A MOTHER and son are fighting crime together from Kidderminster Police Station after he followed in her footsteps to become a frontline officer.

Jordan Unitt, aged 21, has joined the same police force as mum Maxine, aged 44, after watching her tackling crooks since he was six years old.

He decided to keep the family tradition going and began training with West Mercia Police in January this year.

They are now both based at Kidderminster Police Station covering the same beat as Jordan completes his training alongside his mum, who has served for 13 years.

Maxine believes his exposure to the "police family" growing up may have contributed towards her son's career choice.

Kidderminster Shuttle:

Maxine, from Tipton, said: "I've been in the police since he was six-years-old so it's always been a big part of his life.

“The police became the norm for him, so a lot of people that he's mixing with in the station now have seen him grow up because they've been colleagues and friends of mine.

“When you are in the police you are part of a family. Your children are part of it because we all socialise together.

“It was a big part of him and it was over the last few years he expressed an interest in joining.

“When he told me I said go for it, it's a good time for recruiting at the moment. He was at the right age to go in and start his career.

“In a general sense, it's unusual in the fact that we're both on the frontline. There are some families who follow their parents into the police.

Kidderminster Shuttle:

“But a lot of the time, there's a bigger age gap and you don't tend to have two frontline officers at the same time. It is pretty unique."

Due to the recent coronavirus pandemic, Maxine says she is “a bit more apprehensive” than she normally would be about Jordan facing frontline police work.

She added: “He is very chilled anyway, so he was just ready to go on his first day.

“I was a bit apprehensive, as a mother. In the job that we do, you are going to be a little bit apprehensive.

“I know his team very well and we all look after each other but with the pandemic, you are more apprehensive because we are frontline policing, we are not in offices.

“We're dealing with the public so there is a risk to both of us. You just got to deal with it though. He's cracking on with the job.

“They go through rigorous training and assessment before they even join the job.

“When they come out, they tend to be the right character to face what we are dealing with.”

Maxine says that Jordan still gets a lot of stick around the station for being the son of a police officer.

The mum-of-two added: “Jordan is the child of a police officer so he gets a lot of stick.

"We give banter to each other because that's how we make light of difficult situations.

“He does get some stick. A lot of older officers have seen him grow up.

“They've seen pictures of him when he's younger and going on holiday with mum and doing things together.

"He's taking it all in his stride and he finds it all quite funny, to be honest.

"My six-year-old daughter Alex also wants to join the force when she grows up, so there could be three of us here at some point, you never know."

Kidderminster Shuttle:

As part of Jordan's Police Constable Degree Apprenticeship (PCDA), he has a number of weeks of initial training before doing shifts.

Maxine added: “Last week saw him do his first couple of shifts.

“We are both based out of Kidderminster Police Station. His team is usually before mine though."

Jordan did not always want to follow his mum into the force, initially studying Computer Science at university before making the shift into police training.

On working with his mum, he said they have a “great relationship” but the lack of overlapping shifts makes things easier.

He said: “It's been fine, we have a great relationship and we're on different shifts anyway.

“When I finish it's like a changeover to my mum. It's alright with me, its not like I am stuck with her all day.

“We can potentially go to the same job. We could possibly go to incidents together if we were the two officers available at the time.

“That hasn't happened yet but given time, I imagine it might.

Kidderminster Shuttle:

“I like to be outdoors, so the police felt like something I could do.

“I like to do mountaineering and things like that. I got more interested in joining the police and it all fell into place really.

“It's been a bit of a change to what it usually would be like for students training on the job due to coronavirus, so it has been a bit of a strange start.

“We are training at the West Mercia Police HQ in Hindlip and then we go to Worcester University for the more university-based stuff.

“Its around 20 per cent university-based and 80 per cent on the job, which is what I am doing now. I've really enjoyed it so far and I can't wait to qualify."