Here's a bit of a personal story from last night - I'm sure anyone in security is familiar with such stuff, but I don't usually get this kind of gigs as I'm mostly into industrial security, and I wanted to share this. Also, for those who aren't into security/LE, maybe you get a new perspective for what we do
So, summer in the security business, especially here in Scandinavian countries, means lots of so called "extra gigs", which typically are night-time gigs at festival areas and other public and private places that need extra or temporal security, as the warm weather makes people hang out more than usual. These gigs are usually called in, just something like "hey, we got an extra gig from this place, wanna do it on Saturday night?" and they might be anything, anywhere.
So, this weekend I got a gig at an outdoor swimming pool. There's a nice pool in Helsinki area, with a jumping tower, heated pools et al, and the summer nights are quite warm, so naturally there's a bunch of people wanting to go for a dip. Of course the city doesn't want to hire a lifeguard to watch over a bunch of drunk kids, so they get security instead, to make sure the pool stays closed. The bad thing, from my point of view, is that there's only a 7-foot high fence around the place, with nothing on top to prevent climbing - and the fact that they think one person can do the job easily.
So, last night was spent chatting with a whole bunch of people, mostly teenagers, and usually through the fence or while escorting the sneaky ones outside. I got a new group coming in about every 30 minutes or so, anything from 4 to 10 kids aged 16-18, everyone wanting to go for a swim. Now, the kids aren't all bad, some of them are even nice. Still, the conversations started anywhere from "Hey, mr. security officer, would you be so kind to let us take a quick swim?" to "Hey you, security guy or whatever, what are you going to do if we decide to come over there?" - these kids usually don't carry any knives or anything, and I carry both mace and a baton, so it's not that serious, but still, the group of few aggressive teenage males can be very hard to deal with. I didn't want to be a jerk, but unfortunately I can't let anyone in the pools, and that's the rule, so there were some conversations that went in the lines of "c'mon - why not? - why do you have to be such an.. - what are you going to do - you can't do nothing if we.." et cetera. Most of them decided to quit while they were ahead, but some of them had really hard time understanding that: no, they can't use pool facilities if they haven't paid for entrance; yes, it's an offence to enter the closed outdoor area, even if a very minor one; and yes, I as a security officer have a right to apprehend them if they trespass.
Sober teenagers were quite reasonable, but the drunk ones..
I almost got into a wrestling match with a couple of kids, when their drunken girlfriends decided to climb over the fence first with very wrong "you can't do nothing to us, you're just a security guy" -attitude, and their boyfriends got rather pissed off as I grabbed the first girl and firmly told her that she's headed towards the wrong direction. One of the punks who was acting aggressively almost got maced and handcuffed - would had, if he would had climbed all the way over the fence. He made a good decision.
Then again, there were some teens who were reasonable to deal with, and actually fun to chat with. Many of them asked what it's like to work in security, and I also got to explain the legal position and means available to private security personnel to a couple of groups. I'm sure they walked off a bit wiser. I always said a firm "no" to the requests, but if they were polite and didn't use any abusive language, I sometimes remembered that I had something to do on the other side of the building, and very strictly warned them that they better not be in the pool when I get back in a couple of minutes
I have to say the funniest group was a bunch with three guys and a girl. Two of the kids were determined to sneak into the pool, so it turned into a kind of cat-and-mouse game with two of them hiding naked in the bushes, thinking I didn't notice them or their large pile of clothes on the street, while the guy and the girl were trying to act as spotters and ignore their friends' sudden disappearance. So, I would walk around the pools, just so happening that I was always in a bad position for them to make a run for it. Sometimes, when I was just about to go around the corner, I suddenly decided to head back to the pools - I almost got them with one of these, too! This went on for about 15 minutes, but finally I decided to reward the two kids for the patience and being heroicly naked in the cool night, and went behind the corner so they could make a run for the jumping platforms, climb to the highest one and jump. When I heard two loud splashes, I of course came from behind the corner doing my best angry old man -imitation and yelling "D***it kids, now what did I just tell you about no swimming!", so that they could barely make their escape
In the end, I really didn't want to be too harsh on anyone, so I just threw the kids out and told them kindly not to come back. Hey, kids are kids, right? I think the total headcount was around 30 kids turned back attempting to come over the fence, and about 20 or so escorted outside from the pool area. I'm going back for another night tonight. Last night was a really good learning opportunity for how to handle younger people, and I got to chat with some decent kids. In the end, usually after I had escorted out those who actually got as far as into the pool, many of them said that I was "kinda ok, for a security guy" or "thanks for not yelling at us all the time", so I don't think it was all bad!
As a bonus, I got to try out some really wannabe-badass lines, like "you can't do anything if we come over the fence" -"you try that, kid, and you won't only see what I can do, but also what I
will do."
