BREAKING GRIPS.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 373, 15 March 1932, Page 5

BREAKING GRIPS.

Scenes at Detective School. WOMEN LEARN TIIE ART. (Spec'ial to the “ Star.’’) LONDON, February 3. “If he tries to throttle you,” says the six-foot ex-police officer mildly, “ do this! ” And with a murderous gesture he indicates the swiftest way of breaking the throat grip, and snapping the little fingers of the assailant. “ Now, you do it,” suggests the expolice constable invitingly to a group of young women in London. And, very efficiently, they do. For the young women are at school again, the only school of its kind for women who are learning the arts and wiles of the private detective. One goes up a rather dingy stairway in—appropriately—Baker Street, and there finds the girls receiving instruction any day of the week. “Go anywhere after they have finished their training,” says a Press writer, “ and you will find them at work—in the hotel lounge and at the reception desk, at the smart wedding, in the liner that takes you to the winter sunshine.” The training includes a thorough grounding in the rules and practice of Police Court methods, the interpretation of the laws that may affect the private detective, a gruelling teaching of the whole business of giving evidence, of “ shadowing ” —of standing in the rain, for instance, watching a doorway for the exit of a certain person, hardly daring to bat an eyelid, for hours no end. There was the case of one of the school’s “ graduates ”, a detective in a famous London store, spotting a shoplifter getting away with a book. She followed him as he sped down the street and into a post-office. When the coast seemed clear the culprit emerged to find a crowd, and the detective, awaiting him round the corner. He dodged behind a taxi-cab, only to run, plop! into the amazon’s outspread arms, and eventually to be pinned against a railing till a policeman arrived. There are a few experts who remain on the staff of this amazing school after their course. To these come strange adventures and strange disguises. Sometimes there are long-distance trackings, and vital papers to be served.