Legal Issues and Challenges in American Law Enforcement

Abstract

The essay will include information on some legal principles that effect American law enforcement nowadays. It will also observe some facts on how important civil liability is and how it protects citizens from governmental and particularly police officials’ misconducts. This essay will review some principles to promote effectively police accountability. It will explain police discretion and how valuable is to follow the department’s standards and a code of ethics. The essay will present reasons why deviant police behavior takes place and how crucial the use of appropriate force is.

Legal Issues and Challenges in American Law Enforcement

      Fortunately, there has been a significant shift away from the times when police officers physically abused suspects in order to get confessions. Those were the times, when they beat, accused, and tortured suspects in order to obtain information that was necessary to further investigations or incarcerations. Now we have the Bill of rights that protects citizens’ rights from governmental overpowering abuse including unreasonable searches, arrests and gives us an amount of rights (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). Police officers are held liable for their professional misconducts and excessive use of force through the Title 42 US Code Section 1983 and state torts where officers also enjoy some defenses (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). Police departments set their own ethical standards, which officers have to respect and abide. We fight with the existence of police corruption that unfortunately still occurs, where the moral and ethical principles, and also money is on the question. We try to prevent it through the selective programs that are invented for a hiring process to distinguish the officers, who possibly will turn to be deviants and be a shame of a police department. The recruits learn during their trainings what force is accepted in a particular situation and when it is accepted. They also learn the codes of ethics of such an important profession as policing.
      The Constitution was established in 1789 that presented the governmental structure in three branches: the legislative, the judicial and the executive. Later in 1791, the Bill of rights was adopted, which includes the first ten amendments (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). The Bill of Rights guarantees the protection for American citizens
against abuses by the nation’s government. Particularly, the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Amendments put certain limits on police behavior not to violate individual rights of citizens (Palmiotto, 1997).
              The Fourth Amendment puts particular restrictions on police activity in such areas like searches, arrests, seizures, and hot pursuits (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). It specifies that any search or an arrest must be supported by a warrant, which provides an officer a legal protection. Detached and neutral magistrates usually issue warrants where a probable cause should be articulated (Palmiotto, 1997). However, there are some circumstances, that US Supreme Court has established where the places and persons can be searched and seized without an issued warrant. These will include searches based on exigent circumstances, searches incident to an arrest, plain-view, automobile and consent searches (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). The Supreme Court in the case of Weeks v. United States stated the exclusionary rule that excludes from trial any illegally obtained evidences. In the case of Terry v. Ohio, the Supreme Court ruled that an individual could be detained for questioning without probable cause, but under a reasonable suspicion (Palmiotto, 1997).
        The Fifth Amendment protects accused against self-incrimination. The Sixth Amendment provides citizens with a right to an attorney during police interrogations, arraignments and trial. The Miranda v. Arizona case put some changes on police activity. Miranda warnings are required to be read before an interrogation in order to remind the accused to their right to an attorney (Gaines, 1997).  
      Quite often the police officers are found liable for violation of individual, constitutional and civil rights that bring them to lawsuit, makes the nation’s government pay tons of money and in worse situations might result with incarceration of officers, like it was observed in one of the most famous case of Rodney King, who filed the civil rights suit against the police. King won the suit and was awarded over $3 million in damages
by the city of Los Angeles and of course the police officers who participated in the beating were found liable for the assault (Gaines, 1997).
      Since the 1970s, the United States Supreme has applied Title 42 US Code Section 1983 to check police misconduct (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). Section 1983 deals with procedural remedies. Palmiotto (1997) specifies in his book that “section 1983 allows for a suit in equity, or other proper proceedings for redress, for individuals deprived of their Constitutional rights, privileges, and immunities by an official’s abuse of position.” Title 42 of the United States Code, Section 1983 states:
       Every person who under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory, or the district of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States, or other persons within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or   other proper proceeding for redress (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010).
             The Section 1983 legislation has two elements that must be established for a person to sue a government official for any civil rights violation. A person seeking redress for civil rights violation must show that the officials were acting under color of state law, and the occurred violation was of constitutional or federally protected rights (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). If these two elements are not presented, then a plaintiff cannot redress through the Section 1983. Later then, the civil suit still may be brought at the state level under a tort liability (Gaines, 1997).
             State torts usually take place in cases when injures are not serious enough to claim through Section 1983. There are two kinds of state torts liability: intentional and negligence torts that serve a good opportunity for plaintiffs to redress for police misconducts that resulted with some minor injuries (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). Of course, in torts as well as in Section 1983 governmental officials and particularly police officers enjoy some defenses that may justify the officials from legal misconducts or illegal actions. Sovereign and qualified immunities are defenses to Section 1983. Contributory negligence, comparative negligence and assumption of risk are defenses to state tort liability (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010).
      There are also two ways to promote police accountability: external and internal (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). External accountability includes citizen oversight, citizen complaint procedures, agency accreditation, the exclusionary rule, and criminal prosecution. Under citizen oversight, nonsworn personnel oversee and investigate complaints against police work. The next is a citizen’s complaint that includes
documents filed against officers’ misconducts. As statistics show, filed complaints are very seldom resolved in the favor of a person who filed the document (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). Police agencies must be accredited which is very important for them to meet all the professional requirements.The exclusionary rule requires that any intimidating information and evidences should be gathered according to the US Constitution; otherwise, they will not be admitted in trial. Criminal prosecution makes police officers criminally liable for any proven offense.
      Internal affairs are a division that is responsible for investigation of any misconduct inside a department (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). During an investigation, a police officer who is accused of misconduct enjoys a police officers’ bill of rights and other protections. A code of ethics combines standards and principles that an officer should follow.
      Police officers have enforcement discretion that specifies how they enforce the law, maintain order and provide law enforcement service. Every suspect’s fate is in the hands of the police officer who apprehends him or her before going through the criminal justice system. It is up to the officer to decide whether to enforce a specific law, to file the criminal case to the prosecuting attorney for formal charges or not. It should also be mentioned that if discretion is used properly it is a positive aspect of the criminal justice system. In cases when it discretion used improperly, it may turn to be discrimination or illegal and immoral actions. Discretion can be also controlled externally through the courts or citizen reviews. Internally, it can be controlled through the department’s supervision, policies, and trainings (Palmiotto, 1997).
      Deviant behavior occurs when a police officer or any other member of a police profession violates professional law enforcement rules or norms. Deviance can be committed either on duty or off. There are two theories of police deviance: Environmental factors and the Rotten Apple Theory (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). The Rotten Apple Theory says that the deviance is the result of failing to undercover individuals whose interests of corruption were not identified during hiring process. Environmental factors stand for the outside factors that can put some impacts on an officer’s deviant decision-making.
      Young police officers are required to go through different stages of the hiring process, including documentations, tests, interviews, trainings, where the deviance is expected to be discovered and controlled.  Each police department sets their own codes of ethics and standards that specify the rules the officers must follow.
      As it was mentioned above, there are sets of laws professional codes of ethics and departments’ policies that serve as a guide to officers to make a decision, but we should keep in mind, that every situation and circumstance is exclusive and sometimes requires a split-second decision either to use deadly force or not. The use of force might be essential in the job of a law enforcement officer. However, officers are taught that any use of force must be appropriate and used as a last resort. There are two types of force police officers use on apprehending a suspect: deadly and non-deadly (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). Deadly force is defined as a force which leaves death or serious injuries to a target individual. Non-deadly force is a force that does not usually result in serious physical injuries or death. Non-deadly force includes less-lethal weapons (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). These would include Tasers, rubber bullets, stun guns, pepper spray and others. We cannot exclude the fact that people affected by less-lethal weapons and even physical force can die or experience some lasting injuries. As a response to some fatal mistakes that took place prior in the history of American law enforcement officials, the US Supreme Court held in the 1989 case of Graham v. Connor that the excessive non-deadly force has to be overseen under the Fourth Amendment’s “reasonableness” standards (Palmiotto, 1997). The point is that if the force does take place, then it must not go over the boundaries, where the force turns to be unnecessarily excessive.
      Police have a variety of duties they have to perform, such as protecting citizens, apprehending offenders, making searches and seizures and other difficult tasks for which they carry responsibility. What makes the profession more complicated is that the police officers often become the targets for lawsuits. Those happen as a result of inappropriate police force and its excessiveness, abuse of authority, bad arrests and others. In order not to violate the civil rights and the constitution, police officers along with their supervisors, police administration, and chiefs must be responsible for their actions, behavior, procedures and policies. We should remember that being a police officer means to keep up with professional ethical codes and moral principles that include only professionalism and dignity in any police action.

References

Gaines, L.K. (1997). Policing in America. Cincinnati, Ohio: Anderson Publishing co.
Palmiotto, J.M. (1997). Policing. Concepts, Strategies, in American Police Forces.
          Durham, North Carolina: Carolina Academic Press.
Schmalleger, F. & Worrall, J.L. (2010). Policing today. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey:
          Prentice Hall.                                              

Career Concerns in Police Work and the Process of Becoming a Police Officer

 Abstract

The essay will include information on what it takes to become a police officer. Specifically, what tests and exams an applicant needs to take in order to be accepted to a police academy and field training. The essay will also review the problems that might be connected with law enforcement occupation. It will give an explanation as to why and how the police subculture differs from others. This essay will show reasons the community-oriented policing took place, and how important the citizen involvement is to effective policing.
Career Concerns of Police Work and Process of Becoming a Police Officer

Career Concerns in Police Work

and the Process of Becoming a Police Officer

         Police gets tons of attention through negative and positive aspects, but regardless to all difficulties, it still attracts people to work in Law Enforcement.
       Once an applicant submits necessary documents, from which college degree is unofficial requirement (Schafer, 2001), he or she will need to pass a written test, oral interview, personal background, polygraph exam and medical history, results of which will be considered in hiring decision (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010).
      After a candidate successfully passes all the stages of the hiring process and is offered employment, he or she will be sent to an academy for training. There are three types of academies distinguished: in-house, regional and state that provide training for future officers (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010), where during several weeks experienced officers teach students how to fight, shoot, drive in a police car on a high speed and survive in tough circumstances. In an academy recruits learn all the necessary techniques and maneuvers that they will need to employ in their daily police work. Field training follows the academy graduation. During the field training, a student is assigned to an experienced field training officer (FTO) (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). On the field training, the new officer adjusts to agency regulations and procedures. He or she also learns problematical tasks that officers carry out regularly. At the culmination of the field training, the training officer will take a passive role in observing the new officer’sactions. Of course, before taking the important decision such as becoming a police officer he or she should also consider that there are many negative factors that come along with such a significant step. Those factors may include distress, when, as an example, a
suspect puts an officer on target, at the moment where the question between death and survival stands out before an officer, or eustress, such as satisfaction, when a policeman is finally able to take over of such situation, arrest the suspect and make sure that he goes directly behind the bars. It should also be mentioned that police work does not include just critical incidents with criminals, but the criminal justice system might be very demanding and boring as well. Furthermore, a career in this field could be even more stressful with all the public attention that is always around to catch the most negative sides of police work and place it on media sources, where, of course, the reaction of the public can be easily predicted. Not all of the media members for sure, are that evil like it seems most of the time. Periodically they can be very supportive, especially those who has had experienced the police work by being employed in law enforcement in the past. Organizational and administrative structure as well should be included in the list of negative issues that mostly affect lower ranks of police officials. As Joseph Schafer (2001) noticed that, “the traditional structure may lead to the emergence of a number of counterproductive psychological responses among employees. Suspicion is engendered between the ranks. Communication slows to a trickle” (Schafer, 2001).
         Police work is a hard job that includes also shifts when she or he will be required to work weekends, holidays and nights. Residency requirement can also take place, when officers should live in an area they serve. Female police applicants must be aware of sexual harassments that might happen in police agencies.
        A recruit should also know that police present a particular subculture that fundamentally vary from any others. Police carry its particular standards, customs and principles, that shape the unique police subculture. One of the factors that forms police subculture is its organization. Police work is usually divided into three shifts during which several squads of officers work together who at the beginning and the end of their work shifts discuss problems and accidents and share the unique police humor. Police organization follows the quasi-military model of structure where the chain of commands takes place and clarifies who answers to whom. Interaction with other criminal justice agencies and media also shape the policing. Once an officer is issued a gun and gets appointed over a patrolling area a sense of territoriality develops, when he or she feels that a particular piece of land he patrols “belongs” to him by knowing each street, alley, and a house in a corner and recognizing the residents by names. For sure, there is no doubt that the police work is dangerous and unpredictable, when an officer at the beginning of a shift has no idea how the end of it will look. Will it be a hilarious story to tell to fellow-officers by a cup of coffee or will it be the accident with serious injuries or even a death of an officer? All these facts make the police subculture exclusive, make police officers stick together and relate with one another, which is also known as solidarity (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010). The police officers traditionally and historically carry the masculine values, what is sometimes challenging for female officers to go through the “barrier” leaving behind the labels of girlish sentimentality and feminine weakness.
               As it was mentioned above, police agencies do not formally require a college degree, but “college education equips officers with a set of skills and attitudes that make them better able to function in an organization which has adopted a community policing philosophy”(Schafer, 2001). How officers respond to community policing also depends on education.
               Problems in police-community relationship appeared with the development of transportation, radios and telephones during the reform era of policing (Oliver, 2004). At the end of 1970s, however, on the stage of community era, police made a significant step toward the community policing to break somehow the common imagination of a police officer, who sits in a closed car, drives around a community and reacts to disorder or a crime that already occurred (Schafer, 2001). They concluded that the community cooperation might be a very productive maneuver. Communicating with residents, organizing front store meetings, also could be helpful in preventing crime, while the community members or its third parties are willing to inform local departments of planning or ongoing offences, so the police could promptly react on such statements. The community-oriented policing is categorized in three components. They are strategic, neighborhood and problem-oriented policing (Oliver, 2004). The community policing programs are broken down into three groups; they are mobilizing citizens, informing citizens and engaging citizens (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010).
      Community Involved policing should also be distinguished from the community policing. In the community involved policing process, the citizens potentially take part in the actual police process. Street patrolling may serve as an example, where non-sworn police volunteers are given radios and clothing to patrol the streets of their neighborhoods. Civilization occurred to be another step to progressing community involved policing that includes hiring non-sworn workers in order to save a department’s budget (Schmalleger & Worrall, 2010).
        The process of becoming a police officer does not require any particular preparation or college education, but, of course, is prefered. The police assessment test, medical test, oral interview, background check, medical history, polygraph exam and further academy and field trainings help the police administration to select the most preferable personnel, who with dignity will represent a police department. Every recruit should know what would expect him or her on his path as an officer, all the negative and positive sides of this job. Recruits should also understand the police subculture and the way it differs from civil cultures. It will be important for him or her to realize that the police work includes community serving as well, through which the civilians become familiar with hard and dangerous police work, and police desire to prevent and fight crime in the communities they serve, and have the relationship that leads to trust, collaboration with residents and crimeless neighborhoods.



References
Oliver, W.M. (2004). Community-Oriented Policing. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Schafer, J.A. (2001). Community Policing. LFB Scholarly Publishing LLC, New York: LFB Scholarly.
Schmalleger, F., & Worrall, J.L. (2010). Policing Today. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

The “Princess‘” Story

          My grandmother’s name is Vera, which from Russian language means, “to believe”. She is almost 90 years old. She does not really like to tell the stories of her life or where she is from, or who her parents are. All those secrets that grandma kept in silence made us, younger generation, imagine some fairy stories, like as my elder brother once said about her: “Our granny is an escaped Romanov‘s youngest princess, who doesn’t want to undercover her emperor’s roots.” Of course, we laughed, but the nickname stuck for our grandmother. I was much luckier than my siblings or cousins.  Being the only granddaughter and the youngest one, I had many privileges, including countless hugs, kisses and candies. I could talk my old wise ‘princess’ into conversations to which my cousins did not have any access. Once I told her, when I was eight: “Grandma, we love you very much, but we have the right to know our past. Your past is ours. It does not matter how sad it was. We have the right! ” She smiled and she finally spoke up. That brought the sadness and sorrow into the air from the moment she closed her eyes as to bring herself back into almost a hundred year old story.
      Vera was born the youngest in the family alone with one more sister Katya, who was nine years older than her and three middle brothers. The kids were born in Kazakhstan. Her family lived in an old wood house somewhere in the middle of the Kazakh desert, close to the cleanest, clearest and as they will later discover, dangerous river, named Amudarya. The neighbors’ houses were located too far from each other. It was a happy fulfilled family, where the parents loved each other endlessly and where the kids respected and obeyed the parents and their efforts to give them everything they needed.
     Vera was thirteen when World War 2 started, and it did not started with the fascism bombing over the USSR or radio announcement. No! It was a neighbor who signaled the misery, murder and crime in the country, preparing the family to pay a high price.
     Vera’s father was a friendly and fair person, who never refused to help anybody who deserved it. It was May of 1941, a month before the war. Vera’s father invited a male neighbor to hunt with him on horseback, who pleasurably agreed, already feeding an evil thought in his head. That morning Matrena, Vera’s mother, was cheerily humming something while preparing lunch for her husband, whom she would never see alive again. The neighbor never came to Vera’s family to explain why their father disappeared. After two days his body was found shot somewhere next to his dead horse. Nobody went after the murderer, nobody. The woman was left with five kids alone without any help around. The death afflicted the family, when a couple weeks later Vera’s youngest brother went to fish in the Amudarya River with his old horse. The horse came back that evening, leaving the slim young body drowned in its deep blue water.
      The two losses made the family forget for a long while how to laugh or even smile. Vera’s mother turned to be gray-headed, and she spoke rarely. Matrena made a meal with her head down, putting food in plates along with sadness and desperation.
      In several months after the World War against Germany began, two Vera’s last two brothers left for battle. Vera was alone with her mother and sister. Nobody said a joke  or a silly thing that would make the family smile. They forgot how eyes could narrow from a deep laugh.
      The hardest time came when there was not wheat or meat left. The harvest that year was terrible. It seemed like nature was protesting since the war began refusing to give anything to people.
      It was March of 1942, when Vera with her sister and mother received a letter, informing that the older son was killed. After Matrena had read the letter, she placed it on the table. She sat for one more minute in silence, then stood up and walked to her bedroom. Where behind the door Vera could hear nothing that would usually remind a cry or sob.
      In April, the same year the women got finally good news with the letter where the middle son points out a day and time, when his command in a military train would stop at the station, which his mother and sisters could reach easily by walk. They would be able to see each other for about 10 minutes again. The delight of the coming date made Vera dance on the bare wood floor and she could not stop herself. Her mother and sister looked at her silly movements and smiled followed by Matrena’s tears. Vera stopped right there, ran to her already old and tired mother, sat on her lap and hugged her so tight, that nobody could tear them apart at that moment. Her sister stood up, took a glass bowl that a year ago would contain a main dish of a table, around which Vera’s whole family would gather, and Katya put the letter gently with her bony fingers inside. She came to her mother with Vera and hugged them protectively.
      That day finally came. The hungry skinny ladies put on their nicest dresses and went to the train station, where they were supposed to meet at three pm  the only male left in the family; a son and a brother at the same face.
      It seemed very strange for them: it was already four pm, and the station was empty. Vera tried to keep her mind busy with anything else except bad thoughts about the train. She looked at her mother, who was sitting on her right. The hiding sun behind the sandy hills lit her mother so well, that now she could see, how unbelievably old Matrena looked, even though she was only approaching her fifties. Three of them were sitting quiet. Vera then noticed an old man crossing the long train station. Her mother stood up without an effort to straighten her back, walked up to him and asked him something so quietly, like being scared to hear the answer she was asking for. The old man grabbed Matrena’s left shoulder and said the words that we already knew, but refused to believe: “The train passed earlier yesterday, my dear, take your girls and go home, there is nothing for you to wait for!”
      The train station for Vera gave an impression of an Island, within the dust ocean, where the trails looked like two endless canals from the past to the future, from life to death, from happiness to misery, and from laugh to cry. She looked at the man’s back, how he was walking away from the train trails.
      Her mother stood at the same spot for a minute. She did not even glance at Katya and Vera, when Matrena turned her dry body and faced the end of the “canals”, which ends, from Vera’s imagination, would face something the most miserable on this Earth. She stood at the same frozen position for a minute more, than moved from that spot, like an old weak swan, that tries to fly away from the ground. She did two steps parallel to the trails, than tried to run, but she could not. Her feet refused to obey her; she fell down, moaning, like a wounded wolf over its dead pub. Matrena then stood up again and ran, and ran. Katya was running after her. When she caught her, they fell down on the sand this time together. Katya raised her mother and the women now walked home.
      Vera’s mother never recovered after what had happened. In a week she died, leaving the girls behind. In a month after Matrena’s death, Vera and Katya received another letter, where it says how the last brother died.
      The girls survived. They moved to Uzbekistan, where fifty years later I was born.
      At the end of the story, my “princess” told me: “My dear, you will see how short the life is; how fast the train of your destiny will take you from one end to another. Do not look at that last end, do not eager to face it, but be aware of it and not scared. Be careful whom you travel in that train with, whom you choose as a company for the whole destination. Never forget and leave those who love you behind, because one day they may choose a different train that will not bring them back to you. Color you train in the colors of happiness and humanity, that will attract kind people into your world. Moreover, when you come to the end do not be afraid, but smile, because, who knows, and another train may come to pick up your happy butt again.”