Boards
so apparently i'm a terrorist...
my coach down to london from bradford got stopped 20 minutes away from Victoria station at this service station, that had in effect been turned into this little military base for the police.
8 policemen marched on board, told us we had to get off with all our bags, we were sniffed by dogs the second we got outside, had to sit down in the service station and not speak to one another, 4 people of ethnic minority groups were taken away to be searched by hand, and each of our bags was sniffed one by one by a sniffer dog which freaked out quite a few people.
then, just as it was nearly over, the officer picked out me to be questioned and searched. i was taken to a corner of the room roughly, told that i was being searched under the terrorism act number 44, and that i had to comply, and that it was down to the fact that i 'seemed interested in what was going on around me.'
i told him this was no reason to pick me out, but because I've got nothing at all to hide inside my pockets or bag, for him to go for it. he then emptied my pockets, took everything out of my bag one by one, messed up all my forms for the uni audition i was going for...etc... whilst another officer questioned me.
i know my rights in this situation, so when he asked for my name i told him i didn't want to give him it, that as he could see, my bag was clean, so there was no need for him to keep my information. he told me this was fine, but immediately assumed it was because i was hiding some run in with the police. I told him this wasn't true, and that in fact I'd been mugged two days earlier, and that not a single policeman turned up at my door.
they then found my passport in my bag and stole all the information from that. he tried to brush off my questions about where the information that was being radio'd in to god-knows-where was going, by asking why i was being 'so suspicious'. i told him i had every right to ask questions, be curious, and be mistrustful of his organisation.
my friend on another coach got his pot taken off him. this angered me the most.
so yeah, police, pretty wank.