Editorial: Difficult employee, but a good cop

Senior Constable Gavin Benney

When Gavin Benney started policing, it was a different world to what it is today. The booze culture was more prevalent, so was violence. Benney, when he signed up, was a bit rough round the edges.

Becoming a cop never quite smoothed those edges.

His book Country Cop - The life and times of a rural cop is full of anecdotes and yarns about a career that saw him proudly hold the informal title of "best clearance rate in the country".

In lay terms, that means that any crime that came across his Hikurangi police station desk, he solved a high percentage of it, and at one point had the highest crime solving percentage in New Zealand. Ably assisted by his co-worker Senior Constable Russell Rawiri, the pair of them are universally known as "good buggers".

To police management, Benney was also a "difficult bugger". He bent rules, did things differently, didn't always arrest people when he had good reason to, and occasionally laired up with a beer or three.

Toward the end of his career, he says his police colleagues were after him, trying to catch him drink-driving. Why isn't explained in depth in the book.

A fellow cop - a good mate of Benney's - was caught drink-driving. Bad luck, or were they after him too? Does it matter now? Benney's moved on.

Ironically, he and the mate caught drink-driving now co-own a pub. Across the road from the police station. Something that Benney has probably had a laugh about, no doubt.

He doesn't seem bitter, there's criticism, but no vitriol in the book.

Yes, Senior Constable Gavin Benney, good bugger, could be a difficult employee, but you can't avoid observing, after reading his book, that he was also an excellent cop.