Baton (law enforcement)

A baton or truncheon (also called a cosh, billystick, billy club, nightstick, sap, blackjack, stick) is essentially a club of less than arm's length made of wood, rubber, plastic or metal. They are carried for forced compliance and self-defense by law-enforcement officers, correctional staff, security-industry employees and (less often) military personnel. Other uses for truncheons and batons include crowd control or the dispersal of belligerent or non-compliant people.

A truncheon or baton may be used to strike, jab, block, bludgeon and aid in the application of armlocks. The usual striking or bludgeoning action is not produced by a simple and direct hit, as with an ordinary blunt object, but rather by bringing the arm down sharply while allowing the truncheon to pivot nearly freely forward and downward, so moving its tip much faster than its handle – effectively a slingshot action, only without releasing. Sometimes, they also are employed as weapons by criminals and other law-breakers because of their easy concealment. As a consequence, they are illegal for non-authorized civilian use in many jurisdictions around the world. They have a common role to play, too, in the rescuing of trapped individuals—for instance, people caught in blazing cars or buildings—by smashing windows or even doors.

Al Shorta SC

Al Shorta Sports Club (Police Sports Club, Arabic: نادي الشرطة الرياضي‎) is an Iraqi multi-sport club based in Rusafa District, East Districts of the Tigris River, Baghdad. The oldest and best known section of the club is its football team. They are widely regarded as Iraq's best team and they are one of only two Iraqi teams to ever win any major international club competition (the other being Al-Rasheed), having won the Arab Champions League in 1982. They have won ten League of the Institutes and Iraqi Premier League titles, and most recently won the league in both the 2012–13 and 2013–14 seasons.

The club are one of five teams in Iraqi League history to go an entire league season unbeaten, achieving this monumental feat in the 1980–81 season and have won a joint record three Umm Al Ma'arak (mother of all battles) Cups (in 2000, 2001 and 2002).

Al Shorta were founded in 1932 under the name Montakhab Al Shorta and are the third-oldest football club in the country. The club was separated into a number of different teams in the 1960s and early 1970s, before merging back into one single team in 1974. In 1971, one of these teams (Aliyat Al Shorta) reached the final of the Asian Champions Cup (now known as the AFC Champions League) but refused to play the final against Israeli club Maccabi Tel Aviv. Despite this, the club has won a number of trophies outside of Iraq such as the President's Gold Cup and Arab Police Championship.