Published on | #WeAre50
The first Black firearms officer in West Midlands Police.
Paul Lee joined West Midlands Police in 1991 after seeing an advert for the police and deciding to go for it. He was 19 years of age and didn’t really have any career ambitions at this point.
He was initially posted to Stoney Stanton Road, Coventry, undertaking a response role. Three years in he saw some firearms officers returning from a job and was really struck by all the kit and equipment they had. He confesses he thought they looked ‘cool’ and decided that was what he would like to do next!
Paul applied to become an authorised firearms officer (AFO) in 1994.
He stated “I was initially told I’d never get it, I was too young in service and it wasn’t worth applying. My boss basically signed it off because he thought I wasn’t going anywhere. I went ahead anyway and got through the selection process to become an authorised firearms officer.”
Paul was initially based on the M division (Coventry) as a divisional AFO and after passing his tactical course he went to complete 12 months at the airport in 1997. It was standard for officers who wanted to join the unit full-time to start out at the airport and normally they would have to complete their tactical course during their time at the airport. Paul was unusual in the sense that he had completed his prior to starting there, so he didn’t have any of the worry or stress that was occupying the other new officers!
Paul started working on armed response vehicles (ARVs) in 1998. In 2000 he started to focus more on hostage rescue as a specialism and worked as an intervention officer doing hostage rescue up until 2007, when he became a VIP close protection officer. In 2010 he became an instructor all the way through to 2015, where he left Firearms for three years on the driving school, before returning back to firearms for a further three years and retiring in January. Since retiring as an officer, Paul returned to West Midlands Police as a civilian instructor in the Driving School, training firearms officers on VIP close protection courses and protective vehicle escort courses.
His favourite role with the department was VIP close protection and all the interesting people he got to meet. He stated the worst part of the job was when he eventually left the department to retire.
Despite being the only Black officer in the department for several years, Paul remembers only ever being made to feel welcome and part of the team throughout his whole career with Firearms. He stated the attitude generally from colleagues there was that if someone has managed to get through the selection process, they were welcomed to the department as they had already proven themselves.
Paul said before joining, he was a little bit hesitant about joining the police. And again, when deciding to join Firearms, but he has absolutely no regrets over any of the career choices that he has made over the last 33 years within the organisation and has thoroughly enjoyed it.