I was stopped and questioned twice within a span of about ten minutes while walking around near Parliament in the middle of the night because someone _supposedly_ called in some sort of a threat. I was severely jetlagged and had never been to London before, so I figured it wouldn't be any different than walking around NYC but that may have been naive on my part.
You can walk around 99.9% of central London at any time of night and nobody is going to raise any eyebrows no matter how jet-lagged you look. But there's always a chance you're going to attract some attention outside Parliament, or certain embassies, especially if there's an "elevated threat level" or whatever.
First time I was arrested for being next to a fight until I was cleared of any involvement. This required some explaining and the policeman was an idiot.
Second time some busybody reported to the police that I was carrying a knife. This was a Santoku knife that I'd literally bought and was still in the plastic packaging but you could see it through the plastic bag I was carrying it in. We had a bit of a laugh about it and they apologised for wasting my time. They did however arrest me so that they could do a formal search and had right to as they had reasonable suspicion I was carrying it as a weapon. I'm not bothered they were very reasonable and so was I.
In the US both of those would have been handled with an Investigatory detention - same as being pulled over for a traffic stop. Not even remotely an arrest.
> They did however arrest me so that they could do a formal search and had right to as they had reasonable suspicion I was carrying it as a weapon.
What "reasonable suspicion"? They could see the "weapon" that had been reported and at that point it should have been "have a nice day" and then them trundling themselves over to whoever called it in and charged them with making a false report.
I swear, UK police seem generally nicer than US cops but infinitely dumber and the shit you brittons put up with in terms of having your rights violated is astounding.
> In the US both of those would have been handled with an Investigatory detention - same as being pulled over for a traffic stop. Not even remotely an arrest.
I'm not from the UK, but it seems likely that this is just a question of semantics. Many US traffic stops are far more stressful—and handled in a way that is far less conciliatory—than the "arrest" that OP describes. It doesn't sound like they were taken to a police station or even necessarily handcuffed, more just formally detained.
As for US detentions: It doesn't especially matter if they're not technically "arrests" in US parlance, you're still being stopped by the police and you still can't go anywhere until they let you because there's a too-high probability that they'll find an excuse to make your life miserable if you don't cooperate.
"Reasonable suspicion" is the UK equivalent of what Americans call "probable cause" i.e. jargon for when the police are allowed to search you.
The police have to conduct stops in a certain manner, because of the law that gives them the power to stop people: They are legally required to tell the person they're being detained for the purposes of a search, the purpose of the search, the grounds for the search, and the legal power used.
Getting a load of jargon thrown at you about "detained" and "offensive weapon" and "Police and Criminal Evidence Act" sound a bit officious, but once they've stopped you they've got to give you the officious jargon, it's required by law.
Also, while it's rare that the police will have occasion to stop and search a middle class, middle age white guy like myself, when the situation does come up, it's reasonable for them to do it thoroughly and by the book. They should treat a report of me carrying a knife the same as they'd treat a report of a black teenager in a bad neighbourhood carrying a knife.
Because of the increase in knife crimes in the last couple of years the UK police have become incredible aggressive towards anybody in possesion of even small purpose knifes in public. I'm honestly surprised OP got away with it.
Buying a knife and carrying it home is 100% legal, so there's nothing to "get away with" here.
Carrying a Santoku knife in public is only illegal if it's being carried without a "good reason" and carrying a newly purchased knife home is certainly a good reason.
The police have the power to stop and search people when they have "reasonable grounds" to suspect they're carrying a weapon; if the knife is clearly visible that's certainly reasonable grounds. So the search was not illegal.
A stop-and-search means being "detained" in the sense that you are not free to leave until the search is completed, but it's not an "arrest" that would appear on your arrest record. Perhaps there was a miscommunication about the distinction between being 'detained' and being 'arrested' ?
> If they don't like your face they can just decide the good reason is not good enough
The article you linked does not support the claim that the UK police not liking someone's face is sufficient for them to be allowed to stop and search someone.
> A person’s physical appearance [...] cannot be used as the reason for stopping and searching them [...] unless there is information or intelligence giving a specific description of a person suspected of carrying an item for which there is a power to search.
