Open Law Enforcement Research Paper

The Virginia State Police has experienced a rise in staffing issues which include staffing shortages because of poor recruitment, an increase in retirements, poor salaries, and retention issues. However, these issues also occur in other counties around the country. Many local police officers execute their duties, along with the duties of the state police officers. Beyond the low salaries of police officers, the department lacks the proper equipment it needs to perform the jobs well. The lack of money, equipment, and resources has caused low employee morale, which resulted in many police officers quitting or retiring.

The Criminal Justice system, created by governments in order to make sure that no laws are being violated and to penalize individuals that violate the laws. In the United States there are many criminal justice systems. Each system works based on their jurisdiction. For example; city, county, federal or state. Every jurisdiction is different. They all have different ways of regulating certain processes. They also have their own laws. In the criminal justice system there are two main systems; state and federal. These two systems consists of five parts; corrections, courts, prosecution, law enforcement, and defense attorneys. Each of these five parts hold an extremely important role. Prosecutions consist of prosecutors who are lawyers the represent

Christopher E. Smith, Police Professionalism and the Rights of Criminal Defendants, 26 Crim. L. Bull. 155, 158 (1990)

When an officer of the law violates the law in which it enforces it creates mayhem and they lose the trust of the people. By obeying the laws just like the rest of the United States, they gain the social legitimacy that is needed in communities.

Fred is drunk and driving his dad’s car. Fred is a 21 year old student at Columbia College. Fred rams into a parked car at 10th and Rogers. Thinking no one saw him; Fred moves his car and parks it on an adjacent lot. He sprints to his dorm room in Miller Hall. A neighbor saw the wreck and Fred running to the dorm. Police are called and they arrive ten minutes after the wreck. The officers see several empty beer cans and a bottle of tequila (half full) in the front seat. The tags are traced to Fred’s dad, who is called by police. Dad says that Fred is a student at Columbia College. Police run Fred's record and determine that he has two prior DWIs within the past five years. The third DWI in 10 years is a felony. Police contact

Unfortunately, the financial trend that has been seen in policing will likely continue for the foreseeable future, which will not only limit the ability to confront these new critical issues, but will likely exacerbate them as well (Police Executive, 2013). It is also foreseeable that new state efforts to combat their overall economic struggles will serve as a critical issue with adverse policing affects as well. More and more states continue to modify their early release policies, putting criminals back onto the streets sooner and in greater numbers than ever before, which has caused police officials to almost unanimously report that they expect to see increases in their crime rates as a result (Police Executive, 2013).

The goal of the Sacramento State Police Department is “ to ensure that you are on one of the safest campuses in the CSU system” said by Sac State Chief of Police, Mark M. Iwasa. With the amount of incidents increasing more and more on college campuses, Michelle Cowee is taking her safety into her own hands.

7) The need to be in constant emotional control. Law enforcement officers have a job that requires extreme restraint under highly emotional circumstances. They are told when they are extremely excited, they have to act calm. They are told when they are nervous, they have to be in charge. They are taught to be stoic when emotional. They are to interact with the world in a role. The emotional constraint of the role takes tremendous mental energy, much more energy than expressing true emotions. When the energy drain is very strong, it may make the officer more prone to exhaustion outside of work, such as not wanting to participate in social or family life. This energy drain can also create a sense of job and social burnout.

The Department of Public Safety struggles to successfully recruit and train new cadets to keep up with vacant sworn positions. There are several contributing factors to this growing problem including the downturn in the economy and the freezing of state employee pay, increased attacks on law enforcement nationwide, and city and county entities providing higher wages to officers to attract officers away. The Department has been losing offers to retirement and to other law enforcement entities at a rate of about 100 officers per year.

In addition, police officer exposed to high levels of stress relate to their job have been at an increased risk for adverse health problems, including depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder, (Grant & Terry, 2012).

Today in law enforcement officers face an array of problems that can cause them to lose motivation in their job. Officers who are fresh out of the police academy have ambition and are eager to work. The longer a patrol officer is on the streets they face different situations like civil unrest, bad media attention, dealing with criminals, watching other officers and citizens die. At what point do officers loose motivation and are no longer excited to be a law enforcement officer?   Research Question: 1.

more with less. Many police departments have had to lay off officers, and some have eliminated

Law enforcement training is a very intensive and comprehensive process. The purpose of such training is to provide the candidates with the best knowledge, skills, and understanding of the law enforcement duties and responsibilities. There are three main areas of training: physical activity, academic knowledge, and firearms training that are crucial to their profession. Here the physical activity training will be discussed briefly. Ideal physical health and physical training standards are two most critical requirements in law enforcement training.

Over the last several years, most police departments have been facing numerous financial challenges. The main reason is law enforcement agencies are expected to do more with less and the stagnant economy. The combination of these factors has been placing pressure on many departments to begin imposing budget cuts. Evidence of this can be seen with a survey that was conducted by the University of North Carolina. They found that 67% of police departments made some kind of budget cuts for 2011. The most severe reductions were occurring in large police departments such as Los Angeles, Atlanta and Detroit. (Delfem, 2011, pp. 199 - 205) This is illustrating one of the most pressing issues affecting a wide variety of police departments across the country. To fully understand what is happening requires: examining the situation, how they are able to interact with other agencies (i.e. state / federal) and recommending the way this relationship can be improved. Together, these elements will offer specific insights about how police departments can effectively address this problem.

What are the standards in Police Ethics? By definition it is the Rules of conduct recognized in respect to police actions when dealing with a class of people, person or a particular group, culture, etc. In all the research I have done, books, articles and research papers I have read, I am hard pressed to find an ethicist without a political agenda or pure racist opinion, who believes that the policies should stand as written.