Local Law Enforcement Officials Research Articles

Workplace Violence in the Emergency Department: Case Study on Staff and Law Enforcement Disagreement on Reportable Crimes.

Violence in the emergency department (ED) remains underreported. Patient factors are often cited as a source of confusion in determining the culpability of perpetrators and whether to proceed with incident reporting. This study’s objective was to determine how ED staff at one academic medical center perceive certain clinical scenarios and how this compares to local law enforcement officers (LEO). An anonymous survey with 4 scenarios was sent to multidisciplinary ED staff at our academic medical center, as well as local LEO and inquired whether respondents considered any of the scenarios to be reportable as a crime. Chi-square analysis was used for comparison. The study was deemed exempt by the Institutional Review Board. A total of 261 ED staff and 77 LEO completed the survey. Both groups were equally likely to believe that a reportable crime occurred in Scenario 1, where a patient with dementia punches a nurse (LEO: 26.0% vs. ED: 31.4%, p = 0.44), and in Scenario 2, where an intoxicated patient spits at a phlebotomist (LEO: 97.4% vs. ED: 95.0%, p = 0.56). However, the two groups differed in Scenario 3, in which a patient with delirium makes verbal threats to a doctor (LEO: 20.8% vs. ED: 42.9%, p < 0.001), and Scenario 4, in which a patient’s parent throws a chair at a medical student (LEO: 66.2% vs. ED: 81.2%, p = 0.009). As health systems seek to improve workplace safety, it is important to consider the barriers to reporting violent incidents, including staff’s understanding of what acts may constitute reportable violence, as well as LEO understanding of the unique ED environment and patient responsibilities.

Tambang Ilegal di Kabupaten Kutai Kartanegara Terkait Dengan Undang-Undang Nomor 3 Tahun 2020 tentang Perubahan Atas Undang-Undang Nomor 4 Tahun2009 tentang Pertambangan Mineral dan Batu Bara

According to the Mining Advocacy Network (JATAM) of East Kalimantan, there are 151 illegal mines operating in 4 areas of East Kalimantan, this is very worrying and since mining permits are in the center, the local government is increasingly indifferent, they are increasingly empowered to dig without a permit. The issue of Illegal Coal Mining in East Kalimantan is currently a problem that must be resolved together. Because this problem has become a problem at the national level. Currently there are around 100 more illegal mines that must be completed by local law enforcement officers in the Bumi Etam area, especially in Kutai Kartanegara Regency. The author uses the library research method or literature review. This literature review research is conducting research from library books, magazines, journals and articles and sources from the internet that are relevant to the problems discussed.

How Interior Immigration Enforcement Affects Trust in Law Enforcement

The day-to-day behaviors of undocumented immigrants are significantly affected when local law enforcement officials do the work of federal immigration enforcement. One such behavior, which has been widely discussed in debates over so-called sanctuary policies, is that undocumented immigrants are less likely to report crimes to the police when local law enforcement officials work with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on federal immigration enforcement. However, the mechanism that explains this relationship of decreased trust in law enforcement has not yet been systematically tested. Do undocumented immigrants become less trusting of police officers and sheriffs when local law enforcement officials work with ICE on federal immigration enforcement? To answer this, we embedded an experiment that varied the interior immigration enforcement context in a survey (n = 512) drawn from a probability-based sample of undocumented immigrants. When local law enforcement officials work with ICE on federal immigration enforcement, respondents are statistically significantly less likely to say that they trust that police officers and sheriffs will keep them, their families, and their communities safe; will protect the confidentiality of witnesses to crimes even if they are undocumented; will protect the rights of all people equally, including undocumented immigrants; and will protect undocumented immigrants from abuse or discrimination.

Mass Casualty Shootings and Emergency Preparedness: A Multidisciplinary Approach for an Unpredictable Event.

Mass casualty events (MCE) are an infrequent occurrence to most daily healthcare systems however these incidents are the causation for new hospital preparedness and the development of coordinated emergency services. The broad support and operational plans outside the hospital include emergency medical services, local law enforcement, government agencies, and city officials. Modern-day hospital disaster preparedness goals include scheduled training for healthcare personnel to ensure effective and accurate triage for a high-volume of injured patients. This MDT collaboration strengthens the emergency response to optimize the delivery of life-saving care during MCEs. This review identifies the clinical importance of the interdisciplinary team interactions and the lessons learned from past MCE experiences, strengthening healthcare system readiness for such critical incidents.

Separation of Prosecutors

A federal official’s physical proximity to Washington often provides a rough approximation of his political authority. In this respect, our controversial and much-criticized system of federal criminal law is distinct. Within this domain, thousands of immensely empowered officials exercise enormous control despite being scattered across the country. Legal scholarship has generated volumes of criticisms of this system, with less attention devoted to how and why it developed in this manner and what might be said in its favor. This Essay offers a novel explanation and defense of the decentralized nature of the federal administration of justice. To do so, it first excavates the historical and contemporary dynamics surrounding the Department of Justice, demonstrating that this structure is a feature of congressional design rather than a bug of congressional abdication. While Presidents since the Founding have called for the centralization of criminal law enforcement, Congress has generally ignored or rebuffed those demands, instead choosing to disperse prosecutorial power in the hands of thousands of lower-level executive branch officials. The story of federal criminal law therefore reveals that the rivalry between the branches persists in certain domains and that Congress can pursue its objectives by structuring relationships within the executive branch itself. This Note argues that the significant authority delegated to individual federal prosecutors vis-a-vis Main Justice and the President has two undertheorized benefits. Decentralization places a practical check on presidential power in an area bereft of formal constraints. It also enables the creation of relationships between federal and state and local law enforcement officials, facilitating the incorporation of local enforcement priorities in a policy area that has always been considered of uniquely local interest. While defending the general contours of the federal administration of justice, this Note aims also to propose more realistic and productive reforms to the federal prosecutorial system that are responsive to the separation-of-powers dynamics at play.

“They Are Clipping Our Wings”: Health Implications of Restrictive Immigrant Policies for Mexican-Origin Women in a Northern Border Community

We examine racialization processes experienced by women of Mexican origin in a northern border community during a protracted period of restrictive immigrant policies that have disparately affected Mexican-origin communities, and consider pathways through which these experiences may affect health. This grounded theory analysis draws on interviews conducted in 2013–2014 with 48 first, 1.5, and second generation Mexican-origin women living in Detroit, MI. Racialization processes blurred boundaries between Latinas/os, immigrants, and undocumented immigrants. Racialized policies and interactions required women to negotiate shifting and often precarious social and political terrain. We describe racializing markers used by agents of multiple institutions to assess the legal status of women and members of their social networks, shaping their access to the resources over which institutional agents held power. Specifically, we consider the dynamic mechanisms by which multiple legal, social, and employment institutions exacted immigrant policing and bureaucratic surveillance. These include: (1) interior and border immigration enforcement agents’ active surveillance of residents; (2) local law enforcement officials’ assertion of authority over driver’s licenses and contact with immigration officials, often in traffic-related encounters; (3) Secretary of State clerks’ discretion in assessing legal status and issuing driver’s licenses and state IDs; (4) social welfare agents’ scrutiny of citizenship status in determining access to nutritional, economic, and medical resources; and (5) employers’ exploitation of these structural vulnerabilities to justify unfair treatment of immigrant workers. We theorize several mechanisms, by which these processes affect health, including: stigmatization; hypervigilance; and restricted access to health-promoting resources.

Teaching Nursing Students to Care for Patients Who Are Inmates.

Inmates in federal or state correctional facilities or those who are under the custody of local law enforcement officials receive health care in acute care settings, and caring for these inmate-patients is difficult for many nurses. Nurse educators should teach nursing students that nurses care for all patients in all situations with respect for a person's inherent dignity and worth. Information from relevant nursing publications was synthesized to provide nurse educators with content that can be useful when teaching nursing students to care for inmate-patients in acute care settings. A case study is provided as a teaching strategy for nurse educators. Respect, care, and concern are expressed differently when nurses care for inmate-patients in acute care settings. Nurse educators are responsible to teach nursing students how professional nurses should respond to patients, especially in situations that many nurses find challenging. [J Nurs Educ. 2017;56(11):655-659.].

Local Law Enforcement Officers’ Knowledge of Human Trafficking: Ability to Define, Identify, and Assist

ABSTRACTLocal law enforcement officers have been identified as key figures in the fight against human trafficking, yet training has lagged, and their preparation to fulfill this role is unknown. Thus, 175 U.S. local law enforcement officers completed a survey assessing their ability to define human trafficking and to identify and assist its survivors. Approximately 17% of officers reported receiving training on human trafficking, while two thirds relied on mass media for information about human trafficking. Answers indicated confusion between human smuggling and human trafficking and a lack of knowledge of the elements of trafficking and who potential victims are. A substantial minority struggled to identify signs that a person might be a survivor of human trafficking and methods for intervention. Having received training and receiving information on trafficking from an official source significantly increased officers’ knowledge base. These results strongly support the need for formal training of local law enforcement officers and provision of knowledge from law enforcement sources in order to be able to effectively combat human trafficking.

The assessment of capable guardianship measures against bullying victimization in the school environment

Policymakers, school officials and the law enforcement community have expanded legal tools and other strategies to address bullying in recent years. This has resulted in a larger and more challenging role for law enforcement officers working in school settings. The present study seeks to understand the ways in which local law enforcement officers interpret this new role and their efforts to prevent and respond to bullying. We draw upon Routine Activities Theory as a lens to view officer perceptions of promoting guardianship and reducing target suitability of young people most at-risk for bullying victimization. Data collected from qualitative interviews of law enforcement officers working with local schools, suggest that officers see a role for law enforcement in promoting guardianship around this health and safety concern, but recognize the limitations of using arrest authority. They emphasize promoting trust and building relationship in efforts to support potential and current bullying victims.

Does training make a difference? An evaluation of a specialized human trafficking training module for law enforcement officers

Since 2008, the US federal government has prioritized human trafficking prosecutions, although the expectation is that these cases will be brought to federal prosecutors by local law enforcement authorities. Recent research shows, however, that while local law enforcement officers are typically well positioned to identify human trafficking victims, most do not think human trafficking occurs in their jurisdictions and few are prepared to identify and investigate such cases. Recognizing the need for training of law enforcement regarding human trafficking, the Department of Criminal Justice Training at the Kentucky Leadership Institute undertook a statewide training conducted by victim advocates. This article reports the results of an evaluation of that training module. The article discusses the effectiveness of the program in terms of: (1) raising awareness of human trafficking in the officers' jurisdictions, (2) increasing officers' self-reported likelihood of identifying and investigating suspected human trafficking cases, and (3) the dissemination of knowledge gained through training from executive-level and mid-level officers to patrol-level officers. The findings show that participation in the training produced positive, but limited effects with regard to each of the three outcomes of interest.

A Fellow's perspective on the threatened closure of the Illinois Poison Center.

A Fellow's perspective on the threatened closure of the Illinois Poison Center.

Violence Risk, Not Mental Illness, Should Guide Gun Access

Researchers, clinicians, and others maintain that assessment of multiple risk factors for violence must guide standards for allowing purchase or possession of firearms.

Litigating Immigration Detainer Issues (Chapter 34 in Immigration Law for the Colorado Practitioner, 2d ed Feb 2013)

The immigration detainer is the principle mechanism for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the enforcement arm of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), to obtain custody over suspected immigration violators in the custody of state or local law enforcement officials. Published following Colorado's joining ICE's Secure Communities program, this Chapter (revised in the February 2013 edition to address the Supreme Court June 2012 decision in Arizona v. United States and the revised detainer guidance and Form I-247 issued in December 2012) addresses the legal problems attendant to immigration detainers, including potential Fourth Amendment and Tenth Amendment challenges. The Chapter also addresses various remedies available in immigration proceedings to redress constitutional violations incurred in the processing of immigration detainers, and includes practice pointers for litigation.

Intersectional Discrimination In U Visa Certification Denials: An Irremediable Violation Of Equal Protection?

Through the U visa, the Immigration and Nationality Act offers a means to obtain legal immigration status for undocumented victims of domestic violence and other specified crimes who cooperate with law enforcement in the investigation or prosecution of those crimes. In order to apply for such a visa, a crime victim must obtain law enforcement certification that he or she has been, is being, or will be helpful to the investigation or prosecution of the crime. This Note argues that the Act’s provision of discretion to local law enforcement officials in the decision of whether to grant U visa certification requests violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, at least as applied to battered undocumented Latina immigrants in Suffolk County, New York. The Note uses certification denials to critique the equal protection doctrine in the United States and to show how the Inter-American human rights system’s conception of equal protection would better address the intersectional discrimination faced by undocumented victims of domestic violence. The Note discusses the ways in which interrelated forms of discrimination lead to unconstitutional denials of U visa certification requests. It then predicts the outcome of a potential suit based on the equal protection violation inherent in a discriminatory certification denial before domestic courts and before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. It argues that such a suit would have a much greater chance of success in the latter system. Finally, acknowledging the limited practical effect of a successful claim before the Commission, the Note proposes a domestic grassroots movement to more meaningfully address the intersectional discrimination that faces battered undocumented women.

Soldiers in Baltimore: The Wire and the New Global Wars

Soldiers in Baltimore:The Wire and the New Global Wars Philip Joseph (bio) In September 1992, an article appeared in the Baltimore Sun comparing the Murphy Homes project complex in inner city Baltimore to civil war zones around the world: "The image is riveting and clear: police officers with guns cocked walking through the streets shouting angrily at an unruly crowd. It could be Bosnia, Soweto, or Belfast, where civil wars have shredded the fabric of civilization" (Simmons 1992). The Murphy Homes were ultimately demolished in 1999, but the war-like violence that plagued them over the course of the 1990s resurfaces in fictional form in The Wire, HBO's (Home Box Office) series about Baltimore.1 While drawing on local history, The Wire also extends and deepens the above analogy from the Sun, linking Baltimore to war zones in other parts of the world. As if to elaborate on the account in the Sun article, The Wire reminds us that a clear understanding of Baltimore requires coming to terms with the conditions of state failure that bind the city to metropolitan areas like Baghdad and Mogadishu. The statelessness of the [End Page 209] city cuts two ways in The Wire, applying to both the loss of sovereign authority in the projects and to the loss of legal rights and protections for residents. When local law enforcement officials attempt to reclaim the projects by force, they reinscribe the cycle of stateless violence and militarized intervention, raising the specter that war has become a looming, unending reality in urban America. The Wire invites us to view the organized urban violence within Baltimore as a variety of the new low-intensity wars that have been spreading around the globe since the end of the Cold War, turning cities into a primary space of military operation.2 More significantly, perhaps, in the process of defining the American city as a war zone, The Wire raises the agonizing question of how to end the violence associated with these interminable new wars. At the heart of the show is a crucial predicament related to sovereign power: If, as the series suggests, the sovereign state often creates conditions for warfare and participates in its escalation, the state often plays a necessary role in curtailing the violence, as well. Civilians who are victimized by new wars still depend on state intervention for protection, even, paradoxically, when the military force of the state fuels these wars in the first place. The Wire grapples with this predicament, sustaining an inquiry into the potential of a militarized state to be substantively reformed. Reform of the state does not hinge tenuously on the benevolence of officials or on their commitment to democratic values. Instead, the motivation for reform derives from the toll that endless war takes on the state's own flagging authority and reputation. At issue is whether state security forces are capable of listening to the child soldiers who populate the inner city and of simultaneously limiting the influence of the drug organization that hires these soldiers and dominates the projects. Created during a period of national decline that some have likened to an interregnum, The Wire offers us a failing state, whose very existence is threatened by its tendency to suppress the voices of witnesses to war.3 The sovereign state's waning prestige creates a compelling narrative question around whether it will heed the voices of these witnesses, giving them a say in repairing a war-torn environment. Confronted, much like the audience of the show, by a vast array of urban sound—whether transmitted by wiretap, cell phone, high fidelity speakers, or human informants—state officials can only [End Page 210] reclaim their relevance as political authorities through a heightened attention to the musings and grievances that emanate from the projects. New Wars in Baltimore Political scientists, urban geographers, and sociologists who study new wars generally agree that the period of history in which highly centralized state armies fought against each other on battlefields until one side surrendered to the other is over. In the post-Cold War era, state armies find themselves engaged in a type of asymmetrical warfare that renders obsolete their huge stockpiles...

Refining (Not Narrowing) Notions of Program Sustainability

The recent research agenda set forth by Scheirer and Dearing1 on program sustainability may serve as an important step toward clarifying conceptualizations of the lasting effects of public health interventions. A concern arises, however, in defining sustainability as “continued use of program components and activities for the continued achievement of desirable program and population outcomes.”1(p2060) Linking continued activities with ongoing intended outcomes may direct attention and resources away from exploring the full range of enduring program effects. Program outcomes are not only the result of continuing program activities nor are they only desirable or intended. Public health programs have lasting intended and unintended outcomes2a across multiple levels of an implementation system2b that are at least the result of program-setting interactions over time. The seemingly straightforward notion of a “continued program activity” belies complex and meaningful variation; activities can vary in the degree to which they are continued as well as in the degree to which they are considered program-related.3,4 It may be possible to benefit, therefore, from studying the long-term effects of discontinued program activities in addition to the continued intended or modified activities the authors mention. An excellent example of unintended positive effects is provided by research into the continuation of Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.) in many schools across the country despite evaluations showing failure to achieve its intended effects.5,6 The explanation for this continuation is three-fold: (1) implementing schools had lower expectations for the program than did its developers; (2) local school staff perceived that D.A.R.E. helped students build relationships with their families, as well as with local law enforcement officials; and (3) personal evidence was valued more highly than scientific evidence. By focusing exclusively on the intended outcomes related to youth substance use, evaluations of D.A.R.E. ignored lasting positive effects that provide insight into alternative strategies for promoting prosocial youth behavior. Finally, these effects revealed discrepant goals and values among actors that have important implications for the design and conduct of enduring public health programs. Scheirer and Dearing are to be commended for their contribution to advancing research on program sustainability; these conceptual issues warrant clarification. However, narrowing conceptualizations of program sustainability may be counterproductive at this point in time. If we are interested in understanding the full range of effects—and not just the desirable intended outcomes—of public health interventions, there may be good reasons to conceptualize intervention activity levels and ongoing outcomes as distinct but related dimensions of multidimensional program sustainability.

The barriers impeding precautionary behaviours by undocumented immigrants in emergencies: The Hurricane Ike experience in Houston, Texas, USA

Emergency management tends to be planned for legal, resident populations that are responsive to mainstream channels of communication and enforcement. For many areas prone to extreme events and emergencies, populations are also composed of transitory tourists, temporary visitors and migrant workers. This latter group may be a large population and, while not completely invisible to residents, may prefer obscurity and concealment within the social landscape. Tending towards poverty, technologically disconnected and linguistically isolated, undocumented migrants seek employment and attempt to avoid local law enforcement and immigration officials for fear of imprisonment and deportation. In this context, the behaviours prompted by developing public emergencies will be different for undocumented migrants than for the population at large. We examine the experience of 135 Hispanic undocumented migrants in the coastal zone of Houston-Galveston, Texas to understand the factors and issues that influence decision making and behaviours under region-wide mandatory evacuation conditions. Undocumented migrants’ decisions to evacuate rest upon: the presence (or absence) of family and/or children, their access to risk information that they find meaningful and rational and is in harmony with their pre-conceptions about their circumstances, their openness to information that either confirms their experiences or confronts rumour-generated biases they carry, their familiarity with social groups and governmental agencies and the services they offer, and the outcome of their risk analyses that consider the dangers of remaining in situ against the danger of exposing themselves to discovery as ‘illegal aliens’. The results suggest that emergency management plans ought to promote the dispelling of rumours that weaken the effect of emergency communication, promote non-emergency outreach to peripheral populations through community groups, and promote better, basic, non-technical, Spanish-language media through mainstream conduits (i.e. the most commonly watched non-Spanish television channels) that do not require high-tech devices or advanced understanding of visual media tools.

Crime, Immigration, and Ad hoc Instrumentalism

Criminal law and immigration law, once separate fields of governance in the United States, are rapidly growing less distinct. Immigration crimes now account for a majority of all federal prosecutions; deportation is widely seen as a key tool of crime control; immigration authorities run the nation’s largest prison system; and state and local law enforcement officers work hand-in-hand with federal immigration officials. This article traces these trends and assesses their significance. The rise of an intertwined regime of “crimmigration” law has generally been attributed to some combination of nativism, overcriminalization, and a cultural obsession with security, but it also exemplifies, and has helped to reinforce, a crucial and underappreciated development in U.S. legal culture—a rising tendency to treat legal rules and legal procedures as interchangeable tools, to be brought to bear pragmatically and instrumentally on an ad hoc basis. Ad hoc instrumentalism of this kind has genuine strengths, but it also raises significant concerns about the rule of law and political accountability. The accountability concerns, in particular, are exacerbated by two other features of our newly merged system of immigration enforcement and criminal justice: its bureaucratic opacity and its selective application.

Sanctuary Cities: The Reason Illegal Aliens are Getting Away with Crimes?

The question remains: what is preventing authorities from following federal legislation? Likewise, where does the system fail, allowing for criminal aliens to escape deportation? It is no coincidence that these crimes occurred in cities and towns that promote sanctuary policies. Sanctuary cities prevent the adequate cohesion between local law enforcement and federal officials. In Section II, this note will discuss what sanctuary cities are and how and why they are created. Next, section III will detail the history of immigration legislation in the United States, pre- and post-9/11. Section IV will then analyze why federal legislation and immigration laws preempt sanctuary city policies and will look at the case law that supports the preemption. Section V discusses the harms of sanctuary cities, focusing specifically upon the vast amount of crimes occurring at the hands of illegal aliens, including gang crime and sex offenses. It will center on why sanctuary cities, through their passive measures, permit illegal immigrants to continue violating criminal laws in addition to being here illegally. The fact that many criminal illegal immigrants are repeat offenders, once subject to the hands of the authorities, compels the public to ask how this happens. This section will also examine the arrest procedure of an illegal immigrant and what should happen at the state and local level. And finally, Section VI and VII examine possible solutions to prevent criminal aliens from slipping through the cracks of the legal system and harming American citizens. This note does not attempt to discuss a possible solution to the illegal immigration problem that the country faces, but focuses more on illegal immigrants who are committing crimes over and over again, in part because they are not being reported to ICE, are not being denied bail, and ICE and state and local authorities are not provided with the appropriate resources and funding to handle such a tremendous amount of illegal immigrant cases.

Sex Offender Community Notification and Community Stratification

Community notification laws have been passed by the federal government and legislature of every state. At the very least, these laws require local law enforcement officials to publicize the personal and residential information of known sex offenders. Although researchers and other social commentators have begun to assess the effects of community notification on targeted sex offenders and on criminal justice practices and practitioners, the potential consequences of the policy for different types of communities have received only scant attention. Using sex offender registry and US Census data for two states (Nebraska and Oklahoma), we examine the relationship between community characteristics and the residential patterns of sex offenders. Findings from mapping and regression analyses suggest a greater concentration of sex offenders in disadvantaged communities than in more affluent communities. To the extent that community notification allows residents of more affluent communities to mobilize resources in order to remove identified sex offenders, it may increase the geographical clustering of these offenders in areas already facing a greater risk and having fewer resources to manage the problem. Implications of findings in terms of “concentrated disadvantage” are discussed.