Criminal Justice
Introduction
In many ways, the work of police officers encompasses situations in which their sound judgment is being challenged. There are circumstances where the officers find themselves in a position where they need to make a decision on specific matters in which a lack of foresight would result to an act of lawfulness or abuse of authority. Police discretion draws the thin blue line in which law enforcement are given the freedom to make a decision in taking actions about certain situations whether to let a traffic violator off with a warning or to issue a violation ticket. The discussion will examine the context of police discretion including the positive implications of its practice and the circumstances in which discretional power is being abused. In addition, police discretion would be also examined in practice within the detective and patrol division. Police discretion may constitute actions that would entail denial of citizen’s rights or proactive deterrence of crime. The legality of police actions as a result of their decisions can be determined by their sound judgment and foresight or lack thereof.
Definition
Police discretion is a considerably vague term that pertains to the capacity of law enforcers to undertake actions based on their judgment of circumstances. It is primarily a decision-making power afforded by law enforcers that enable them to pursue applicable police procedures or let someone off with a warning (Alpert et al., 2006). For instance, when police officers responds to a crime in progress and the circumstances poses potential of life endangerment, it is the discretion of the police to draw firearm or exercise subjugation. Other situations where police discretion is being exercised can be a person being pulled over because of a traffic violation can be either issued with a violation ticket of be left off with a warning.
Positive Implications
One of the positive implications of police discretion can be attributed to limitations in resources where the police department does not have enough space in jail facilities, police force, or community-based correctional programs that will accommodate individuals brought in for processing. Police discretion allows local law enforcers to utilize the available resource more efficiently and focus on more critical situations (Walker and Katz, 2002). Every police encounter is different and requires specific actions to take. This because communities have varying assumptions of behaviors and what constitutes criminality. Police discretion provides a sense of tolerance that fosters a positive police-community relationship. Forgivable offenses that do not constitute imminent danger to the greater public are being tolerated by the police in order for them to create a more approachable image to communities, which in return enables the police to gain trust and greater cooperation from the citizens.
Negative Implications in the Extent of Abuse
Discretion is inherent of power and authority in which an excessive practice would lead to several negative implications. One of the problematic natures of police discretion is that law enforcers can abuse it and use as justification for their lack of foresight and sound judgment. For instance, uncontrolled use of discretion may constitute violation of individual rights and often manifest as police brutality (Engel, 2003). Situations where excessive force was unreasonably applied, the distrust between the police and the public at some point escalates to unnecessary confrontations. For example, a person being pulled over for a minor traffic violation should be questioned only about the said violation. However, if the police decided to forcibly conduct a body and vehicle search without any reason to believe that the person being searched is in fact in violation of the law other than the minor traffic offence demonstrates abuse of authority.
Police Discretion in Practice
Regarding the question of whether police department can exist with discretion being banned, the immediate response would be no. This is because according to Goldstein (1977), the nature of police work and the environment in which law enforcement operates will always make use of discretion. One of the reasons attributed to this assertion is that police officers often work in pairs and sometimes alone when in contact with the public. This entails low visibility of actions that could endanger not only the public, but also the lives of the police officers. For example, a police officer working alone would engage in an arrest of more than one individual. Typically, offenders outnumbering the apprehending law enforcer have a greater chance of resisting because of the number advantage. This could result to the life of the police officer to be in danger if no immediate action has been made. In such situation that police discretion is critical because the situation necessitates no time for input from another decision-maker.
The concept of police discretion is being put into practice not only in the field operations, but also various levels within a police department. For example, the police on a highway patrol can exercise discretions on the matters concerning traffic violations. In police operations involving response to a reported on-going hostage situation, the level of discretion whether to take down the hostage taker by firing a shot or pursue a peaceful negotiation is critical because it is a life and death situation (Klahm IV and Tillyer, 2010). For police officers investigating a murder case, inspection of the crime scene is of critical importance to solving the crime, which involves discretionary measures in identifying, which articles are essential evidence and those that are not. Police officers working behind the desk also exercise the same decision-making process. For example, the desk police officer may decide if a report about a missing person is valid or not based on circumstances described by the reporting individual.
The area within the police department in which police discretion is often observed is the patrol division and detective division. Normally, the responsibility of police on duty in a patrol division is to conduct regular patrolling within the designated district zones. At some point police patrol would receive an order ranging from pursuing a reported drug dealer spotted near the area or a domestic disturbance. Discretion is being exercised in the patrol division to decide whether or not an imminent threat in the community exists or not. For instance a request to respond to a domestic disturbance may or may not be an incident more serious than what was reported, and it the decision to investigate, observe, and assess the situation further is within the discretion of the responding police officers. The same goes with deciding whether a person spotted while patrolling is a threat or not based on the police officer’s assumption, assessment, and detection of suspicious behavior (Bronitt and Stenning, 2011). In the detective division, the extent of importance of sound decision-making is key to the immediate resolution of a case (Corsianos, 2010). One of the areas in detective work where discretion is often observed is deciding, which cases are to be prioritized for investigation. Detectives decide whether to pursue a case for investigation based on the weight of the gathered testimonies and evidences. A detective may declare that a case is closed, but such decision may result to grave consequences particularly if new developments arise pointing the investigation to a different direction and a person has been wrongfully accused.
Conclusion
Discretion is part of the law enforcers’ decision-making power in which a lack of sound judgment would entail dire consequences. Implications of both positive and negative may be constituted by police discretion, but untimely decisions are necessary in the police operational environment given the fact that discretion would mean life of death.
References
Alpert, G., Dunham, R., Stroshine, M., Bennett, K., & MacDonald, J. (2006). Police Officers' Decision Making and Discretion: Forming Suspicion and Making a Stop. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice. Retrieved from https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/213004.pdf
Bronitt, S. & Stenning, P. (2011). Understanding discretion in modern policing. Crim LJ, 35(1), 319-332. Retrieved from http://www98.griffith.edu.au/dspace/bitstream/handle/10072/44249/76896_1.pdf?sequence=1
Corsianos, M. (2010). Discretion in detectives' decision making and 'high profile' cases. Police Practice And Research, 4(3), 301-314. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1561426032000113893
Engel, R. (2003). How police supervisory styles influence patrol officer behavior. Washington DC: National Institute of Justice.
Goldstein, H. (1977). Chapter 5: Categorizing and structuring discretion. In in Policing a Free Society(1st ed., pp. 93- 130). Cambridge, MA: Ballinger Publishing Company.
Klahm IV, C. & Tillyer, R. (2010). Understanding police use of force: A review of the evidence.Southwest Journal Of Criminal Justice, 7(2), 214-239. Retrieved from http://swacj.org/swjcj/archives/7.2/Klahm%20and%20Tillyer%20Article%20(5).pdf
Walker, S. & Katz, C. (2002). Chapter 2: The history of American police. In The Police in America: An Introduction (4th ed., pp. 22-56). Boston: McGraw Hill.
