A municipal police officer from Alovera (Guadalajara) has reported his town hall for planting a tracking device in his car since he reported sick.

It appears that the said town hall is not entirely convinced that he is not swinging the lead (pretending to be sick) so they hired a private detective, who was caught red-handed as he was installing the GPS tracker on the underside of the car by the policeman himself .

The policeman is fully backed by the police union in this affair and the union spokesperson, José María Antón, considers that his client’s Right to Privacy, has been violated.

The policeman feels it bit baffled by why the town hall would do this as he has already gone through two independent medical examinations, including one by an medical-insurance company hired by the town hall.

(Editorial note: non-native English speakers might wonder where the expression “swing the lead,” meaning malingering, comes from. Whilst it is certainly a naval expression there are two contradictory etymological explanations. Sailors tasked with depth sounding with a line would have two swing a lead weight as far forward as possible and then count off the fathoms as the ship passes directly over the line. Normal weights were between seven and 28 pounds where as “deep sea” lead could weigh up to 56 pounds.

The first explanation goes that as it is hard work to pull up the lead from the seabed, a sailor tasked with taking the soundings would prefer to just swing it backwards and forwards as along as possible rather than actually launch it and have to retrieve it.

The second explanation goes that being chosen to gauge the depth with a line was one of the easier tasks on board, compared with working in the rigging, etc, so drawing that duty was a cushy job.

Personally, I would opt for the first. What do our ex-matelot readers say?

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(News, Alovera, Guadalajara, Castilla-La Mancha)