They went for a curry. Or a Thai meal. Or a Chinese. To be fair, there was some method in the madness. More than 1,100 racial offences were recorded by the Met in February and some might argue that serious crimes, such as assault, stem from the prejudice and viciousness inherent in such hate crime .
Hate crime is an issue which causes misery.
You only have to look abroad, to places such as Kosovo and Rwanda, to see the dangers. A minicab driver from Ilford, Essex, Islam suffered horrific injuries which required 50 stitches across his face and lips when he was savagely beaten by three youths and struck by a beer glass in what police described as an unprovoked racist attack. He is scarred for life and has only just been able to return to work part-time after the incident a year ago. His attackers were recently sentenced to five years imprisonment. But whether the way to tackle such serious crime is to spy on diners in curry houses is open to question, especially when the Met is short of more than 1,000 officers.