This article by Philip Johnston in the Daily Telegraph leaves us with very mixed feelings.
On the one hand, we despise the litigious society, believing that we should accept that accidents happen, people make mistakes, and not everything is someone's fault.
On the other hand, Johnston makes some telling points which are hard to ignore …
by Philip Johnston
The anger and frustration felt by people who are the victims of crimes to which they have already alerted the police can be imagined. But when a loved one is murdered because the police failed to act in time, despite warnings that something terrible might be about to happen, the feelings of relations and friends can only be guessed at. advertisement
Spare a thought, then, for the parents of Giles Van Colle, who will on Wednesday learn if a legal battle they have waged since he was murdered nearly eight years ago has been successful. If it is, the implications are profound. Irwin and Corrine Van Colle sued the police for failing to protect their son, who was a witness in a court case.
However, this is not a story of gangland intimidation: Mr Van Colle, 25, was simply preparing to do his duty as a responsible citizen in what should have been a straightforward case of theft. But it was to turn into a nightmare - and the police did nothing to stop it unfolding.
Mr Van Colle was an optometrist with his own business, GVC Opticians, in Mill Hill, north London. He had employed as a laboratory technician an Iranian whose real name was Ali Amelzadeh, but was known by the alias Daniel Brougham. He had obtained the job using a false CV and when he was challenged about his National Insurance number and the disappearance of equipment from the clinic, he left.
Subsequently, stolen property, including glasses and frames belonging to Mr Van Colle, were found at Brougham's home and he was charged with theft. Mr Van Colle was asked to identify the property as a court witness. Until now, this was fairly unexceptional case.
However, Mr Van Colle began to receive threats to his life and his family from Brougham, to which the police were alerted. Then his car was set ablaze outside his home. Yet nothing was done to protect him.
In November 2000, two days before the trial was to start, Brougham lay in wait for Mr Van Colle as he left work and shot him three times at close range.
Most murders happen out of the blue and there is always a danger of accusation by hindsight. But that was not the case here. A witness in a court case was specifically threatened on a number of occasions by the man against whom he was giving evidence. It should have been relatively straightforward for the police to have offered him protection or to have revoked Brougham's bail.
Since Brougham lived in Stevenage, that job fell to Hertfordshire constabulary and specifically Det Con David Ridley. At a disciplinary tribunal in 2003, he was found guilty of failing to perform his duties diligently, failing to investigate thoroughly the intimidation of witnesses, and failing to arrest Brougham. He was fined five days' pay.
Mr Van Colle's parents considered it was important to establish where the duties of the police lay and invoked the European Convention on Human Rights, claiming a violation of Article 2 - which enshrines the "right to life" - and Article 8, which guarantees everyone's right to respect for their home and family life.
In the High Court, Mrs Justice Cox awarded them £50,000 in damages against Hertfordshire Police. She said that, had Mr Van Colle been placed in a safe house or given other protection after Brougham threatened his life, there would have been "a real prospect of avoiding this tragedy".
The award was reduced in 2007 to £25,000 by the Court of Appeal; but the judgment against Hertfordshire Police was upheld. This is where the case stands. The chief constable appealed to the Law Lords, who will rule on whether the police can be sued for failing to carry out their duties properly to investigate a crime.
The police say that unless it is overturned, they - and other public services - will face a flood of similar claims. But is that true? Are they simply not being required to do their job properly? After all, Mr Van Colle's case is not an isolated one.
Alex and Maureen Cochrane died and their daughter, Lucy, was seriously injured in an arson attack on their home in Wythenshawe, Greater Manchester, in 2006. The attack had been preceded by an incident at the Cochranes' home in which a fluid was poured on to the front door and a tree uprooted in the garden.
Police, who were aware of a feud with another family subsequently convicted of the killings, failed to act. Last year, an investigation by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) found Greater Manchester Police guilty of "individual and systemic failings" over the tragedy.
Scotland Yard is investigating complaints that it failed to respond to threats made against a schoolgirl a few weeks before she was killed. Last year, the same force apologised for doing nothing to protect a young father shot dead after confronting a gang in the road where he had been stabbed just months earlier.
Wiltshire Police were strongly criticised by the IPCC for failing to protect Hayley Richards, a pregnant woman who was murdered by her boyfriend a week after he attacked her. Even though police were told where he was, officers who could have responded were dealing with a report of a dog locked in a car.
In all these cases, the police say that the murderous intent of the killers could not have been foreseen. But that is not the point. It is the fact that they did nothing that is so appalling. People can understand if, despite their best endeavours, some dreadful criminal act occurs; but it is the first principle of policing to prevent crime, not investigate it after it has happened.
In the Appeal Court, Sir Anthony Clarke, the Master of the Rolls, said the duty of the police to protect Mr Van Colle was "not an onerous one"; and nor was he persuaded that the court's ruling would "threaten police resources" or "open the floodgates to baseless claims against the police".
"They should have done everything that could reasonably have been expected of them," added the judge.
That is all that Mr and Mrs Van Colle, and the rest of us, are asking.
Most of the comments sent in by Telegraph readers supported Johnston's argument, but Zac Smith had this to add …
The Police are doing an excellent job. In general they catch the bad guys and charge them. Job done. They are then bailed, found guilty and allowed to walk free by a mix of CPS timidity/incompetence and hopelessly inadequate sentencing (in accordance with government-issued sentencing guidelines).
Even the investigating officer here deserves our sympathy. How likely is it that an optician would kill over theft of some glasses? He made the wrong call and I bet he regrets more than anyone else. May I remind you of the recent suicide of PC Anthony Mulhall who was hounded to death by the media and Police Complaints department. If you must indulge in this Daily Mail style orgy of blame, direct it at the Government, which has had 11 years to fix the criminal justice system so that criminals go to gaol. Its that simple.
… which makes some sense. If you're not familiar with the case of PC Mulhall, there's a report here, another one here, and the CCTV footage is here.
Looking at the video, one's first impulse was not to feel outraged by the brutality, but to wonder (a) why the policeman seems to be dealing with a difficult situation on his own for so long, and (b) why when help does arrive there are about fifty of them?
One's second impulse is to wonder what the hell the poor copper was supposed to do when the woman resisted arrest so vehemently - just give in and let her go?
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