Fed II Star - April 9, 2006

REAL LIFE NEWS: GRASS DEFEATS ROLLER-SKATING POLICE

It seemed like a great idea at the time: give four police officers, whose beat is one of the royal parks in London, in-line roller-skates so they could get to where they were needed fast by skating at high speed along the paths. But the scheme has had to be abandoned, because criminals pretty soon discovered they could escape simply by running across the grass.

Similar schemes in Flordia, Paris and the Netherlands had been a success, perhaps because they were patrolling in areas without turf. But, as Supt Derek Pollack of London's Royal Parks operational command said of the London experiment, "It just didn't work. The moment people realized they were being chased they would switch to a soft surface... the officer giving chase had to stop, take off his skates then follow him without proper footwear."

This wasn't the only problem. According to Pollock, "Not an awful lot of officers were interested because it hurts when you fall over." Awwww... so much for the image of the rough, tough policeman!

The officers have now returned to their traditional method of locomotion, the bicycle - so criminals, beware!