Life on the crime frontline

IN THE LINE OF FIRE WITH ROSS KEMP

STV, 9pm TIME for hardman Ross Kemp to pull on his bulletproof vest again as he joins armed officers on the frontline of British crime.

Ross heads out with cops who have experienced being confronted with lethal weapons, raising the issue of whether police at any level can be left unarmed today. First he hears how two such officers dealt with a violent man who was threatening them with a kitchen knife, revisiting the scene with two constables, Alex and Debbie, from Northamptonshire Police.

Debbie says: “I honestly thought that Alex was going to be killed.”

Later Ross goes out with a covert mobile armed support surveillance team on the hunt for a suspect with a gun in the West Midlands, but the man is aggressive when the team tries to arrest him.

Ross also visits a counter-terror training base, designed to instil military-style tactics into everyday police officers.

During a practise raid, he acts as a hostage while officers use explosives to gain access to a building.

Before the officers burst in with stun grenades, Ross says: “It’s actually tense doing this. I mean I know what’s about to happen. Can you imagine what they’d feel like in a real hostage situation?”

And Ross interviews officers with different views on whether or not police should be armed.

One says: “The number of incidents that we’re now seeing involving gang violence, they’re carrying guns and yet we’re still deploying with a small can of pepper spray and a baton.”