It must’ve sucked to be a police officer in Ōpōtiki today, having to provide traffic control for the Mongrel Mob so they could have total uninterrupted use of the road for the funeral procession.

That must’ve been a really cool experience for our officers, providing an escort to a bunch of people who probably deserve to see the inside of a jail cell, rather than getting waved through like VIPs or dignitaries.

But that is exactly what happened today. 

Our police officers, get a load of this, shut the main drag in Ōhope for two hours around midday to 2pm so that the gang could use both sides of the road.

Which meant that law abiding citizens were forced to pull over and wait for two hours to be able to use the road and get where they need to go. According to our reporter, there was a line of at least 400m worth of cars waiting.

Now how do you think that felt for them? They weren’t allowed to use the road that they paid for in their taxes, while these delinquents and bludgers get exclusive use.

I don’t think this is the kind of policing that any of us want to see, where extra coppers are brought into the district to control the normal folk so the gangs can have free reign.

I don’t think we want to see this, where the police stand around doing no more than taking photos of gang members who are pulling shakas and sieg heils and burnouts in front of the officers, as if rubbing their faces in it.

And where the worst that the police can threaten is some after the fact punishment for reckless driving and skiddies.

There were gang members driving on the wrong side of the road, hanging out the windows and doors. If that was me, I'd have a police officer on my tail pulling me over. Can they not do the same to the gangs? 

If numbers are the problem, get more police. There were 500 mungies there and 100 cops. Do you see the problem with that equation? 

What the police and the public have been forced to endure today is embarrassing.

This isn’t going away. When we see the police wave the gangs through like VIPs, they’re going to get used to it and keep expecting it. 

Police bosses have set themselves up for more of this.

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