Views Of Police Officers Research Articles

Organizational Structure and Its Connection with the Justice Views of Police Officers

Organizational Structure and Its Connection with the Justice Views of Police Officers

Are Memories of Use-of-Force Incidents Altered When Police Officers View Their Body-Worn Camera Footage?

For evaluations of police conduct, the Supreme Court of the United States ruling in Graham v. Connor (1989) sets the standard for deciding if an officer’s use of force was reasonable and justified. The “reasonableness” criterion, according to this ruling, must be “judged from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene, rather than with the 20/20 vision of hindsight.” How should “the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene” be evaluated? The results of research indicate that viewing their body-worn camera (BWC) footage of a use-of-force incident can alter officers’ memory for what occurred during the incident, and so their perception of the event after viewing the video may be different from their actual perception “on the scene”. If an officer’s event memory is to be used to determine whether their use of force was justified, then it is important to ensure that these memories are not altered by viewing their BWC footage, which we now know can be a powerful source of post-event suggestion.

The Views of Police Officers Toward Gun Legislation and Public Health Policies Driven by Firearm Safety Concerns.

Gun violence is a principal cause of premature death in America. It has been suggested that solutions to gun violence may be found using a public health approach, which is broader than dealing with the problem via law enforcement alone. A component of a public health approach to gun violence is the implementation of policies or laws. Unfortunately, there is a serious gap in our understanding of how street-level police officers view proposed or existing firearms legislation. This is an important omission, because it is line-level personnel who are tasked with enforcing these policies within highly discretionary contexts. We surveyed police from three jurisdictions to establish a baseline understanding of officers' views about potential gun legislation and identify possible resistance and implementation barriers of firearms laws. The findings suggest that those responsible for enforcing new laws show limited or mixed support for the same. Officers were most supportive of laws that increase the presence of trained gun owners within certain contexts and ensure that individuals with criminal backgrounds or mental health concerns do not have access to firearms. Most officers support prohibiting gun ownership following conviction of a domestic violence offense. However, officers generally opposed gun legislation banning assault weapons, large capacity magazines, and internet ammunition purchases. Finally, officers with the Buffalo Police Department-which recently had experienced an active-shooter event-were more supportive of almost all types of legislation. Respondents expressing greater concern about officer safety related to firearms were supportive of several types of firearm legislation.

Police body-worn cameras and privacy: Views and concerns of officers and citizens

Police body-worn cameras (BWC) have been lauded for their potential to increase transparency and accountability by documenting officers’ actions and interactions with citizens. However, despite their widespread use in recent years, several law enforcement agencies have been hesitant to adopt this technology because of privacy concerns. This article explores the views of police officers and citizens from the Canadian province of Quebec towards the use of BWCs. Specifically, it seeks to: (a) understand how officers feel about being monitored by BWCs and (b) assess citizens’ privacy concerns towards police BWCs. A mixed-method research design was used, including interviews and focus groups with 78 police officers, including 46 officers from four pilot sites, and a telephone survey of 1609 residents from the same sites. The results show that officers are concerned about the potential effects of BWCs on their privacy and the privacy of the public. One major area of concern is the impact it may have on their work performance and the use of adaptative measures that support them in carrying out challenging duties. By contrast, most citizens have no reservations about being recorded by a BWC. Certain individual characteristics—such as age and perceptions of the police—however, were associated with heightened privacy concerns. Without neglecting citizens’ privacy, this study provides insights into the development of BWC policies that preserve officers’ right to privacy and ability to fulfill their duty.

Police officer perceptions towards drug liberalization policies in the context of an overdose crisis in British Columbia, Canada

Background British Columbia, Canada, is experiencing an overdose crisis that has pushed drug liberalization policies to the forefront of the response. This study examines police officers’ perceptions of enforcement and drug liberalization policies, including support for decriminalization and regulation or ‘safer supply’, in this context. Methods Qualitative interview data were collected in September-November 2020 from active police officers involved in drug law enforcement in British Columbia, prior to decriminalization reforms being introduced in the province. We conducted a thematic analysis of this data with a focus on police officer views towards drug enforcement and drug liberalization policies. Results Policing and reforms amid the overdose crisis has shaped officer perceptions and actions towards illegal drugs and drug policies. Although officers saw overdose as a health issue, these views coincided with a strong emphasis on supply-side policing, such as drug trafficking investigations. Policing continues to be entrenched in the overdose crisis, which has impacted the way police officers view drugs and drug use, particularly, their belief that current interventions to disrupt the illegal drug market are not working. Conclusion This study advances knowledge on the motivations for promoting drug enforcement, and enacting drug policies, in the context of an overdose crisis.

Police Stigma toward People with Opioid Use Disorder: A Study of Illinois Officers

Background Fatal opioid overdoses continue to break historical records. Stigma toward people with opioid use disorder (OUD) can negatively impact treatment access, retention, and recovery. Attitudes and beliefs of police officers can profoundly shape key discretionary decisions. Therefore, we examined police officer views indicating stigma toward those with OUD. Objectives We administered an online survey to select Illinois police departments using a stratified random sampling strategy with a final sample of 248 officers from 27 police departments. We asked officers questions measuring stigmatizing attitudes toward people with OUD including distrust, blame, shame, and fear. We found officers held somewhat stigmatizing views with a mean score of 4.0 on a scale of 1 (least stigmatic) to 6 (most stigmatic). Results Regression results showed certain officer characteristics were associated with more stigmatizing attitudes of blaming and distrust of those with OUD, including gender, education, race, years in policing, and department size. Conclusions/Importance Since most officers in the sample held at least some stigmatizing views toward people with OUD, this may impede the feasibility and acceptability of criminal justice interventions meant to improve behavioral health, such as police deflection programs that link people who use drugs to treatment in lieu of arrest. Departments should offer officer training and education on substance use disorders, treatment for addiction, and the potential for a person’s recovery. Training should allow officers to hear directly from, or learn about, personal experiences of people who use drugs and have been in recovery, as this type of interaction has been shown to reduce stigma.

'An accident waiting to happen' - experiences of police officers, paramedics, and mental health clinicians involved in 911-mental health crises: a cross-sectional survey.

Police and ambulance staff are increasingly asked to help people experiencing mental health crises, but they often feel under-prepared. The single frontline service approach is time-intensive and risks a coercive pathway to care. The emergency department is the default location for transfers by police or ambulance involving a person involved in a mental health crisis, despite being viewed as suboptimal. Police and ambulance staff struggled keeping up with the mental health demand, reporting inadequate mental health training, little enjoyment and negative experiences when trying to access help from other services. Most mental health staff had adequate mental health training and enjoyed their work, but many experienced difficulties getting help from other services. Police and ambulance staff found it hard to work with mental health services. The combination of limited training, poor interagency referral processes, and difficulties accessing support from mental health services means that when police and ambulance services attend mental health crises alone, distress may be heightened and prolonged. Enhanced mental health training for first responders and more streamlined referral processes may improve process and outcomes. Mental health nurses have key skills that could be utilized in assisting police and ambulance staff who attend 911 emergency mental health calls. New models such as co-response teams, whereby police, mental health clinicians and ambulance staff respond conjointly should be trialled and evaluated. INTRODUCTION: First responders are increasingly called to assist people experiencing mental health crises but little research exists canvassing multi-agency perspectives of such work. To understand the views of police officers, ambulance and mental health staff attending mental health or suicide-related crises in Aotearoa New Zealand and to discover how they experience current models of cross-agency collaboration. A descriptive cross-sectional survey involving mixed methods. Quantitative data were analysed using descriptive statistics and free text by content analysis. Participants included 57 police officers, 29 paramedics and 33 mental health professionals. Mental health staff felt adequately trained, but only 36% described good processes for accessing inter-agency support. Police and ambulance staff felt undertrained and unprepared. Accessing mental health expertise was considered difficult by 89% of police and 62% of ambulance staff. Frontline services struggle managing mental health-related 911 emergencies. Current models are not working well. Miscommunication, dissatisfaction and distrust exist between police, ambulance and mental health services. The single-agency frontline response may be detrimental to service users in crisis and under-utilizes the skills of mental health staff. New ways of inter-agency cooperation are required, such as co-located police, ambulance and mental health nurses responding in partnership.

Crime prevention in Colombia: A pilot study

ABSTRACT A need to develop effective crime prevention strategies has been recognised throughout history. Due to the financial constraints of criminal justice systems, there are major global efforts to ensure that the strategies employed are highly cost-effective, rational, and evidence-based. To aid such efforts, this study explores the impact of a collaborative, community-oriented crime prevention initiative in Colombia. Empirically, it is based on pre- and post-intervention views of police officers and citizens (assessed by questionnaires) in areas covered by the initiative and control areas, complemented with focus group interviews and crime statistics. The police officers appreciated the greater autonomy provided by the approach and associated changes in organisational culture. The citizens had substantial trust in the police, despite high perceptions of general disorder and personal fear of crime. The preliminary findings indicate that the approach has had some promising effects, but several aspects require more attention.

A comparative study of the police officer views on policing during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States

PurposeThis study adds to the developing literature on how coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) affected policing. Unlike prior research, which focused on police agencies, the authors focus on the perceptions and experiences of police officers. Specifically, about changes in workload or activities during the peak of the pandemic compared to prior to the pandemic. Additionally, officers report on changes in potential second-order effects resulting in changes from the pandemic.Design/methodology/approachThe data come from the survey responses of 167 police officers from seven police agencies of various sizes from around the USA. The authors assessed mean level differences between organizations using a general linear model/ANOVA approach and report a standardized effect size.FindingsThere is a considerable heterogeneity in police officers' perceptions of organizational and operational changes made by their police agencies in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The results show that perceptions of some changes were more strongly by the agency than were others. The study’s results show there are substantive differences in how police officers from different police agencies viewed these operational and organizational changes (i.e. between agency differences). Most of the variance was primarily explained by differences between police officers within the same agency (i.e. within organization differences).Originality/valueThis study moves beyond the monolithic approach to studying how the pandemic affected the police agency and moves to asking officers about their experiences with these changes and the second-order effects of these changes.

Police Officers’ addiction frameworks and policy attitudes

Police officers have frequent encounters with people who use drugs, either by making an arrest for a drug-related offense or responding to a drug overdose call. Yet, little is known about how police officers view drug addiction – as a disease, a moral failure, or something else – and how their frameworks for conceptualizing addiction impact their attitudes toward drug policies, including the use of naloxone. This research examined police officers’ adherence to a moralistic addiction framework in relation to their support for treatment-oriented drug policies. Officers (N = 618) were surveyed about their beliefs on drug policy and the extent to which drug addiction was a product of one’s morals or related to social or biological reasons. Results found that approximately 22% of the variance in drug policy attitudes could be explained by addiction frameworks and control variables. Officers who embraced a biological perspective of addiction were more supportive of policies that expanded treatment, including access to naloxone, and less punitive sanctions. Those with stronger moralistic views were less supportive of expanding treatment initiatives and endorsed expanding punitive sanctions. Officer age and education was positively related with expanding treatment and naloxone use while exposure to overdoses was negatively related to policy support. These results demonstrate that officers’ frameworks about drug addiction play an important role in drug policy attitudes and, by extension, how they might interact with people who use drugs.

Inside and outside views of the Croatian police

ABSTRACT This paper explores public views about police integrity and contrasts them with the police views about police integrity. It also compares citizen and police officer views about the police. A modified version of the police integrity survey, containing 14 hypothetical vignettes describing various forms of police misconduct, was distributed to both students and police officers in Croatia. The respondents in the study, 1,142 police officers from Croatia and 450 students from the University of Zagreb, shared their views of how serious most police officers would evaluate misconduct, the expected discipline, and whether they would report the described misconduct. The results suggest not only that students expressed less positive views of the police than police officers themselves did, but also that students expressed attitudes associated with somewhat lower integrity than police officers did.

The changing perceptions of St. Lucian policing: how St. Lucian police officers view contemporary policing

ABSTRACT The article explores the changes in St. Lucian society and how they inform current policing attitudes and practice based on interviews with police officers. It critically outlines the history of policing in St. Lucia and provides evidence that challenges popular notions about colonial policing. The article examines how the rise in crime has exposed the fundamental failings of the Royal St. Lucian Police Force (RSLPF) and the changing nature of police work. It elucidates that the primary legacy of colonialism on the workings and practices of the RSLPF is a dysfunctional culture of supervision and management that adversely affects most aspects of policing and the ability to effectively fight crime.

Seeing and Doing Gender at Work: A Qualitative Analysis of Canadian Male and Female Police Officers

This qualitative study examines the ways in which male and female police officers view and enact gender in their workplace. Data were generated from in-depth interviews with 20 active police officers working in a populous Canadian province. Although most male officers deny gender differences and gender bias, female officers describe experiences of workplace sexism and deploy adaptive strategies daily in their workplaces to resist gender inequality. Both men and women describe a masculine-coded ideal police officer and disparage the “old police culture” and “old boy’s club.”

What Made Reading Dangerous in Eighteenth-Century France?

Abstract This article approaches reading by comparing the views of police officers and physicians in eighteenth-century France. Both had a vested interest in readers as part of their professional duties. Contrary to expectations, anxiety about reading cut across the ideological divisions of the Enlightenment. When we situate the police perspective on the dangers of reading in this broader conversation, we see their repressive activities in a new light. What distinguished their views from those of doctors, who targeted reading as a public health problem for medical intervention, was not their conviction that reading required regulation but their understanding of fiction and its effects. The police located the dangers of reading outside the text, not inside it. Reading fueled conversations, speculations, and the production of more texts. By contrast, the doctors warned about the absorptive powers of fiction and moved the danger zone inside the individual's imagination. This analysis suggests that attitudes toward reading revealed doubts about the human capacity for self-government that guided both royal officials and men of science in their diagnosis of social life.

Challenges for Police Leadership: Identity, Experience, Legitimacy and Direct Entry

The police service in England and Wales has developed a new approach to police leadership where individuals from outside of the police service can now enter directly to leadership ranks. Previous research identified that officers place great value on being led by someone who has experience of being a police officer. Adopting a social identity perspective, the current paper reports on quantitative and qualitative data about police officer views on direct entry and existing police leadership captured as part of a wider national survey (N = 12,549) of police officers in England and Wales. The paper identifies the importance that shared identity and credibility play in police follower/leadership relationships. It argues that direct-entry police leaders face credibility issues linked to their lack of shared police identity but also that serving officers perceive existing leaders to be poor because they believe they have forgotten what it is like to be a police officer. This paper develops a new theoretical and empirical approach to police leadership utilizing social and organizational psychology theory and research. The paper suggests that if police leaders understand police identity, then they can create propitious conditions within which police officers will follow their leaders.

What are the factors that contribute to road accidents? An assessment of law enforcement views, ordinary drivers’ opinions, and road accident records

What are the main contributing factors to road accidents? Factors such as inexperience, lack of skill, and risk-taking behaviors have been associated with the collisions of young drivers. In contrast, visual, cognitive, and mobility impairment have been associated with the collisions of older drivers. We investigated the main causes of road accidents by drawing on multiple sources: expert views of police officers, lay views of the driving public, and official road accident records. In Studies 1 and 2, police officers and the public were asked about the typical causes of road traffic collisions using hypothetical accident scenarios. In Study 3, we investigated whether the views of police officers and the public about accident causation influence their recall accuracy for factors reported to contribute to hypothetical road accidents. The results show that both expert views of police officers and lay views of the driving public closely approximated the typical factors associated with the collisions of young and older drivers, as determined from official accident records. The results also reveal potential underreporting of factors in existing accident records, identifying possible inadequacies in law enforcement practices for investigating driver distraction, drug and alcohol impairment, and uncorrected or defective eyesight. Our investigation also highlights a need for accident report forms to be continuously reviewed and updated to ensure that contributing factor lists reflect the full range of factors that contribute to road accidents. Finally, the views held by police officers and the public on accident causation influenced their memory recall of factors involved in hypothetical scenarios. These findings indicate that delay in completing accident report forms should be minimised, possibly by use of mobile reporting devices at the accident scene.

Police officers’ trust in criminal justice

This study attempts to gain a clearer view of police officers’ beliefs about criminal justice and the factors that may contribute to their lack of trust in it. It is based on both qualitative interviews and an electronic survey of police officers in the Netherlands. The study shows that Netherlands’ police officers are generally highly critical of the criminal justice system. They complain that prosecutors and judges frequently let them down. Their negative views concentrate on the practices of criminal evidence, sentencing, and pre-trial detention. The negative views of police officers do not only result from their experience of specific failures of criminal justice, but also reflect a cynical police subculture. The notion of street justice may be important to understand the officers’ frustrations and their negative views on the practices of public prosecutors and the courts.

Comparing Police and Public Perceptions of a Routine Traffic Encounter

Police perceptions of procedural justice are less well understood than citizen perceptions. Our paper compares the views of police officers and citizens of a routine Australian policing encounter, the Random Breath Test. We examine perceptions of two versions of their encounter: a business as usual and a more explicitly procedurally just interaction. Our results indicate that the procedurally just version affected the views of police officers, but not drivers, regarding the reasons for conducting Random Breath Tests. It also appears that police officers believe that the encounter has a greater impact on drivers’ views than the drivers report themselves. This study has important implications for policing as it demonstrates that incorporating procedural justice within police-citizen interactions affects police officers as well as the citizens. It also highlights the importance of using external (e.g., larger community) measures, in addition to internal measures (e.g., within police organization), when assessing the effectiveness of police organizations to ensure a more complete picture.

The Laws Have Changed, But What About the Police? Policing Domestic Violence in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Despite having received gender sensitivity and domestic violence (DV) education in the post-war reformation era, anecdotal evidence from across Bosnia and Herzegovina indicates that most police officers view DV as a private family affair and continue to hold negative attitudes toward women and DV victims. This study assessed these claims by examining gender and DV attitudes held by 137 Bosnian police officers. It was hypothesized that officers who received DV training would be less likely to hold sexist attitudes toward women or view DV as justifiable compared with untrained officers. Results, as well as policy implications and suggestions for future research, are presented.

The state of police integrity in Armenia: findings from the police integrity survey

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to study the extent and nature of police integrity in Armenia. It analyses police officer views about misconduct seriousness, appropriate and expected discipline, and willingness to report misconduct.Design/methodology/approachThe respondents surveyed in this study are 468 Armenian police officers assigned to work in two large police departments, Yerevan and Lori. The overall response rate is 84 per cent. The respondents evaluated 11 hypothetical scenarios describing cases of police misconduct.FindingsAlthough the majority of the respondents recognized and labelled the behaviour described in the scenarios as rule violating, a large proportion, in some cases even above 40 per cent, did not do so. The respondents’ evaluations of misconduct seriousness varied greatly across the scenarios. In only two scenarios, describing the acceptance of a bribe from a speeding motorist and the theft of a watch from a crime scene, the respondents thought that both the appropriate and expected discipline should and would be severe; in all of the other scenarios, the respondents expected and approved of either no discipline at all or quite lenient discipline. The code of silence appears to be strong among our respondents, protecting almost all behaviours described in the questionnaire. Unique to Armenia is the finding that the respondents estimated that they would subscribe to the code of silence to a larger extent than their fellow officers would.Research limitations/implicationsPolice officers included in the survey come from two police departments.Practical implicationsPolice administrators interested in controlling the code of silence could apply the methodology used in this research to ascertain the extent and nature of the code beforehand. They could use the methodology to assess and compare the police officer perceptions of the discipline the agency is expected to mete out with the discipline meted out in actual cases and, if necessary, work on addressing the discrepancy between the perceptions and reality.Originality/valueAlthough Armenia has been one of the former Soviet republics that purged the communist government even before the breakdown of the Soviet Union, the transition toward democracy has been troublesome and riddled with widespread accusations of various types of failures in police integrity. The methodology used in this research enables measurement of the nature and extent of police integrity at the present time and also, subsequently, monitoring and detection of the changes in police integrity, which is particularly relevant for a police agency in transition.