Police agencies have beautiful roles and functions in accomplishing law enforcement for protection and maintenance of peaceful, orderly, and safe society. Police officers are meant to be authoritative figures that can make the people feel safe and protected. The history of policing and establishment of polices departments in America reflect roles of police officers in fulfilling the defined and perceived the public need for law enforcement bodies that will look after keeping the peace and order in the communities. However, the temptations of time and circumstances have been always around and allowed permeation of corruption in police officers.
An article written jointly by Mark Perez and Anthony H Normore, published in the Journal of California Law Enforcement discusses the growing concern that the public’s trust in law enforcement is at an all-time low due to the ethical choices that some of our leadership have been making and how we can improve the publics opinion of law enforcement and some of their unethical decisions. The purpose of their article is to share their thoughts on police leadership and ethic, they feel by having just one powerful confident police leader in a department it can have a positive impact on that police department by reducing the rate of misconduct. They also feel by having a police force with strong integrity
Police are rarely held accountable for their wrong doing actions. As I mentioned above only 27 of 80 officers have been convicted, with only one convicted of murder for police brutality. Police are seen as a form of power and abuse that privilege. Officer’s do what they want knowing that they will not be held accountable. Police Officer’s beat people, shoot people and harm people (abuse of power) and blame it on the civilian they are harming. Most of the time the police officer’s will be believed over the civilian. When police officer’s abuse their power this leads to lack of trust between police officers and civilians. This also leads to lack of trust between police officers and communities. This divides us and makes us afraid of one another. Stress in police officer’s also causes police brutality. Stress can come from the civilians and the pressure of the job making officer’s take out all of their anger and aggression on civilians. Police brutality causes people and communities to be vulnerable. People become vulnerable to police officers because they are powerless. The officers take power over us, make us helpless, defenseless and weak at the time of a police brutality attack. In order to stop police brutality, the state and local governments must come together to reevaluate the officer’s code of conduct, enforce new rules and regulations for the officers and hold officers accountable for their actions of wrong doing. According to, Police Brutality is Getting Worse and Shows No Signs of Slowing Down, the only way to stop police brutality is to have officer’s wear body cameras, a complete overhaul on how law enforcement handles mentally ill men, women, and children and truly independent, powerful review boards for all police misconduct. According to others, some of the changes should consist of more community police, more foot patrols and engagement with residents. Police brutality will
The third journal article was written by policing scholars and details police attitudes about police violence and abuse. The abuse of police authority: A national study of police officers ' attitudes was the first national study of its kind. Researchers interviewed over 900 police officers in over 5,000 police departments across the country. An interesting finding is that officers believe the "potential for abuse of police authority comes directly from the heightened community expectations and the closer community-police contact (Weisburg, Greenspan, E. Hamilton, Bryant, & Williams, 2001)." In addition, "Participants indicated the need for more experienced officers to take a lead in helping officers cope with the stress of the job and their personal lives (Weisburg, Greenspan, E. Hamilton, Bryant, & Williams, 2001)." While this report does not touch on civil liability it does discuss abuse of authority and community policing. It goes over how supervisors handle misconduct complaints and allegations. It gives readers a viewpoint into the culture of policing and the mindset of officers and their supervisors, decisions are made. This article is helpful in that it provides an inside look into the lives of police
The police handle an essential part in society as its protectors. The law enforcement officers look out for the citizens and try to protect their safety and happiness whenever possible. Throughout the years, however; the society has questioned the use of force, racism and internal corruption as well as other forms of misconduct by officers of the law. Some people claim that many of these problems are misconstrued by the media and blown out of capacity; these officers are simply doing their job. Others argue that these circumstances can be drawn back to poor training and policies. Others maintain that the whole system needs to be changed and that with the rise in crime; officers have become enforcers more than protectors.
Every day Police officers are faced with fight or flight situations putting morals constantly into question with every choice. This isn’t to say however, that fight or flight situations are the only situations where the ethics of an officers are challenged. In some cases, ethics can also be more planned and objective oriented (Sherman, 1982). Ethics play a pivotal role in determining the boundaries in which officers must operate. When applied to the police, high moral standards and integrity are the key to societies trust however. “It also constitutes one of the most significant obstacles to positive police-public relations in today’s society” (Grant, 2002:12). If a working relationship between society and law enforcers is the desired end
The Oakland Police Department (OPD) presides over one of the most crime-ridden areas in the nation. Policing Oakland is a challenging task by any measure and there have been many allegations that officers have employed inappropriate policing tactics. (Guardian article). After a gang of rogue police officers in the 1990s was accused of framing and beating suspects, the department was placed on a court-ordered monitor by a district judge. As part of a Negotiated Settlement Agreement, OPD is required to complete a list of “tasks”. The department has received other independent recommendations for reforms. There was a clear lack of accountability in the departments past, which created the impetus for reform. For the purposes of this paper, accountability entails establishing expectations, verifying performance, assessing blame, and sorting responsibility (Romzek 241). In this paper I ask, “Will accountability related reforms be institutionalized?” I evaluate the need for these reforms and use two applicable tasks to analyze reform success. I argue accountability-based reforms has penetrated the police culture and will be institutionalized because of internal support and decentralization, which improve collaboration and present an opportunity to engage with the community.
Throughout the evolution of police, there has always been an unsteady relationship with the public. The waver in civilian’s confidence in law enforcement agencies can be attributed to the increase in police misconduct, or corruption. Then a new strategy called, civilian oversight model was introduced giving regular citizens the chance to have a say in police conduct. The public was in full support of the new model implemented through the law enforcement agencies. However, there was disagrees in the police field with the public having more power over there actions. The increased implementation of civilian oversight models for police wrongdoing has both positive, and negative attributes to the community as a whole.
As American history has shown us, with great power also comes great responsibility. The great power part has not been as much of a problem as the great responsibility has because as police officers begin going through training they soon realize the great power they will soon have. And as over time and the facts have shown us, many of them show that they can handle great control and responsibility, but it is the small percentage of those officers who are corrupt that have made them look like the bad bad people and lack of trust in police departments around the world.
Police are considered to be the representatives of civil authority of the government (Banton, 2015). Their primary goal is to ensure safety among the citizens and maintain public order. They are also burdened with law enforcement, and they are tasked to prevent, detect and even investigate criminal activities. Police are subsequently conferred with regulatory functions and such functions are known, according to Banton (2015), as policing. However, scholars have criticized the word police for two reasons: (i) first, it defines police through their purpose and not by the means they use in order to be efficient in their functions; and (ii) the situations where police are required to interfere in order to enforce the law and maintain society’s
When the word ‘police’ is mentioned, various perceptions flow into people’s mind. The roles and function of police are expectations that public expects from them, but due to the image they portray to the public, people have developed various perceptions about them. Functions and roles of police are clearly outlined in the constitution of every country (Bowling & Phillips, 2003). The obvious role that is conspicuous to the eyes of normal civilian is that of law enforcer. We all admit that human is a victim of imperfections. Law breaking is a fruit of human imperfections (Miller, 2013). The police emerge not to eradicate crime, but, at least, to push for reductions and extremes. Far from this expectation, the police are also human beings, a product of any society. Their minds are socialized to the society that they
Police accountability generally refers to holding the police officers and other law enforcement agencies responsible for efficiently delivering basic services of crime control and maintenance of law and order, while at the same time treating all citizens fairly within the bounds of law. The police are mandated to uphold high standard of professionalism when carrying out their duties and operate within the laid down procedures and laws. There is high expectation by the police to uphold laws regarding due process, search and seizure, arrests, discrimination and other forms of harassments which the police are expected to adhere to. Police misconduct affects law enforcement
A Critical Assessment In defining police ethics, ethical policing and police ethics are not synonymous or interchangeable connotations to or for one another. Aside from establishing a police role independently from establishing any definition of ethics or police ethics, the semantics tend to complicate the defining process. Some of these complications include, but are not limited to, sociological aspects, psychological conditions, or philosophical reasoning. Examples of sociological complications include historical, political, cultural, or economic aspects. Some psychological examples include one’s ability to discern sociological implications from other implications; namely, the condition of post-traumatic stress disorder, hydrophobia, or even weary dreams. Lastly,
Within our police system in America, there are gaps and loopholes that give leeway to police officials who either abuse the authority given to them or do not represent the ethical standards that they are expected to live up to by society. Because of the nature of police work, there is a potential for deterioration of these ethical and moral standards through deviance, misconduct, corruption, and favoritism. Although these standards are set in place, many police officers are not held accountable for their actions and can easily get by with the mistreatment of others because of their career title. While not every police abuses his or her power, the increasingly large percentage that do present a problem that must be recognized by the public as well as those in charge of police departments throughout our country. Police officials are abusing their power and authority through three types of misconduct known as malfeasance, misfeasance, and nonfeasance and these types are being overlooked by management personnel who rarely intervene even though they know what is happening. Misconduct is wrong because it violates rights and causes people to be wrongly accused of crimes or be found not guilty and set free when they are still an endangerment to other people. The public needs to be educated on what is happening in the police system in hopes that someone will speak out to protect citizens from being violated by police officers.