Police Detectives Research Articles

Preustroj sigurnosnoga sustava banske Hrvatske 1915. godine

Druge godine Velikoga rata preustrojava se sigurnosni sustav banske Hrvatske. Tom prilikom Središnja defenzivno doglasna služba, koja je obavljala poslove tajne državne policije, kao samostalno tijelo pri Zemaljskoj vladi postaje njezinom sastavnicom, ulazeći u sastav novoosnovanoga Odsjeka IV-B za pogranična redarstvena satništva Odjela za unutarnje poslove Zemaljske vlade. Razlozi preustroja, pored političkih, osobito sukoba vojnih i civilnih vlasti, bili su i raznovrsni funkcionalni. Zahvaljujući potrebama obrane Zemaljska vlada preko te službe počinje dobivati i dio financijskih podataka koji su joj do tada bili nedostupni jer su izlazili iz okvira autonomnih poslova banske Hrvatske. U članku se na temelju arhivskoga gradiva i relevantne historiografske literature te dijelom i tiska predstavlja i analizira preustroj sigurnosnoga sustava 1915. godine.

Examining English and Welsh Detectives’ Views of Online Crime

The advancement of the Internet and digital technology has enabled individuals to commit crimes affecting both virtual and real targets at will. Criminological scholarship related to cybercrime and technology-enabled offending has primarily focused on offenders and victims, calling to question how police agencies effectively respond to these incidents. Limited empirical research has largely focused on line officers, who view these cyber offenses to be less serious in comparison to traditional crimes. Research examining the perceptions of detectives and inspectors is virtually nonexistent, though they are much more likely to have an investigative responsibility to pursue offenders and engage with citizens about the offense. Thus, there is a need to understand the attitudes inspectors hold toward online crime in order to improve our knowledge of police views and inform policy makers in building effective strategies to aid their response to unique and emerging crime types. This study examined the attitudinal factors associated with online crimes and incidents using a sample of 155 inspectors from 26 local agencies across England and Wales. The implications of this study for both police detectives and law enforcement agencies are discussed in detail.

Rezultati i problemi policije opšte nadležnosti u suzbijanju kriminala

Police duties related to the suppression of crime make an essential content of the work of the Ministry of the Interior (MoI), and the results achieved in this area represent one of the most important indicators of MoI's efficiency. The fight against crime involves all organizational units of the Ministry, each of them performing tasks under their authorities. The purview of the different police organizational units is different, so their contribution to the fight against crime is also different. General police and crime investigation police (detectives) take measures and actions aimed at combating crime on a daily basis. Other organizational units of the police do this in certain cases, performing primary tasks under their specialisation (e.g., traffic police, border police, etc.). General police is the most numerous composition of the MoI, and through the patrol work they cover the whole state territory. This paper deals with the contribution of the general police in combating crime and points to some problems and possibilities of improving the current state.

Functions of Conversation in Detective Fiction: An Analysis of Smiley’s Duplicate Keys From Grice’s Theory of Conversational Implicature

Duplicate Keys , published in 1984, is a detective novel written by Pulitzer Laureate Jane Smiley. The novel develops around a murder discovered by Alice, the heroine, in Manhattan, in which two band members, Denny and his adopted brother Craig, were shot dead in Denny’s apartment. Since besides Alice, some of their other friends, and even their friends’ friends have duplicate keys, it’s extremely distracting and difficult for Police Detective Honey to solve the case. With suspense resolved and mystery unraveled, it turns out that the killer is Denny’s girlfriend and Alice’s best friend Susan, who pretends to be on a trip far away at the occurrence of the murder. The novel contains an abundance of conversations, which play a crucial part in plot advancement as well as characterization. Guided by Paul Grice’s theory of conversational implicature, the paper analyzes some conversations from Duplicate Keys , especially the disobedience of the cooperative principle in the conversations, deciphers the reasons behind the disobedience, while at the same time exposes characters’ inner world, and exhibits their personality traits. In so doing, functions of conversation in detective fiction are revealed.

Towards a Single Government Approach via Further Consolidation of Law and Order in Estonia, with Domestic Violence as an Example

An appropriate ‘solution pattern’ for social problems in a state based on the rule of law entails the existence of corresponding legislative regulations. The solution should be approved at the level of a law as a legislative act of supreme juridical power. A solution created at that level would fully correspond to the principle of rule of law and also minimise the possibility of socalled departmental special interests prevailing, in recognition that this danger accompanies efforts toward the solution of every multifaceted problem. The authors find that, since Estonia already possesses relatively extensive experience in legislative consolidation for various aspects of the society’s reality, with most of this experience being of a positive nature, it would be a most welcome development if the issue of DV were to be included in the current process of consolidation under the auspices of the project Towards the Development of Better Legislation. Legislative drafting is stimulated by the perception of acute social problems and of a need to regulate them by legislative means. Results from 2014 and 2017 surveys show that Estonia’s legal practitioners perceive DV as a problem the causes of which demand research and whose victims require help. Most legal practitioners surveyed encountered DV in their day-to-day work, with prosecutors and police detectives bearing the heaviest burden: it consumed nearly one third of their work hours. A serious problem was identified in prejudice and stereotypes, which yield an oversimplified and distorted image of the actual causes of DV, in which the victim frequently is considered responsible. Both the general population and legal practitioners widely share the erroneous impression that the victims could avoid violence through ‘appropriate conduct’. Such stereotypic attitudes wherein victims are considered partially to blame for violence can obstruct the work of law-enforcement agencies. While the idea of a special law on DV found support and scepticism in roughly equal measure, support for it increased significantly when respondents judged the concrete opportunities and solutions offered by such a law. These legal practitioners perceived numerous bottlenecks and unsolved problems in relation to the existing legislative regulation and legal practice, which one would expect to be overcome through a special law on DV. The authors conclude from the survey-based findings that Estonia’s legal practitioners demonstrate considerable anticipation for a law on DV. The participants in the surveys also perceived an increasing need for co-operation with law-enforcement agencies in this regard – i.e., for concentrating on collaboration within this domain. However, the authors consider it undoubtedly important also to increase the involvement of specialists in the DV field: victim support services, staff of women’s shelters, and municipal social workers.

Challenges for Research into Military Investigations

In cases of suspected violations of rules, regulations or the law by armed forces personnel, investigations are invariably mandatory. Military investigations differ from well-researched civilian criminal investigations. Differing from civilian police detectives, most military investigators – as disciplinary supervisors and military police personnel – have a number of tasks to accomplish, which include leading in combat and ensuring military readiness. Military investigations can lead to substantive negative or positive consequences for military readiness, including mental health, unit cohesion and subjective legal certainty. This impact on unit cohesion and mental health is influenced by any prior history of distress or trauma; military investigations are often preceded by contravention of internal disciplinary acts, complaints and traumatic events. This study explores factors in the differing military and legal systems of Germany and the United Kingdom (UK) that might help military personnel to successfully conduct investigations while ensuring deployment readiness and maintaining human rights.

The Right Stuff: Class Identity, Material Culture and the Victorian Police Detective

The Right Stuff: Class Identity, Material Culture and the Victorian Police Detective

True and false alibis among prisoners and their detection by police detectives

The present study was designed to determine whether differences exist between true and false alibis and how accurate police detectives and lay people are in determining the veracity of alibis. This article provides a replication of the research by Culhane et al. (2013) with more representative participants. In the first experiment, real suspects in a remand prison generated true or false alibis. In the second experiment, a subset of those alibis were written out and were provided to experienced police officers and students for alibi evaluation and discrimination. Our results show that differentiating between true and false alibis is difficult, and even when more representative materials and participants are included, the accuracy did not exceed 60%. Interestingly we found that students and police officers focus on other aspects during the alibi discrimination. Thus, research using student participant cannot be, directly, used in alibi discrimination studies.

Offender and family member perceptions after an offender-focused hot spots policing strategy

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine how both offenders and their families perceived their interactions with police and whether there were negative consequences of the offender-focused strategy that was implemented in a hot spots policing experiment.Design/methodology/approachData from interviews of 32 offenders and 29 family members are examined qualitatively for themes to evaluate how the strategy was carried out and how it impacted offenders’ behavior and both groups’ perceptions of the police detectives and the strategy overall.FindingsThe results show that there was overwhelming agreement by both offenders and their family members that the police detectives who contacted them treated both groups with dignity and respect. After the contact was over, the offenders appeared to commit less crime, followed probation more closely, and had positive feelings about what the police detectives were trying to do. Improvement of the offenders’ relationships with their families was an unanticipated finding indicating a diffusion of benefits of the strategy.Practical implicationsThe results suggest that when procedural justice principles are used in an offender-focused police intervention, positive impact can be achieved without negative consequences.Originality/valueThis is a rare example of an in-depth evaluation of the perceptions of offenders and family members contacted through a hot spots policing offender-focused strategy.

White Women, U.S. Popular Culture, and Narratives of Addiction

The United States war on drugs has, for decades now, systematically targeted communities of color. This sustained attack on people of color is accomplished through the use of whiteness. Recently, mainstream news media and elected officials have called for a “gentler war on drugs” to address the opioid epidemic. While some may see this as a welcome change, we take a more critical view. Specifically, we examine the role of White women in two popular television series that feature narratives of addiction as a gendered instance of “white drug exceptionalism.” To do this, we conducted a systematic analysis of a narrative television show, Law & Order, and a reality-based show, Intervention, using nine seasons over the same time period (2000–2010). In the procedural drama Law & Order, White women were featured prominently as part of the carceral state, both as police detectives and as prosecutors. Occasionally, White women are portrayed as victims of drug culture. On the rehabinspired Intervention, the majority of all characters are White, and the audience is invited to view drug use and recovery through a white lens that tells a particular kind of story about addiction. Both the carceral model promoted by Law & Order and the therapeutic model valorized by Intervention rely on particular notions of White womanhood mapped onto neoliberal regimes of citizenship that not only compel us all toward “health” and “sobriety” but also warp our collective imagination, so that we only see some drug users as worthy of a gentleness and compassion.

From Convicts to Contemporary Convictions: Two Hundred Years of Australian Crime Fiction

European Australia began in 1788 as an English jail, and from 1818 novels and stories appeared locally and in London about escaped convicts acting against free settlers, and sometimes Indigenous people resisting the taking of their land. Gold, discovered in 1851, brought new stories and locations, including suddenly rich Melbourne, and past convicts and bushrangers were recreated sympathetically as a tough, independent national image. Twentieth-century fiction continued to feature the crime novel and the bush detective; police remained unpopular, but some mid-century women writers used them before moving on to strong psychothrillers, while American war-time presence led to popular private-eye fiction. Both the imperial weight of London publishing and local literary prejudice made Australian crime fiction little known at home, but this changed by 1980, and well-recognised local crime writing and publishing has strongly developed. Private eyes, both men and women and even police detectives are well-known, crime novels and psychothrillers are flourishing, many contemporary issues are debated in the genre, including Indigenous writers and their concerns.

The Impact of Specialized Domestic Violence Units on Case Processing

This study involves an evaluation of an innovative approach to the handling of domestic violence (DV) cases in the city of Cleveland, Ohio that includes (1) a DV Project composed of specially trained police detectives, prosecutors and victim advocates for investigating and prosecuting domestic violence cases involving adult female victims who are married to, cohabitating with, or have a child with the defendant; and (2) a Dedicated Domestic Violence Docket that involves two Municipal Court judges hearing all of the domestic violence cases that are handled by the DV Project. We collected data on six months of domestic violence cases occurring in the latter half of 2008 (N = 1388), by linking records from the Cleveland Police Department, the Prosecutor’s Office, and the Municipal Court. We found that very few victims in police districts lacking the DV Project follow up with a prosecutor to pursue the case further, indicting that specialized DV units in police departments can have a significant impact on the number of DV cases that move forward through the criminal justice system. DV Project cases were slightly less likely to result in charges issued by prosecutors (OR = .499) but more likely to result in dismissals (OR = 2.545) and referrals to DV treatment programs (χ2 = 3.88).

Sharko by Franck Thilliez

Reviewed by: Sharko by Franck Thilliez Nathalie G. Cornelius Thilliez, Franck. Sharko. Fleuve, 2017. ISBN 978-2-265-11559-0. Pp. 576. Police detectives Frank Sharko and Lucie Henebelle return along with other brigade regulars for a riveting thriller in their sixth novel together. Investigation leads to counter-investigation when Sharko's cover-up of Henebelle's inadvertent murder of a suspect in a kidnapping case threatens to unravel. As Sharko and Henebelle struggle to keep their secret, macabre elements of the crime scene draw their team into a dark and violent side of Western society. Initially, a seemingly unrelated incident of a man suffering from galeophobia who coolly allows himself to be devoured in a shark tank elicits the fascination of readers and characters alike. Mythology and fact are meshed in a realm where limits normally set by fear, this primordial human instinct for protection and survival, are nonexistent. Central to this intrigue, embedded in layers of culture and history, is blood. In the book, blood has not only symbolic and biological significance, but is also a source of financial profit and political power. Thilliez's knack for blending plausible fiction with meticulously researched fact creates the framework for an elaborate storyline spanning decades and continents, interweaving science, marginalized cults, BioArt (art created using living organisms and live tissues), and colonial history. As with his recent prior novels, Thilliez illustrates the proverbial butterfly's wings whose beat in one location sets off a chain-reaction ending in catastrophe elsewhere. The result compels the readers to avidly google the many authentic references to people, events, and places, in order to reassure themselves of the fictitious nature of a few. The baroque elements of the plot are grounded by the human element of Sharko, who continues to evolve beyond his character as a clinically effective detective (perhaps an allusion to French neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot, whose studies and techniques are referenced by Thilliez in several of his novels). The skeletons of Sharko's past and the psychic flaws that he acquired through experiences in prior novels are further explored as contributors to the character's cruelty, courage and tenacity. Thilliez's stylistic sensibility confers a depth of characterization to the protagonist. Sharko's model train locomotive, charmingly named Poupette, is a soothing presence that helped the protagonist retain his sense of sanity and purpose even when faced with the most heart-wrenching trials in the detective's earlier exploits. The miniature machine also incarnates Sharko's unfailing will to continue to function. Compared to Thilliez's Rêver or Puzzle, this novel is less psychologically destabilizing, and thus less effective in inviting a lasting reader's reflection on the human psyche. [End Page 221] However, the novel's revelations of crimes against individuals and societies illuminate dark truths that politics attempts to sweep under the carpet. This intelligent novel is an important reminder to its readers that history will repeat itself if one is not vigilant, and that, despite everything, the past continues to exert its influence in the present. Nathalie G. Cornelius Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania Copyright © 2018 American Association of Teachers of French

Matthew Bacon, Taking care of business. Police detectives, drug law enforcement and proactive investigation

Matthew Bacon, Taking care of business. Police detectives, drug law enforcement and proactive investigation

Analyzing Decision Logs to Understand Decision Making in Serious Crime Investigations.

Objective To study decision making by detectives when investigating serious crime through the examination of decision logs to explore hypothesis generation and evidence selection. Background Decision logs are used to record and justify decisions made during serious crime investigations. The complexity of investigative decision making is well documented, as are the errors associated with miscarriages of justice and inquests. The use of decision logs has not been the subject of an empirical investigation, yet they offer an important window into the nature of investigative decision making in dynamic, time-critical environments. Method A sample of decision logs from British police forces was analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively to explore hypothesis generation and evidence selection by police detectives. Results Analyses revealed diversity in documentation of decisions that did not correlate with case type and identified significant limitations of the decision log approach to supporting investigative decision making. Differences emerged between experienced and less experienced officers' decision log records in exploration of alternative hypotheses, generation of hypotheses, and sources of evidential inquiry opened over phase of investigation. Conclusion The practical use of decision logs is highly constrained by their format and context of use. Despite this, decision log records suggest that experienced detectives display strategic decision making to avoid confirmation and satisficing, which affect less experienced detectives. Application Potential applications of this research include both training in case documentation and the development of new decision log media that encourage detectives, irrespective of experience, to generate multiple hypotheses and optimize the timely selection of evidence to test them.

Pleasures of policing: An additional analysis of xenophobia

In police research, dominant explanations of why law enforcers harbour xenophobic attitudes are most often dressed in cultural or political rationalizations. Based on an ethnographic study of Danish police detectives and their noticeable negativity towards foreign suspects, this article offers an additional explanation of xenophobia. It demonstrates how resentments are spurred not only by cultural prejudice or politics but also by the ways in which foreigners complicate quite ordinary yet, from a police perspective, valued work practices. Following this ethnographic observation, the article ultimately constitutes a call for a better grounding of our criminological theories in the wider context of the workday situations and sensibilities of law enforcement.

Building a Professional Profile: Charles Dickens and the Rise of the “Detective Force”

Building a Professional Profile: Charles Dickens and the Rise of the “Detective Force”

Tunnel vision in a murder case: Telephone interaction between police detectives and the prime suspect

The article analyzes an interactional form of tunnel vision or cognitive bias in a series of mundane police–suspect interactions. The data come from a murder case in which the suspect, later convicted and then released from prison with the help of the Wisconsin Innocence Project, frequently calls police detectives to inquire about his confiscated van. As he is operating in a context in which accusations are rarely made explicit, we highlight the suspect’s use of a complaint-denial device to tacitly claim innocence. The police respond by focusing on the complaint rather than the denial part of the device. The use of the complaint-denial device is compared to more formal inquiries in which accusations are overt. We discuss the implications of a sociological understanding of cognitive bias – how it may operate in practices of talk and social interaction during informal encounters – for other criminal justice settings.

Pengaruh Kepemimpinan Terhadap Kinerja Anggota Reserse Polresta Pekanbaru

This research was conducted in Pekanbaru City Police Reserve Unit Jalan Ahmad Yani No. 11 Pekanbaru-Riau. The purposeof this study is KnowingLeadership Influenceon Performance Pekanbaru Police Detective Member. While the benefit soft his research is as consideration in applying the provision of leadership in improving the performance of Pekanbaru Police Detective Member on the future. Data collection techniques used in this research is to use the data collection tool in the form of questionnaires and interviews, and the sampling method used is random sampling by the formula Slovin. Where the amount of the overall population of 156 people and a sample of 88 people. Analysis of the data used is a simple linear regression analysis with SPSS vers. 17. Besides done also partial test (t test). From the results of research on the influence of leadership in improving the performance of members of disatlantas pekanbaru tcount t¬¬tabel ie greater than 8365> 1,999. Leadership means having a significant effect in improving the performance of members of Traffic pekanbaru. Large influence the dependent variable can be seen from the value of coefficient of determination (R-square), the amount is 0.449 or 44.9%, while the remaining 55.1% is influenced by other independent variables were not examined in this study.influenced by other independent variables were not examined in this study
 Keywords: Leadership, Performance

Policing advance fee fraud (AFF)

Advance fee fraud (AFF) involves an offender using deceit to obtain a financial gain from the victim. The victim believes that by forwarding a sum of money, there will be a future ‘pay-off’. The most commonly witnessed forms of AFF perpetrated via the Internet include classic ‘Nigerian’ or ‘419’ scams, investment fraud and romance fraud. Because of the largely transnational nature of AFF offending, where the victim and offender typically reside in different parts of the world, police are adapting their traditional and reactive approaches to more innovative strategies to combat this crime more effectively. This article utilises a qualitative, semi-structured interview design to explore the experiences of police detectives involved in the implementation of an early intervention model with victims of AFF. The study highlights the challenges involved in developing effective police strategies to proactively reduce the duration and severity of this type of financial victimisation.