shoved me hard to the chest and I stumbled backwards and fell to the floor. As this happened, my colleague was also coming forward and she managed to get hold of him. I scrambled up (no mean feat in my police kit) and assisted in detaining him to make the arrest.

In these situations, to prevent escape and to prevent injury to them and us, we’ll try to take a suspect to the floor where we can better control them. During the struggle, we managed to get him to the floor, but I think it was more that we all fell together, rather than a takedown in line with the police officer training manual.

When on the floor we’d then look to control his arms by getting him in handcuffs, but we were struggling to get his hands out from underneath him, so instead we just tried to keep him on the floor as we waited for further officers to come to our assistance.

Neither myself nor my colleague are particularly heavy, so it was clear we were going to struggle to keep him on the floor. He was shouting and struggling with us and was starting to get up, with both of us still attached to him.

At times like this, I’ve found time seems to slow down – I seem to have the capacity to think quickly and assess where we’re at and where I think this is going and I remember thinking “we’re going to lose control”. While this wasn’t crime of the century initially, he’d responded by assaulting me – we’ll always take positive action and prosecute anyone who assaults emergency services workers.

Then, while I was considering alternative action, we were all back on the floor and I realised a member of door staff from the bar opposite was now on top of us all – none of us were getting up now. That resolved the situation.

Our colleagues arrived and he was taken to into custody. I’d received some injuries – nothing major, but enough for my kids to ask why I had ‘poorlies’ on my arms from going to work. Unfortunately, this is the reality of policing – sometimes we get hurt.

Ask for help to manage your own risk:

From this incident, I learnt that having patience can avoid taking a risk, but at some point we have to move on from that – resilience is often rewarded and help can come even if you’re not asking for it.

I now have no hesitation in asking for assistance – I can’t lose anything by asking for help. Sometimes help is needed and when you’re so focused on the danger that you can’t see a solution, help can come along anyway.

With every confrontation we take on, there’s a tipping point where you can walk away and another where you’re committed. That tipping point is present in all confrontations, but this situation made me acknowledge it in a physical way. Looking for this point and backing out before it’s crossed, has been the simplest way I’ve maintained my safety in my personal life, but I sometimes need to take a different approach within my work.

I now look to get together what may be needed if things don’t go to plan before I actually need it. As an experienced officer, my judgement will tell me when to ask for another unit to assist or be nearby, or when I’m comfortable dealing with something alone.

Being exposed to some significant risks, I’ve had to take decisions on my safety and that of others. These haven’t always been the right ones, but they’ve got me to where I am today, still pretty much in one piece. By sharing a couple of stories from my life in policing and the lessons I’ve learnt, I hope I’m able to assist someone else.

Read part 2 of Lorna's story

Police Sergeant Lorna Clarke

Sergeant Lorna Clarke is a police officer with nearly 20 years’ experience with Cambridgeshire Police and Northants Police. She now leads a small team of on-campus police offers dedicated to the safety of the University of Northampton.