Capstone Paper (All)

Capstone Topic I am interested in studying policing. I chose this topic because of my interest to work in the field as a patrol officer after graduation. I also believe that police are the faces of the criminal justice system from the outside looking in. I will be focusing on the techniques and trainings that police go through and how they are portrayed when placed in the actual field. I will also address how police officers working in the field are affected by how they are and will be viewed in courts, as liars, in corrections as abusive, and when trying to develop laws that are favorable to one societies view. Problem Statement/ Introduction Lately there has been a high amount of police brutality videos in the media, and a push for police to be better trained in their field. The police are the first contact that citizens face in the criminal justice system, therefore they should be held to a high standard. Certain techniques and practices should be implemented so that cops will be able to adapt to situations in a justifiable and scholarly way. There is a rise in political activist groups such as black lives matter, and blue lives matter. These groups highlight and change perspective views of each other when placed in courts, corrections, and when developing laws, which is why this topic is important to the criminal justice system. Recent news media has increased its coverage of racial discrimination between citizens and police officers. What these show is the dangerous rise of violence with citizens and the criminal justice system as a whole. The entire criminal justice field is affected by this coverage because citizens only see the police and negative aggressive force to enforce law. The courts base their cases on what the police report says and valid evidence such as recorded video, when there isn’t video judges are faced to side with the officer that has taken the oath to correctly enforce the law, which may not be in favor of public opinion. When the government create laws or develop rulings they have to use their most reliable resource which is the people who are enforcing the laws, and come in contact with various criminals on the daily. This shows that there is a need for police to make their strategies and techniques more socially acceptable. This will allow society to see the criminal justice system as helpful and not harmful. Some law enforcement institutions have implemented new training techniques and programs that officers have to go through in order to work in the field. These programs include humanitarian interventions and head officer evaluations. Other institutions require officers to obtain a degree in order to work in a certain areas, and in the field. This requirement creates smarter officers in a sense of knowledgeable of the aftermath of getting into certain situations. As discussed in class this also helps them to learn to work with other people with different backgrounds and skin tones, which puts a limit on discrimination between officers and offenders. In order to improve the criminal justice there should be a push for more institutions to have these requirements and programs for their officers. The recent rise of groups such as black lives matter and blue lives matter, and all lives matter show that there is a divide in society. This divide highlights the different views and attitudes of everyone towards the role of the criminal justice system. Each group feels that the other side is unjust when it comes to court proceedings and one side wins over the other. They also feel that laws are created in favor of the other group, and that they are not held accountable for violent actions when it comes down to corrections. All these viewpoints show that there is a need for policing to improve in order for the criminal justice system to be acceptable in society. Literature Review There are many researchers that have studied the topic of policing in society. There are people who agree that education is necessary for officers and that it should be required. Some researchers focus on discrimination that leads to deaths, mainly in the black communities. Accountability is also a factor in determining if police are fulfilling their obligations that society has established them for. What they all have in common is that they show need for improvement in policing, and how change will be better for the entire criminal justice system. The media play a vital role in how society views police officers, and the techniques they use in the field. Meg Stalcup and Charles Hahn discuss the use of body cameras by officers and how they are used in positive and negative situations. They examine and highlight how officers wearing the cameras are held accountable for their actions, which may spark greater treatment towards individuals. They also mention that it may provide protection for on the job or in the field injuries (Stalcup, Hahn, 2016). In my research I will focus on bettering the perception of police, and how these video cameras can also show the good side of police officers, since the media mainly cover the negative. Michael S. Scott discusses a case study conducted in Wisconsin on the importance of education in the area of policing and police research. In the article he discusses that the academic society has downgraded the roles of police. He also mentions that even police officers in the field notice that their job is more complex than what they and other people make it out to be. He goes on forward to say that officers are placed in numerous amounts of situations, and just as physicians need to know how to treat thousands of different diseases so should police officers know how to address the hundreds of crimes and disorder problems. This article highlights the educational attribute conducted in my research (Scott, 2010). Some people are looking at all the aspects of policing as they are now, and are projecting how they will be in the future. John P. Cranks article addresses views of scholars and how they see policing changing in the United States. They suggest that although information is getting passed from generation to the next some information is being missed out on because of some generations not being computer savvy and not transferring there insight. The author says that today there are numerous approaches police officers take in order to solve crime, and that we will see a greater push towards intelligence based policing in which we embrace counter- terrorism. This article highlights the growth and the changing of policing techniques and practices. (Crank, Kadleck, & Koski, 2010). Keon L. Gilbert and Rashawn Ray’s article discusses how there has been a rise in “justifiable homicides” when police use excessive force on black males. In order to reduce these mortality rates, the article suggest that the process of Public Health Critical Race Praxis (PHCRP) be implemented. This process focuses on patterns of racial relations, knowledge production, conceptualization, and action. The outcome of this process will result in understanding policing behavior, and is useful in raising the voices of marginalized groups. This article adds to the race attribute, within my research (Gilbert, Ray, & Gilbert, 2016). Jocelyn Cheung discusses the changes of the definition of accountability for the police. She says in the 1940’s that police had a responsibility to answer the call, and that there was an argument to whether they needed to rely on public interest or just fulfill their moral responsibility. The article goes on to discuss the role police in the 1960’s were shifted from a moral responsibility to a subjective responsibility, in which officers need to examine situations professionally. From the 1990’s to present the article states that there is a push for redefining accountability for officers as we move toward a society who are more complex than we were in the 1960’s. This article shows how my research addresses the need for changes in the policing agencies (Cheung, 2005). Shaun Ossei-Owusu describes the divide that criminal justice reforms have taken in the forms of the Black Lives Matter group versus the Blue Lives Matter group. The article addresses the reasons why these groups have formed and created this divide. The article mentions how minorities are profiled, and how officers are forced to meet a quota, and punished when they do not (Ossei-Owusu, 2016). This article highlights my papers topic in its entirety, it shows how police are viewed as aggressors and there is a need for a reform in techniques and procedures so that the criminal justice system won’t fail. When police commit these crimes there seems to be little punishment for their actions, which is why groups like “Black Lives Matter” develop. Joanna C. Schwartz addresses the question of who pays for these lawsuits that the government faces when these incidents happen. She mentions how that when departments get these settlements and judgments the law enforcement agencies pay some or all of the fees. She also says when they go over budget they almost always get the money from other government agencies. What this takes away from is other government agencies, in all areas of the criminal justice field. This shows the impact policing have on the different parts of the criminal justice field (Schwartz, 2016). In conclusion, these articles show why there is a need for a change to policing, and highlight how policing is a vital part in how the criminal justice system is seen from the outside in terms of courts, law, and corrections. They also give solutions to these new developing issues and how policing will eventually have to adapt to a more technological form of policing. Educating these officers at a higher level will help the criminal justice system as a whole, and the relationship between police and their communities. Body Policing is a very tough field to go into because you never know what to expect. Societies over time have established multiple forms of policing techniques to keep themselves and their communities safe. There are also many theories to what methods will work in the field, and what methods are ineffective. The communities show and tell us their viewpoints of the police which show us the effectiveness of the system. The goal of these innovations is to increase the positive perception of police in courts, law, and corrections. There are so many situations that police officers have to deal with, that there is no specific training that can prepare them for each problem. When in training officers are put in scenarios where they will have to address victims as if it were a real situation, so they know what to do in the situation. These situations allow them to think on the spot, and make split second decisions. All officers have to remember that they have a family to go home to, so after all these trainings covering different scenarios, the officers must remember officer safety. Although they have all these trainings to go through, there are some situations that they just can’t imagine would happen. The methods and tactics as to how the officers address each situation is changed and evaluated as the generations change. (Cheung, 2005) One reform that the police created was community oriented policing. This style of policing requires the police to be more involved with the community they work in. This allows the community to feel more comfortable with the police and the police more knowledgeable about the issues within that society. This program makes it to where when people know that there is an issue they can call on the police without the police bringing more chaos. What this system relies on is communication between the officers and the people in society, no matter the differences they may have with that community of people. Recent events have caused distrust from the communities and the police to rise, societies have begun to question rather the police are truly there to help them, or just using their badges to control them. People also believe that the police, courts, and corrections are working together against them, making the communities rely on self-policing and causing this reform more difficult to be applied (Ossei-Owusu, 2016). The system of community oriented policing is reliable to work with, however police have to reestablish their trust from the community. Another way police take on crime is intelligence led-policing; this method addresses the problem pro-actively rather than reactive. In these situations police look for information and analyze to find out when, where, and how crimes will occur. This method is very statistical, because they act upon leads, and rely on their own understanding of crime. The goal of this system is to solve multiple crimes rather than just one. What the police have to get from these cases is proof, and probable cause as to why they are taking action on the situation. In order to get this proof the police have developed a form of forensic science that will allow them to link case to case. The goal of this program is to go beyond the facts, develop a hypothesis and increase their knowledge on the situation. The problem with this form of policing is that police begin to discriminate against certain profiles, and labeling people as criminals (Ossei-Owusu, 2016) Society sees this practice as the people in power taking control and enforcing their own rules on the minority. This method shows characteristics of the labeling theory, in which people are placed in the box the higher authorities have characterized them in. The problem with this theory is that it doesn’t explain why commit crime, but places a tag on them that societies hold them accountable for. There are many theories and practices used when determining how the police take action on situations, and how they should interact with citizens. Some of these practices are proactive which causes profiles to be created, which leads to discrimination, and labels placed on certain social groups. Those practices also lead to false convictions, and innocent people serving time, and death sentences just on false information. Other methods are reactive which may lead to over excessive force and conflict between the police and the community. These methods also are enforced under police discretion, in which police give their own judgment to whether a person is defying the law enough for punishment (Crank, Kadleck, & Koski, 2010). All these methods provide some type of conflict, and shows there are no direct approaches to preventing crime, but what they suggest is that the police are trained on critical thinking when addressing suspects and victims. When police change policies to reduce crime rates, they sometimes cause crime rates to rise. Some suggest that they take hidden actions to enforce the law. An example of this would be using bate cars in a known carjacking area, however if your placing the cars in that area for people to steal, then you’re encouraging the crime to continue, when all you have to do is patrol that area to where people will be less persuaded to steal those cars. It’s like if your house has roaches and ants because you’re always dropping crumbs on the floor and never picking them up, so to get rid of the ants and roaches you set out a special crumb full of poison to kill the insects, when all you have to do is clean up the first time. What this shows is that there is a better way for police to go about doing things, even if one method shows to work (Stalcup, Hahn, 2016). One of the solutions to the problem of policing in our communities is making officers go to college. Officers that don’t go to college have the basic knowledge of a high school student, and learn under experience in the field. Officers that go to college learn how to critically think and apply those skills and knowledge in the field rather than just using excessive force and guns to solve every situation. They are also introduced to diversity, and learn how to work with others that don’t have the same physical characteristics that they see daily, and aren’t from the area that they were born, raised, and never been away from. (Scott, 2010) Another solution would be joining community oriented policing with intelligence based policing. With this you’ll have the community backing you up and seeing that you’re there to help them, and you’ll have leads and proof that suspects actually committed crimes. Police will also have the community backing them up when media falsely portray them as violent individuals when they already have seen them as outstanding members of the community. Through these practices police aren’t seen as strangers that are invading people’s personal lives. Along with these solutions I see the police using more technology, in order to pass down techniques from generation to generation in order to prevent crimes from occurring. What the police have to realize is that they are at the forefront of the criminal justice system, and when they are approaching people they may have already labeled them as a threat, so they have to take caution to show that those labels aren’t meant for all police. If these officers reinforce this label that persons going to feel as if the whole criminal justice system is out to get them, from that point on. Minorities are forced to believe that the entire criminal justice program is against them from the laws created, to the courts that provide sentences, and in the correction facilities that take away their people for profits. Untrained police that don’t know how to critically think in tough situations are place on film harshly abusing victims, and sometimes killing them. When placed in court these officers are let off, or given a fine that their agencies end up paying for with money the government provides, causing the courts to look like an unjust system. When the victims are placed in correction facilities, people protest and cause uproar that promote the courts being unjust towards the victims and bias for their fellow Intra professional partners (Gilbert, Ray, & Gilbert, 2016). Some police practices also only affect one group within the community which causes tension, and suggest that the laws are meant only so that they group will be affected and punished. Therefore in order to improve how the public sees the entire criminal justice system the police have to implement practices that promote anomie (Cheung, 2005). With this the media won’t have negative stories to cover, crime rates will decrease, prisons will be less crowded, and racial tensions will be less of a problem when it comes between police and society. Conclusion In order to improve policing we have to review the policies in the past and in the present that are working, not working, and that need improvements. There are many theories and practices that have been suggested and implemented in order to solve the issues within these policies, however unless we require and force the police to learn these techniques they will continue to be led by basic knowledge. As my research suggest policing is as tough of a practice as being a physician, because of the different cases and phenomena’s an officer may encounter on a day by day basis. In order for officers to be held at an accurate accountability I suggest that they be required to finish some form of college, to be able to critically think in various situations, and learn how to work with people of a different background. I also believe that they should be held more liable for incidences that involve unlawful and unjustifiable force, and actions. Things such as paying court fees, and serving time in correctional facilities should be held at the officer’s expense, and not the department which receives government aid. This will persuade officers to do the right thing, since they won’t be bailed out so easily. Not only do police have a role in bettering their relations, but the communities also have to officially establish a role for the police, in which the officer’s jobs are clearly outlined as to what they are expected to do outside of enforcing the law, such as being mentors and leaders for the younger generation, and for people on the street. There is a lot of stress placed on people in this field, so I would also recommend counseling when officers are placed in overwhelming situations, which may cause anxiety in their future encounter within the community. The goal is to remove the tension between the community and the criminal justice institution, this starts with the encounters and perceptions each side portrays to the other. The media plays a vital role in how the police are seen within our communities, and how the communities are seen by the police. If the news show’s black minorities doing violent things in the community, the police’s fear is heightened and there discretion is more negative towards that group. Also if the police are seen on the news doing violent crimes then the communities don’t trust the police, and behave accordingly. Therefor in order to stop negative discretion, the minorities have to stop giving off violent attitudes, and the police have to stop giving the media something to negatively feed society. Since the media holds the key, the police have to be seen doing positive things, showing efforts to improve practices, and bonding with their communities, then the entire criminal justice system will begin to gain trust within society, and society will faithfully rely on the criminal justice system.