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Law and Order Unit V

The Police: Organization, Role and Function

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Police organization

Most municipal police departments are independent agencies

They rarely work with other departments

They have their own budgets, rules, policies, procedures

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Police Department Rank system Patrolman Sergeant Lieutenant Captain Deputy Inspector Inspector Deputy Chief Assistant Chief

Bureau Chief Chief of

Department Deputy

Commissioner First Deputy

Commissioner Police

commissioner

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Time in Rank system

A system to promote officers based on their time in a particular rank

An officer accrues points based on time in rank, awards, citations, and test scores

when the accumulate enough points they get promoted

No officer is allowed to skip a rank, an officer cannot leave a department and assume a higher rank in another department

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Patrol Function

Deter crime by maintaining a visible police presence

Maintain public order (peacekeeping) within the patrol area

Enable the police department to respond quickly to law violations or other emergencies

Identify and apprehend law violators Aid individuals and care for those

who cannot help themselves

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Patrol Function

Facilitate the movement of traffic and people

Create a feeling of security in the community

A patrol officers responsibilities are immense they must make split second decisions

They may face a suicidal teen, angry mob, armed felon, domestic dispute

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Patrol Function

Most of the time they are peacekeeping, this is where the officer must use discretion

Discretion is vital, officers must decide if a noisy neighbor complaint can be handled with just talking to the people or making arrests

They are looked as community problem solvers

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Does Patrol Deter crime?

A visible police presence was once considered vital to deterring crime

The 1970’s experiment on patrols was designed to shed some light on the effectiveness of patrols They divided the 15 districts into 3

groups, on e group retained the normal patrols, the second group increased the number of patrols and the third eliminated patrols

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K.C. patrol experiment

The results of the experiment showed that patrols had little effect on crime patterns

And had little impact on the citizens attitude towards the police

Displacement might be a reason for the crime rates not changing

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Improving patrols

Proactive policing: an aggressive law enforcement style that take the initiative against crime instead of waiting for criminal acts to occur

Aggressive patrol: jurisdictions that have patrol officers issue citations, aggressively arrest, detain suspects and actively enforce minor infractions have lower crime rates

NY city took an aggressive approach in the 90’s and greatly reduced their crime rate

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Improving Patrols

Targeting specific crimes in specific areas

Patrols are increased in areas that have high crime rates, officers are told what crimes have been the biggest problems and they look for that type of activity

Kansas City gun experiment, police targeted a problem area for guns. Prior to the gun patrol there where 169 gun crimes in 29 weeks, after they had 86 in 29 weeks

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Improving Patrols

Evidence shows that more arrests reduces the number of crimes

Aggressive police activity reduces the number of crimes

Technology: NYPD introduced Compstat, a computer program that takes input on crime and shows where patrols should target

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Detectives

They investigate the cause of crime and attempt to identify the individuals responsible

Sometimes they go undercover and try to infiltrate a criminal organization

They can pose as victims to capture predatory criminals

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Broken Window Model

George Kelling and James Q. Wilson created the Broken Window ModelTheir three points are

1) neighborhood disorder creates fear. Urban areas filled with street people, youth gangs, prostitutes, and the mentally disturbed are the ones most likely to maintain high degrees of crime

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Broken Window Model

2) neighborhoods give out crime-promoting signals. A neighborhood filled with deteriorated housing, unrepaired broken windows and untended disorderly behavior gives out crime promoting signals. Honest citizens live in fear in these areas and predatory criminals are attracted to them

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Broken Window Model

3) Police need citizen cooperation. If police are to reduce fear and successfully combat crime in these urban areas they must have the cooperation, support and assistance of the citizens

This approach requires a change in the entire department , not just a small department located in a traditional police department

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Community Policing

Programs designed to bring police and the public closer together and create a more cooperative working environment between them

The federal government has encouraged the growth by providing millions in aid for the hiring and training of officers for this program

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Community Policing

Early attempts to improve relationships between the community and the police had been handled by the Police-community relations or PCR unit

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Community Policing

Foot patrols took officers out of the cars and on to the streets was one of the first steps to implementing community policing It gave police a face and formed a bond

between the community and the police

The first foot patrol experiments were conducted in Michigan and New Jersey Residents in the area perceived greater safety

and were less afraid of crime even though crime rates did not drop

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Community Policing

Community-oriented policing: programs designed to bring police and the public closer together and create a more cooperative working environment

Feature a bottom-up approach to community problem solving, decision making involves the officer on the scene not directives from headquarters

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Community Policing

Neighborhood policing: problem solving is best done at the neighborhood level,

police take the initiative in identifying issues and actively treating the cause

Efforts are made to decentralize

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Community Policing

Police have to share power with community organizations

Citizens must be active Patrol officers become managers of

their beats

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Community Policing

Police departments have to alter their recruitment and training

Officers must be problem solvers, along with their normal police duties

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Problem oriented Policing

They focus on the problems of the community and find ways to solve them

They will develop tactical units to combat the crimes of the community

Gang units Drug units Car theft units

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Internal affairs

investigates allegations of police misconduct

When there is an allegation they investigate