“Now don't you look spiffy jiffy” my amma (“grandma”) says each time I see her. She then briefly mentions how her health is, “great!” or “I simply had the most terrible tumble on my daily walk last week, it was hilarious” then she describes the dangers of smoking (I don't smoke) and how Iceland is taking a turn for the worse and that crime is rife throughout the country. “A lady can't walk on her own any more, rape, drugs, booze, it is all about town.”
To some extent it is true, there has been an increase in crime over the years, but this week, I have noticed that most of the incidents have been rather unglamorous to say the least. Crime items to hit the Icelandic news this week include:
A tenant, who heard a noise coming from the bathroom, was afraid a burglar had broken in and was rifling through the toiletries. The police was immediately notified and rushed to the scene. The coppers arrived, stormed the bathroom only to find that an electric shaver had been left switched on inside a closed cupboard.
What happened next you might ask? According to mbl.is, “The police handled the situation by turning off the electric device and the tenant was able to sleep without further worry.” Note: the razor was not charged.
Actual burglars were also handcuffed this week, that is to say, not rogue home electrical appliances. Mbl.is reports that police arrested four house prowlers who had fallen asleep in the very summerhouse they broke into.
The men were between 18 and 32 years old and were found with various other items they had pinched from other summerhouses as well as drugs. Though the extreme stupidity of this arrest is obvious, I am willing to say in their favor that at least the summerhouse was empty at the time of their nap.
On a more sinister note, another crime afoot in Iceland this week includes drug smuggling. IR wrote on Thursday that a man in his thirties was arrested for picking up a postal delivery addressed to his store which contained 13,000 steroid tablets. What kind of drug smuggler sends his illegal Thai steroids through the mail? I suppose this guy does, but honestly, the mail?
Considering all the troubles other police stations around the world suffer, you would think that the Icelandic police have a pretty easy job and that it is all fun and steroid mail, but you would be wrong.
According to ruv.is, the Reykjavík Police department is suffering from overcrowding and the good old police building by Hlemmur, across the street from the central bus station, is simply no longer big enough to house both police and prisoners.
I must admit leaving your granny with “Right amma, I am now off to be raped and killed in today's ever deteriorating society”, is never a good note to leave on. But sometimes when I am wandering about through Reykjavík's gun ridden streets, I wonder what masterminds and super villains our fine boys and girls in blue will have to fight to keep your amma and my amma safe at night. Or in some cases: the burglars safe from our amma's.
Having watched many detective shows, I, with a Sherlock Holmes style deduction know there are two cop worlds out there. The tough and the fluff. The tough cop world is where hard ass criminals steal money from children with incurable diseases. Where TJ Hooker reigns supreme and where a man is not afraid to kick a confession out of you to solve a crime.
Then there is the fluff side of the law. There is no punching here, detectives spend their time thinking about their personal demons, which somehow always seem to relate to the case they are dealing with. These are the great crime detectives of history, Jessica Fletcher, Morse and Colombo. Complicated crimes by complicated people.
My question is: Which sort of police person would our police department need in the 21st century to fight the ever growing crime wave swamping our fair country? Hooker, Morse, Chuckles the Clown? No, the Icelandic police, and a damn fine job they are doing, eh?