Reykjavík Grapevine - 24.08.2012, Side 20

20
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 13 — 2012
It’s 11:30 PM on a Sunday night
and the police have just replied to
a question posted on their wall one
hour earlier. “My girlfriend and I
are in France and I bought her pep-
per spray so that she could protect
herself. Why is it illegal for women
in Iceland to carry pepper spray
in their purse as a precautionary
measure?” Snorri Arnar Sveinsson
asked.
“Greetings Snorri,” the police respond-
ed. “It’s not really our place to elaborate
on this as the police don’t make the
laws. Pepper spray, however, has likely
been looked at like other weapons,
which could become dangerous in the
wrong hands. As a police officer, I don’t
recommend that anybody carry such
spray without proper training. The use
of pepper spray can be tricky and it
could easily cause greater harm to the
one using it if used incorrectly.”
The Reykjavík Metropolitan police
don’t carry guns, but they are armed
with pepper spray, extendable ba-
tons and iPads. Yes, iPads. The police
bought eleven of them last summer at
85,000 ISK a pop so that they could,
as Chief of Police Stefán Eiríksson told
DV at the time, better update their Face-
book page, which they created in 2010.
So savvy are the police when it
comes to social media that they are
one of the finalists in the international
ConnectedCOPS Awards, which will be
decided this September. “With 22,000
followers on Facebook in a country of
320,000, it’s one of the largest follow-
ings, per capita in the world,” Con-
nectedCOPS says in their profile of the
Reykjavík Metropolitan police.
What are they doing
on Facebook?
In addition to fielding questions such
as the one posed by Snorri, the police
post all kinds of status updates, rang-
ing from the helpful to the arguably
useless, albeit somewhat entertaining.
I mean, who doesn’t enjoy watching a
poorly lit 14-second video of the police
enjoying fireworks on Culture Night?
Sometimes they post simultaneous-
ly entertaining and helpful statues. For
instance, they posted that a black iPod
Nano had found its way to the police
station in Hafnarfjörður last week: “…
its owner is called Edda. Edda can call
444-1140. We don’t know where and
when it was found though.”
In another, yet stranger, lost and
found case, they posted: “A large num-
ber of stuffed animals, which were all
found in the same place, are at the Reyk-
javík police station lost and found…
Ownership claims must be verified.”
This was accompanied by a photo of a
bunch of pink stuffed animal rabbits,
only highlighting the bizarre.
Other times they post stats: “Seven-
teen drivers were ticketed for driving
under the inf luence of alcohol or drugs
in the capital area over the weekend.
Twelve were stopped in Reykjavík, three
in Kópavogur and one in Garðabær and
Hafnarfjörður. Five were ticketed on
Saturday, eleven on Sunday and one on
Monday. It was 13 men between 12–65
and four women, 18–35 years. Two of
these drivers had already before lost
their driver’s license and one has never
had a license.”
They also post statuses about how
their day went and about what kinds of
things they had to deal with the previ-
ous night: “The night was on the quiet
side—there was one convenient store
break-in, but the individual was arrest-
ed shortly after. Said individual spent
the night with us. Later a driver was
pulled over, suspected of driving under
the inf luence of drugs.”
And these posts may involve a de-
gree of shaming: “A forty-year old man
was pulled over at Reykjanesbraut in
Hafnarfjörður around dinnertime yes-
terday and his obliviousness and that of
the two adult passengers in the car was
unbelievable,” read a post about adults
driving their kids around without seat-
belts and car seats.
In addition to Facebook, the police
are on Twitter, YouTube and EVEN In-
stagram, too. “We are trying out the
photo app Instagram, which is used on
smartphones,” they wrote on Facebook
earlier this month. “You can see our
photos under the tab higher up on this
page marked Instagram LRH. Insta-
gram users can find us under the user-
name: Logreglan [the Icelandic word
for “police”]. Do check us out and tell
us what you think.”
Okay, seriously, what are they
doing on Instagram? #LRH
We checked them out. And no, they
aren’t posting bloody crime scene pho-
tos masked with Lo-fi filters, but then
we only have an average of two murders
per year in Iceland.
Their 24 photos to date are mostly
of their people or vehicles on duty. One
of the first ones was a photo of their of-
fices, comically captioned “Facebook
hq.”
But the photos get more exciting,
especially when the narcs are involved
(Icelandic: “fíknó”). For instance, there
is a photomontage showing a fish, a
bong, a plant (which may or may not be
a marijuana plant) and a traffic ticket,
accompanied with the caption, “A legal
pet, a plant and a parking ticket. Fantas-
tic Tuesday!!! #logreglan #fikno.”
In a similar photomontage, there’s
a donut burger, some bullets, a large
marijuana plant and a snake—three of
which are illegal in Iceland. The cap-
tion reads: “A great Friday shift. Do-
nut burgers and house searches, basic!
#fikno,”
It seems people are mostly interest-
ed in food, though. When asked where
one finds a burger like that, the police
replied: “This awesomeness can be
found at Roadhouse on Snorrabraut. It
doesn’t come with the others…” reveal-
ing a bit of police humour.
And again they share their dining
tips: On a photo of cars parked near
the Reykjavík’s famous hot dog stand,
which is accompanied by the caption “I
am an undercover cop, nobody sees me.
HurrDurrRhh #logreglan #leynilogga
#fikno” someone asked “Were you just
eating a hot dog?” The police replied:
“No, a bacon sub with sautéed mush-
rooms from Nonni, too too good.”
So what are they
REALLY doing?
“The social media implementation is a
small step towards building digital po-
licing in Iceland, the end product being
a fully digital police station with addi-
tional presence in Twitter (the Chief is
currently using Twitter) and YouTube,”
ConnectedCOPS goes on to say in its
profile of the Reykjavík Municipality
Police.
“The RMP is finding that social me-
dia is both a cost-effective way of com-
munity policing but is also turning out
to be one of the key points into building
trust between the police and the pub-
lic.”
But you tell me, are the police hav-
ing too much fun, or what?
“
The Reykjavík Met-
ropolitan police don’t
carry guns, but they are
armed with pepper spray,
extendable batons and
iPads. Yes, iPads. „
The Reykjavík Metropolitan Police (RMP) is the largest of 15 police districts in
Iceland. It employs 300 police officers and serves more than 200,000 people.
Words
Anna Andersen
Photos
@logreglan
What! The Police Are On FB, Twitter
And Instagram, Too? #LRH
Internet | Law enforcement 2.0