IN 2012 the PSNI went to great lengths - unsuccessfully, as it turned out - to shut down a Facebook page called Keeping Our Kids Safe From Predators.
There were some reckless allegations in the comments section, which is a problem across the internet. However, all the page's Limavady-based author was doing was taking court and newspaper reports on convicted sex offenders and republishing them in a single place. This information is supposedly accessible on the grounds of open justice and public protection, yet the PSNI became extremely alarmed when the internet allowed the public to cross an invisible line where openness and self-protection had plainly become irresponsible or even sinister.
It is revealing to compare this to the past week's online activities of Holywood PSNI. Last Thursday, officers reported on their Facebook page that two young men had been arrested on a north Down beach for "taking all their clothes off to go for a swim". This meant they "had to be reported for indecent exposure" and hence they or "anyone who decides to do the same" could "end up with a criminal record and (be) placed on the Sex Offenders Register".
When Facebook users complained the arrests were excessive, the PSNI added that such "bad behaviour" caused "distress to families".
Given the presumption of innocence and the fact that photographs of at least one of the undressed youths were known to be circulating via social media, the PSNI's Facebook posting had already cross the Limavady line. But it was much worse than that, because public nudity alone is not indecent exposure. The law was changed in England in 2003 specifically to prevent 'bad behaviour' like skinny-dipping landing people on the sex offenders register and the relevant section of that law was enacted in Northern Ireland five years later.
Under the Sexual Offences (Northern Ireland) Order 2008, indecent exposure is defined solely as intentional exposure of the genitals with the intent of causing alarm or distress. In other words, the PSNI had confused mere nakedness with jumping out of the sea in a metaphorical dirty raincoat. This does not mean yobbish public nudity is beyond the law but the correct law to use is a straightforward public order offence.
Suspecting that officers had misunderstood the legislation, I posted this in a Facebook reply. Holywood PSNI responded by repeating its misinterpretation, saying "if you skinny-dip it is very likely you will expose your genitals" and adding there were "many children" on the beach.
I asked if officers were aware how serious it is to imply that someone has intentionally exposed themselves to children.
PSNI Holywood replied it was "measured when dealing with incidents and take(s) into consideration a number of facts when dealing with all alleged offenders."
This could be construed as an insinuation of other 'facts' in this instance, which risks being prejudicial or even dangerous. It is on a par with the Limavady comments problem, except the commenter here was the PSNI. It also conflicts with the PSNI's insistence that no other facts are required for the skinny-dippers to be treated as sex offenders.
What are we to make of this extraordinary online performance? There is clearly a trend of authority viewing technology as a one-way street. Police film the public at will but anyone brandishing a camera in their vicinity may be ordered to surrender it for deletion on no legal basis whatsoever. Now, in a synthesis of George Orwell and Douglas Adams, the PSNI is accusing two apparently harmless idiots of being sex offenders after attempting to remove court judgments on convicted paedophiles from the same social media platform.
The reluctance to use old-fashioned public order charges reveals a deeper problem with modern policing. Just as nurses stopped cleaning wards once they started getting degrees, it affronts the professionalism of today's officers to admit they are hired muscle for the average citizen, so they prefer to raise issues like child protection when addressing 'bad behaviour'. The PSNI's official statement on the Limavady Facebook page was a classic this kind, citing "public protection" and "making communities feel safer" while trying to stop a community noting actual sex offenders in its midst.
The PSNI may have a particular problem with public order legislation because revealing it has carte blanche to enforce good behaviour would raise awkward questions about why whole categories of disorder are ignored.
Above all, what we can say without dispute about the skinny-dipper debacle is that Holywood PSNI needs to step away from the keyboard.