Police night shift: A look at what goes on in Shepparton after dark

As we awaited the handover from the afternoon sergeant to Sgt Murnane, I could not help but notice on the table in front of us were two condolence books from a church service at St Brendan’s Church honouring slain police officers Detective Leading Senior Constable Neal Thompson and Senior Constable Vadim De Waart-Hottart, who were shot dead while on duty at Porepunkah in August.

The two police officers, and another injured in the same incident, were just doing their job. Something that all police do every day.

Sure, they would know there were risks, but I just wonder how many ever thought they would be the one who would not be going home to their loved ones that night.

An arresting time

On this night, judging by the handover, it did not seem there was much happening — initially, at least.

Our night would see us accompany Sgt Murnane and the officer who was her driver for the night, as they went about their regular duties.

With Rechelle and I in the back seat, it was an all-female car. I loved the girl power vibes going on there.

Our first job was to go and check in with police who had gone to a Shepparton house after an incident earlier in the night.

It was expected to be a quick check-in with them, to make sure they were okay with everything, and as we arrived we were told we would be there less than a minute.

As such, we didn’t even get out of the car.

Then, as we watched on, there was movement, and we saw a man being walked out of the house in handcuffs and put in the back of a police divvy van.

I was not expecting an arrest on our first job.

It showed how unpredictable the night could be for police and how they needed to adapt all the time.

It was only 11.08pm. Was this going to be how our night turned out?

Later, during one of our visits back to the police station, we saw the man in the cells on a screen at the station used to keep an eye on those in custody.

There were a few cells occupied that night, it seemed.

The incident had been deemed a smaller one when we went out for it, but I later noted the News ran a story about that man appearing in court a few weeks later in an unsuccessful bail application.

Among his charges were being a prohibited person possessing a firearm, after a Snapchat video of him allegedly loading a gun was found on his phone during investigations after his arrest that night.

For me, it was a full circle moment after having seen his arrest, and then to have heard more about it from court.

Triage process

That night, there were three divvy vans on the road, as well as a highway patrol unit, and the sergeant’s car we were in.

There was also a crew of two keeping police guard overnight on a crime scene at Toolamba, that we found out a few days later was a large-scale clandestine drug lab that had been discovered as part of a national week of action targeting illicit drug activity.

Sgt Murnane told us how the job of the sergeant on the shift was not to respond to incidents per se, but rather to listen to the jobs as they were called in and then dictate what sort of police response they should have – whether that be one police unit to attend, two, or more.

“It’s a triage process,” she said.

When the sergeants do respond to jobs, it is to be there as extra support for the police who are out patrolling in the divvy vans all night.

“I’m not turning up as the primary responder. I’m there in the background in case something curly happens,” Sgt Murnane said.

“It’s supporting the members, without telling them what to do.”

Among our driving around we met up with other Shepparton police who were on patrol in Mooroopna and Tatura, stopping for a catch-up to see how their night was going and whether they needed any advice.

These sort of check-ins, I was told, were a regular part of the night for a sergeant, whether they did them in person, or over the phone.

The second spot we turned up to was in a suburban street where police had been called to two different close-by addresses, with the two called in as a noise complaint, and a possible family violence incident.

We trailed along behind the police for this one, as they quickly headed along the street with their torches on, but it turned out there was little happening.

It was deemed that it was probably two calls about the same incident, and we left as officers attended a house to talk to a group of people there about a noise complaint.

Anyone home?

Next, we headed to Mooroopna to check on people on court Drug and Alcohol Treatment Orders to make sure they were at home during their curfew.

One was there, while the next did not answer the door.

That would be a breach, which would be marked on his court order.

While it was not an exciting part of the night, Sgt Murnane explained that curfew checks were something that police routinely did throughout the nightshift.

Some curfews are for things like DATOs, others can be as part of bail conditions.

It was one of three checks the sergeant did that night, with other units tasked to other curfew checks.

On our third check, the woman in question also wasn’t home.

Only one out of three following their court orders did not seem great to me.

It must be frustrating for police.

While trying to find the woman’s house on a dark street, we were treated to one of the nifty features of the police car at work.

The cars have lights that can be shone out to the side to show up house numbers easier.

‘I have to speak to them’

We also caught up with a highway patrol crew who had just pulled over a P-plater in the north end of Shepparton.

The ute had been spotted earlier in the night among a group of vehicles that had driven fast down Kialla Lakes Dve in Kialla.

On another job, we met up with the vans on patrol, which had been called to a family violence job where a child had called police reporting feeling unsafe.

Police helped her to move to another family member’s house for the night.

One of the things that stood out for me on the night, was that police were always alert to everything going on around them.

The most impressive was when we were driving down Wyndham St to another job. Our driver suddenly did a U-turn and said, “I have to speak to them”, as she pointed to a car on the other side of the road.

She had taken a report about a crash in a supermarket car park a couple of days earlier involving that car, where the driver had left without giving their details.

The officer had recognised the number plate.

Granted, when we pulled up behind the car, it did have a recognisable custom number plate, but I was still impressed that she had seen it while driving past on the opposite side of the road.

What I also liked about this was seeing the results of the work between that officer taking that report and then randomly spotting the car late at night.

On another occasion, we spotted a man pushing a shopping trolley full of what looked like his belongings on a road.

We pulled over for Sgt Murnane to have a chat to him about how she didn’t want him to get hurt and that it would be safer if he walked on the footpath.

This interaction showed a softer, caring side to policing, with the man having a friendly chat and going on his way safely.

For Sgt Murnane, it was important to have these good interactions with community members.

For me, it was a stand-out moment of the whole night.

It showed a real human side to policing.

“We take the small wins on the way,” Sgt Murnane said.

“It might be a positive interaction with someone.

“It’s not all about getting people convicted at court.”

Sgt Murnane said Shepparton police were encouraged to talk to people they saw while doing other duties and to have conversations about referrals they may need for things such as alcohol or drug misuse, or legal referrals.

“It’s not just about ‘is there a crime?’ It’s also about if there is a social issue to identify support (is needed for),” she said.

Keeping an eye out

We were told that part of police tasking for the night was patrolling any problem areas in local towns – with one area of particular interest that night being a spot where several cars had been broken into the night before.

This meant police cars on the road would intermittently go into that area throughout the shift to see if anyone was where they shouldn’t be.

Sgt Murnane said police would also check people walking the streets of Shepparton late at night.

“We often get people with outstanding (arrest) warrants floating around at night … and you scoop them up at 2am,” she said.

One of the things that I really noticed was just how quiet the streets of Shepparton’s central business district were.

I had expected to see more people moving between venues, but there really were few people around.

As we got back to the station later in our four-hour stint, we saw some of the police who were on the road float back in to write reports about some of the incidents they attended.

Also happening in the background was a person keeping an eye on Shepparton’s Safe City Network cameras, which are placed throughout the central business district.

The job of this person, who is employed by Greater Shepparton City Council, was to monitor the cameras overnight and flag anything to police that they saw that the police would be interested in.

“It’s a multi-agency approach,” Sgt Murnane said.

“Often they’ll see things before there’s too much trouble.”

Standard night

For me, it felt like a busy night.

For the police themselves, it was not what they would consider busy.

Sgt Murnane described it as a “standard night”.

While not busy from people calling 000, there was still lots for police to do.

“Shepparton is a consistently busy area,” she said.

“It’s often Shepp, Shepp, Shepp over the radio all night long.

“We are out and about pulling over cars and doing bail compliance checks.

“That’s all work but it doesn’t get quantified (in policing figures), but the community should know that we are doing all this in the background.”

Remaining calm

Sgt Murnane spent a bit over three years at Shepparton Police Station.

The night we went on the ride-along was among her last few shifts.

While now stationed in Bendigo, she said she still had a lot of respect for her colleagues in Shepparton.

“If my family or close friends were ever in an incident, I’d want the Shepparton police involved,” she said.

Sgt Murnane said it was important for the sergeant on the shift to remain calm, no matter what was happening.

“I have to say ‘this is what we’ll do, our plan, and our risks’,” she said.

“We do the checks and balances and adapt our response.

“As the sergeant, you try to bring the calm.

“Me getting frazzled is not helping anyone.”

It was comforting to see all the behind-the-scenes things that our police do to help keep our community safe that most people – myself included – don’t even know is happening.

As well as arrests and car chases that we hear about all the time in Shepparton, there seemed to be a lot of work going on that we perhaps do not know about.

But it all keeps us safe.