Police Behavior Problems and Solutions

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Police Behavior Problems and Solutions
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How do we evaluate police behavior?

• Police are in a unique position in democratic
  societies. They are given a great deal of power
  and can engage in actions disruptive of personal
  freedom
• Power to detain
• Power to search
• Power to arrest
• Power to use force, including deadly force
• Yet we need police to maintain order and security
  so a free society is possible.
• But do both police and citizens understand their
  duties? Who establishes limits on police use of
  authority and who enforces those limits? WHO, IN
  OTHER WORDS, POLICES THE POLICE?

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• Before we decide how to control police behavior,
  we have to decide what we expect from them.
• Defining the proper role for police is for
  citizens and their elected officials not for the
  police themselves.
• (Recall our early discussion of legal culture.)

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Evaluating Police

• General Standards (E3R)
• Equal treatment
• Equitable treatment
• Efficiency (assuming Effectiveness)
• Responsiveness
• Specific Standards (What do we expect from police
  in their encounters with)
• Citizens
• Victims
• Witnesses
• Suspects

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Law Enforcement Code of Ethics

• As a Law Enforcement Officer, my fundamental duty
  is to serve mankind to safeguard lives and
  property to protect the innocent against
  deception, the weak against oppression or
  intimidation, and the peaceful against violence
  or disorder and to respect the Constitutional
  rights of all persons to liberty, equality and
  justice.
• I will keep my private life unsullied as an
  example to all maintain courageous calm in the
  face of danger, scorn or ridicule develop
  self-restraint and be constantly mindful of the
  welfare of others. Honest in thought and deed in
  both my personal and official life, I will be
  exemplary in obeying the laws of the land and the
  regulations of my department. Whatever I see or
  hear of a confidential nature or that is confided
  to me in my official capacity will be kept ever
  secret unless revelation is necessary in the
  performance of my duty.

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•  I will never act officiously or permit personal
  feelings, prejudices, animosities or friendships
  to influence my decisions. With no compromise for
  crime and with relentless prosecution of
  criminal, I will enforce the law courteously and
  appropriately without fear or favor, malice or
  ill will, never employing unnecessary force or
  violence and never accepting gratuities.
• I recognize the badge of my office as a symbol of
  public faith, and I accept it as a public trust
  to be held so long as I am true to the ethics of
  the police service. I will constantly strive to
  achieve these objectives and ideals, dedicating
  myself before God to my chosen profession...law
  enforcement.

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"Yes Me, the Lousy Cop" 

• From birth you teach your children that I am the
  bogeyman, and then you're shocked when they
  identify me with my traditional enemy, the
  criminal. You accuse me of coddling juveniles,
  until I catch your kid doing something. You may
  take an hour for lunch, and have several coffee
  breaks each day, but point me out as a loafer if
  you see me having just one cup.
• You pride yourself on your polished manners, but
  think nothing of interrupting my meals at noon
  with your troubles. You raise hell about the guy
  who cuts you off in traffic, but let me catch you
  doing the same thing and I'm picking on you. You
  know all the traffic laws, but never got a single
  ticket you deserved. You shout "foul" if you
  observe me driving fast en route to an emergency
  call, but literally raise hell if I take more
  than ten seconds responding to your call!!!

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• You call it "part of the job" if someone strikes
  me, but it's "police brutality" if I strike back.
  You wouldn't think of telling your dentist how to
  pull a badly decayed tooth, or your doctor how to
  take out your appendix, but you are always
  willing to give me a few pointers on law
  enforcement. You talk to me in a manner and use
  language that would assure a bloody nose from
  anyone else, but you expect me to stand and take
  it without batting an eye.
• You cry, "Something has to be done about all the
  crime!" but you can't be bothered with getting
  involved.
• You've got no use for me at all, but, of course,
  it's OK if I change a tire for your wife, or
  deliver your baby in the back seat of my patrol
  car on the way to the hospital, or save your
  son's life with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, or
  work many hours over-time to find your lost
  daughter.
• So Mr. Citizen, you stand there on your soapbox
  and rant and rave about the way I do my job,
  calling me every name in the book, but never stop
  a minute to think that your property, your
  family, or maybe your life might depend on one
  thing, ME, THE LOUSY COP"

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How do we control the police?

• Citizens
• By requesting police presence actions
• By Complaint
• By Friendship
• Police Department
• Hiring/Training Standards
• Policies and Procedures
• Supervision and Command Structure
• Peer Group Pressure
• External Controls
• Laws
• Court System Feedback
• Political System Feedback
• Legal Culture

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Written Policy Directives

• (Police Agencies with more than 100 Sworn
  Officers)
• Local Sheriff State
• Police Depts. Police
• Code of Conduct/Appearance 99 95 100
• Use of Deadly Force 99 96 100
• Pursuit Driving 99 90 98
• Strip Searches 81 88 37
• Juveniles 95 86 74
• Domestic Disturbances 93 77 49
• Mentally Ill/Handicapped Persons 86 81 53
• Homeless Persons 30 19 6
• Off-Duty Employment 95 96 100
• Citizen Complaints 95 84 92

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An Example of Dept GuidelinesHot Pursuit
Policies

• Consider the following factors
• Vehicle condition road conditions
• Seriousness of the violation
• At no time will officers pursue the wrong way
  down a freeway or frontage road
• Police shall not discharge their firearms at a
  fleeing vehicle.
• Actions requiring supervisory authorization
• Driving along the side of the fleeing vehicle in
  an attempt to force it from the road.
• Roadblocks

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Role of the Courts Miranda v. Arizona

• Do criminals go free because we mirandize them?
• Many (40-50) confess voluntarily.
• Many others dont understand the Miranda warning
  (a function of lack of education, poverty and
  socialization).
• Some police are more casual and dont see it as
  critical
• Court challenges to the need continue to this
  day.
• The Impact Few confessions are coerced, few
  are overturned, and police clearance and
  prosecutorial conviction rates are little
  changed.

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Corruption

• Virtually every police department in the nation
  has experienced both organized corruption and
  major scandals as a result of that corruption.
• Corruption is not confined to big cities.
• One advantage of our fragmented police industry
  is that it provides citizens with alternatives.

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A Simple Typology of CorruptionGrazers versus
Meat-Eaters

• Grass Eaters
• Accept payoffs that come their way
• Minor favoritism
• The mooch free lunch
• Meat Eaters
• Aggressively misuse authority for personal gain
• Bribery / extortion / shakedowns

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The 1st Major NYPD Scandal

• Hearings held by the Lexon Committee of the NY
  Senate 1894
• Instigated by Rev. Charles Parkhurst who paraded
  gamblers, prostitutes, madames and police
  officers in front of the committee.
• The (bad) publicity lead to the election of a
  reform mayor in NYC and the appointment of a new
  police chief to clean up the department.
• This new chief, Theodore Roosevelt, would use
  this position to go on to be elected Governor of
  NY in 1898 and would become the President of the
  US in 1901 with the assassination of President
  William McKinley. Did he actually fix the NYPD?
  Probably not, given the long history of problems
  that followed.

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New York CityA 20 Year Cycle of Corruption

• 1894 Lexon Commission
• 1911 Curran Commission
• 1932 Seabury Report
• 1951 Harry Gross (Gambling Czar) Investigation
• 1971 Knapp Commission
• 1992 The Mollen Commission
• 1995 Commission to Combat Police Corruption
  (CCPC), a permanent board to monitor and evaluate
  anticorruption efforts

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Frank Serpico

• Perhaps the most famous of the investigations
  into the NYPD was stimulated by the revelations
  of NYPD Officer Frank Serpico.

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• 1966 - Serpico is asked to join a gambling pad.
• He refuses and tells his captain. His captain
  replies Frank, you could end up in the East
  River for such accusations.
• Serpico complained to
• His District Commander
• The 1st Deputy Police Commissioner
• The Mayors Assistant on Police
• The Commissioner of Investigations
• The District Commander finally begins an
  investigation in late 1967.
• With little movement internally, Serpico goes to
  the NY Times in April 1970.

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Frank Serpico

• Politics and Corruption
• In response to the Times stories, NYC Mayor John
  Lindsey appoints a committee to investigate but
  the committee is compromised by the fact its
  members include the Police Commissioner and the
  Manhattan DA who were supposed to be in charge of
  the day-to-day oversight of the department
  corruption .
• A second independent committee is appointed The
  Commission to Investigate Allegations of Police
  Corruption and the Citys Anti-Corruption
  Procedures (Whitman Knapp, Chair)
• The Police Commissioner resigns before the
  investigation begins.
• The Commission documents extensive problems
  ranging from minor payoffs to 80,000.

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Other Cities, Same Problems

• LAPD (Need I say more?)
• Philadelphia 1990 Grand jury investigates
  100,000 arrests from the previous decade involve
  police use of drugs and paraphernalia to pay
  informants, setup suspects, bribe witnesses and
  buy sexual favors.
• Cleveland 1991 30 police officers indicted for
  extortion, obstruction of justice, narcotics and
  gambling.

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Other Cities, Same Problems

• Detroit 1991 The Police Chief is found guilty
  of embezzling 2.6 million from a special fund
  for undercover investigations.
• New Orleans 1994 10 officers indicted for
  selling drugs and guns
• Greenport (NY) 1994 The entire police
  department (9 officers) is disbanded due to
  corruption, ineptitude and widespread drug and
  alcohol use by on-duty officers.
• Jersey City 1995 Officers are charged with
  selling themselves 113 impounded cars at discount
  prices.
• San Francisco 1996 Officers indicted on charges
  of perjury, soliciting perjury wrongful arrests
  and stealing from suspects.

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The Police SubcultureWill They Fink On Their
Fellow Officers?

• Q How often do the other officers in your
  department engage in the following activities?
• Always or Rarely or
• Sometimes Never
• Sleep on Duty? 63 37
• Drink on Duty? 89 11
• Perjury/Lying? 47 53
• Excessive Force? 54 46
• Sex on Duty? 45 55

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Systematic Approaches to Policing the Police

• Internal Affairs
• They dont exist in all departments
• Questionable effectiveness (Contrary to TV image)
• The dont want to investigate their own
• They perceive a lack of support from the police
  command
• There are problems of citizen access to report
  problems

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Internal Affairs

• Houston PD
• Formed in 1977 after the Jose Campos Torres
  incident.
• Captain, 4 Lieutenants, 18 investigating officers
  drawn from the ranks for 1 year tours
• Caseload of 75-100 per officer.
• Report violations to COP

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Internal Affairs - Reported Violations Houston
Police Department, 1978-1984

• 1978 1984 Increase
• Department Rules 129 217 68.2
• Neglect of Duty 217 351 61.8
• Excessive Force 544 545 0.2
• Potentially 388 657 69.3
• Criminal Acts
• Conduct/Behavior 371 707 90.6
• TOTALS 1,865 2,888 54.9

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Investigating Police Shooting IncidentsHouston
Police Department lAD - 1983

• What happened to the Citizen?
• Death lnjurv No Injury
• lAD Ruling
• Justified 88 67 64
• Shooting
• Not Justified 6 10 8
• Shooting
• Accidental 6 23 28
• Shooting

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Problems with the Houston IAD

• Investigations take too long.
• Use of pro-officer neutral witnesses to clear
  accused officers.
• Criminal records checks of those who register
  complaints
• Bad record keeping
• 3 x 5 index cards
• 1,000 accusations lost
• Inability to track bad apples (117 officers, 3
  of the HPD force received 20 of all complaints.
  
• After severe punishment (dismissal) no one speaks
  to future employers

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The Denver Model A Police Monitor

• A response to the Paul Childs shooting
• Independent of the Police Department

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Systematic Approaches to Policing the Police

• Internal Affairs
• Federal (DOJ) Oversight
• Civilian Review Boards
• Police Monitor (Denver)

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Related Issues in Contemporary Policing Racial
Profiling