If you are a photographer and want to avoid being arrested, have a look at these….as recommended by the British Press Photographers Association, probably as an ‘in joke’ considering how many photographers get arrested just for working with a camera.
Perhaps I should have had one of these on to save me being arrested a few years back while photographing a riot (in my Newspaper days). After two days solid photographing rioting football fans during the World Cup, whilst working for a newspaper in France, I went back to the hotel for some sleep - only to get a call from Newsdesk sending me straight back out. Apparently, English football fans don’t sleep.
I arrived in the City Centre, got the cameras out of the boot, and went off photographing. When I got back to the car I had a brand of French shotgun placed in my face, while two members of the French riot police kicked my feet away, only then to pin me down and let an Alsatian bark at me. To be honest, I was beginning to prefer the company of the rioting fans, to the protection of the police.
Police officers surrounded my car while two searched it. It turns out that someone had seen me remove a long lens from the boot, and assumed it was a snipers rifle with scope. After about an hour they let me go, and then passed me a note. The note was from the reporter I was working with at the time, asking for me to confirm he was who he said he was (he forgot his Press Card). It turns out he had been held as he was seen talking to me when I arrived three hours earlier. He was an absolute slacker, so it was with great reluctance I admitted he was with me. I went back to the hotel and processed the film in the bath, falling asleep on my laptop a few hours later, waking to a Picture Editor shouting abuse, and refusing to believe my story.
Lesson learned, nobody should mess with the Compagnies Republicaines de Securite (the French Riot Police). In retrospect, a t-shirt probably wouldn’t have helped.
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