Monday July 19, 2010
Bar Council: Police identification a standard procedure
PETALING JAYA: Police officers should identify themselves regardless of whether they are in uniform or not, said Bar Council chairman Ragunath Kesavan.
He said that showing police identity cards should be the standard operating procedure for officers when approaching suspects or members of the public.
“Police officers must produce their identity cards to show their name and badge number.”
Ragunath said this when asked to comment on the front-page article in yesterday’s Sunday Star in which police have proposed gazetting blue uniforms as the police’s so they had exclusive rights as it was difficult to tell them apart from other agencies and security guards who wore similar dark blue uniforms.
This follows complaints from the public over alleged abuse by “men in blue” who eventually turned out to be enforcement officers from local councils and other agencies or security guards in the private sector.
An informal survey had also found that most people could not tell the difference between genuine badges/paraphernalia and the fake ones, which are widely available and often misused.
Petaling Jaya OCPD Asst Comm Arjunaidi Mohamed disagreed with Ragunath saying that uniformed police officers were not required to show their identification cards as the full uniforms would show that they were genuine police officers.
He said plainclothes police officers, however, are required to show their identity cards for obvious reasons.
“Those who impersonate police officers usually do not wear uniforms,” he added.
Asked whether the public should be hesitant in requesting police officers to produce their identity cards, he said “there should not be a problem about doing so (asking for it).”
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