Difference between revisions of "Peter Imbert"

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(Detective Superintendent Peter Imbert)
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==Metropolitan Police==
 
==Metropolitan Police==
In 1956, Peter Imbert joined [[Special Branch]], learning shorthand and Russian during his 17 years with the unit. In 1973, he was made deputy head of the Metropolitan Police Anti-Terrorist Branch, where he became an expert on European terrorist groups such as the Red Army Faction (Baader-Meinhof group), and gave lectures on hostage negotiation and counter-terrorism tactics.
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In 1956, Peter Imbert joined [[Special Branch]], learning shorthand and Russian during his 17 years with the unit. In 1973, as Detective Superintendent, he was made deputy head of the Metropolitan Police Bomb Squad (later renamed Anti-Terrorist Branch), where he became an expert on European terrorist groups such as the Red Army Faction (Baader-Meinhof group), and gave lectures on hostage negotiation and counter-terrorism tactics.
  
 
===Balcombe Street siege===
 
===Balcombe Street siege===

Revision as of 16:13, 16 June 2015

Person.png Peter Imbert  Rdf-entity.pngRdf-icon.png
(policeman)
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Peter Michael Imbert, Baron Imbert CVO QPM DL (born 27 April 1933) is the former Chief Constable of Thames Valley Police (1979-1985) and Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Service from 1987 until his retirement on 31 January 1993.

On 6 May 1993, The Independent newspaper reported that former Police Commissioner Sir Peter Imbert had made a shorthand record of his interview with Patrick Armstrong on the planting of the Guildford pub bombs on 5 October 1974.[1] Sir Peter was in the witness box at the Old Bailey to assist three former Surrey police officers accused of perverting the course of justice by lying under oath. Imbert told the court that his record of one of the Guildford Four confessing to planting a pub bomb which killed five people was 'as accurate as one could humanly make it'.[2]

He was the Lord Lieutenant of Greater London until 2008, and was made a Life Peer as Baron Imbert of New Romney in the County of Kent in 1999.[3]

Early life

Born in Kent, Peter Imbert was educated at the Harvey Grammar School in Folkestone, spent his National Service in the Royal Air Force Police and worked for a short time with Kent County Council, before joining the Metropolitan Police in 1953 at Bow Street Police Station.

Metropolitan Police

In 1956, Peter Imbert joined Special Branch, learning shorthand and Russian during his 17 years with the unit. In 1973, as Detective Superintendent, he was made deputy head of the Metropolitan Police Bomb Squad (later renamed Anti-Terrorist Branch), where he became an expert on European terrorist groups such as the Red Army Faction (Baader-Meinhof group), and gave lectures on hostage negotiation and counter-terrorism tactics.

Balcombe Street siege

On 6 December 1975, four members of the Provisional IRA barricaded themselves in a flat in Balcombe Street, Marylebone with two hostages. The men had been responsible for a wave of bombings in London, but had been intercepted by armed police while attacking a restaurant.[4]

On 12 December 1975, Joseph O'Connell, Harry Duggan, Hugh Doherty and Eddie Butler were arrested in London at the conclusion of what has become known as the Balcombe Street siege. After a dramatic car-chase through the West End the previous Saturday, the four had taken refuge in 22b Balcombe Street, Marylebone, the home of an elderly couple, Mr and Mrs Matthews, whom they held hostage for six days.

News pictures of the siege and the final surrender of the four were flashed around the world, becoming some of the most familiar in the history of photojournalism. The IRA maintained that the reason the men remained so long in the flat, with no possibility of escape, was to win maximum publicity for the IRA cause; and to ensure that after their surrender the men would not be assaulted by either the police or prison staff. (In view of what had happened a year earlier to those accused of the Birmingham bombings, this seemed a sensible precaution.) Once safely in police custody, the four gave their names, where they came from, and added that they were all IRA volunteers.[5]

Police interrogators Detective Chief Superintendent Jim Nevill and Detective Superintendent Peter Imbert of the Bomb Squad asked Eddie Butler what was the first job he had done in England. Somewhat to their surprise, he told them. It was the bombing of the King's Arms in Woolwich.

"You've already got someone for that," Butler added.

It soon became apparent that the police had got the break they needed and had captured the Active Service Unit (ASU) responsible for the intensive bombing campaign conducted throughout London and south-east England since August 1974. Their delight at such success, however, must have been tempered by the embarrassment of realising that the Surrey Constabulary had got it all wrong. The four jailed for the Guildford and Woolwich bombs had nothing to do with them.

The Balcombe Street four came to trial at the Old Bailey on 24 January 1977. There were exactly one hundred indictments. Each defendant was charged on a total of twenty-five counts of murder and causing explosions, relating to the period from December 1974 to December 1975. There was no reference to incidents during the autumn of 1974. In normal circumstances IRA defendants would have refused to recognise the court, and thus declined to take any part in its proceedings. They reasoned that, as Irish Republicans at war with British imperialism, they were hardly likely to secure justice in an English court. On this occasion, however, they opted to become more actively involved: they felt they had been handed the perfect opportunity to demonstrate the hollowness of what they would pejoratively have referred to as "British justice". Although they refused to plead, therefore, they did make statements. O'Connell said, 'I refuse to plead because the indictment does not include two charges concerning the Guildford and Woolwich pub bombings – I took part in both – for which innocent people have been convicted.' Butler and Duggan made similar statements. The prosecution case closed on 7 February 1977. Defence counsel told the judge that no witnesses would be called on behalf of the defence, but that instead Joseph O'Connell would make a statement from the dock. Mr Justice Cantley immediately responded that he would not allow a political speech. O'Connell went ahead regardless. Of course, most of the speech was political ('We say that no representative of British imperialism is fit to pass judgment on us.' etc). The part relating to the Guildford and Woolwich trials ran as follows:

We are all four Irish Republicans. We have recognised this court to the extent that we have instructed our lawyers to draw the attention of the court to the fact that four totally innocent people – Carole Richardson, Gerard Conlon, Paul Hill and Patrick Armstrong – are serving massive sentences for three bombings, two in Guildford and one in Woolwich, which three of us and another man now imprisoned have admitted that we did. The Director of Public Prosecutions was made aware of these admissions in December 1975 and has chosen to do nothing. We wonder if he will still do nothing when he is made aware of the new and important evidence which has come to light through the cross-examination by our counsel of certain prosecution witnesses in this trial. The evidence of Higgs and Lidstone played a vital part in the conviction of innocent people. Higgs admitted in this trial that the Woolwich bomb formed part of a correlated series with other bombings with which we were charged. Yet when he gave evidence at the earlier Guildford and Woolwich trial he deliberately concealed that the Woolwich bomb was definitely part of a series carried out between October and December 1974, and that the people on trial were in custody at the time of some of these bombings. Lidstone in his evidence tried to make little of the suggestions that the Guildford bombs could have been part of the "phase one" bombings with which we are accused with the excuse, and this appeared to be his only reason, that the bombings in Guildford had occurred a long time before the rest. When it was pointed out to him that there were many clear links between Caterham and Guildford and that the time between Guildford and the Brooks Club bomb with which we were originally charged was 17 days and that Woolwich occurred 16 days later, and that equal time gaps occurred between many of the incidents with which we were charged, Lidstone backtracked and admitted that there was a likely connection. This shifty manoeuvring typifies what we, as Irish Republicans, have come to understand by the words "British justice".

On 9 February 1977, the jury acquitted the defendants on twenty-six of the hundred indictments. On the remaining charges, the Balcombe Street Four were found guilty and each received a thirty-year minimum sentence. [6]

County forces

In 1976, Imbert left the Met and became Assistant Chief Constable, and later Deputy Chief Constable of Surrey Constabulary. In 1979, he became Chief Constable of Thames Valley Police, the youngest Chief Constable in the country at that time.

During his time at Thames Valley, Imbert allowed the BBC to make Police, a 1982 fly-on-the-wall documentary series about the police at work. The opposite of a public relations exercise, Thames Valley and the police in general came under sustained criticism when an episode of the programme showed three detectives interrogating and dismissing a rape victim. Shocked at the attitude and behaviour of his officers, and the public reaction, Imbert instigated improvements to the handling of rape cases to Thames Valley which were adopted throughout the country.[7]

Back to the Met

Peter Imbert returned to Scotland Yard in 1985 as Deputy Commissioner, becoming Commissioner two years later.

Building on the reforms to the Met implemented by his predecessor, Sir Kenneth Newman, Imbert began his own set of reforms called the PLUS program, aiming to improve the corporate image and quality of service of the Met. The programme saw the Met renamed from the "Metropolitan Police Force" to the "Metropolitan Police Service", the name it has retained to this day.[8] In addition, a "Statement of Common Purpose and Values" was devised.

Imbert suffered a heart attack in 1990, and took six months off duty. Further illness in 1992 led to his retirement from the police on 31 January 1993.

Honours

Peter Imbert was awarded the Queen's Police Medal (QPM) in 1980.[9]

Imbert was Knighted in 1988.[10]

Imbert was created Deputy Lord Lieutenant of London in 1994, and Lord Lieutenant in 1998, an office he held until 2008.

He was created a life peer on 10 February 1999, taking the title Baron Imbert, of New Romney in the county of Kent.[11]

He was appointed a Commander of the Royal Victorian Order (CVO) in the 2008 New Year Honours.[12]

Imbert Prize

Lord Imbert is a patron of the Association of Security Consultants (ASC), which has awarded the Imbert Prize annually since 2005. The prize is awarded for the development of ideas for the advancement of risk and security management in the UK. It consists of three categories: 1) Best academic dissertation, 2) Most notable contribution in the security industry in the preceding year and 3) The ASC member that has made the most significant contribution to independent security consultancy.[13][14] Between 1983 and 2001 Baron Imbert served on the academic consultative committee at Cumberland Lodge.[15]

References

  1. "1974: Four dead in Guildford bomb blasts"
  2. "Confession in Guildford Four case 'accurate': Former police chief says he made shorthand record of interview on planting of pub bomb"
  3. "Lord Imbert in the House of Lords"
  4. "Professional Security magazine interview"
  5. "1975: Balcombe Street siege ends", BBC News, 12 December 1975.
  6. "The trial of the Balcombe Street Four"
  7. Police (1982), screenonline.
  8. Fleming, Robert; Hugh Miller (1995). Scotland Yard. London: Signet. ISBN 0-451-18250-2.Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css must have content model "Sanitized CSS" for TemplateStyles (current model is "Scribunto").
  9. London Gazette |issue=48212 |date=14 June 1980 |startpage=29 |supp=yes
  10. London Gazette |issue=51558 |date=13 December 1988 |startpage=13986
  11. London Gazette |issue=55403 |date=15 February 1999 |startpage=1763
  12. London Gazette |issue=58557 |date=29 December 2007 |startpage=3 |supp=yes
  13. "The Imbert Prize". Association of Security Consultants. Retrieved 2009-06-26.Page Module:Citation/CS1/styles.css must have content model "Sanitized CSS" for TemplateStyles (current model is "Scribunto").
  14. {{URL|example.com|optional display text}}
  15. "Cumberland Lodge: Trustees"

External links

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