The Lack Of Moral Courage In Law Enforcement

In the United States, there are city, county, state, and national police forces. They have very difficult and dangerous responsibilities. These public servants are required to perform many different jobs. They enforce laws and maintain order. They teach people how to help prevent crime and to protect themselves ( Mittleman, 2000). They offer assistance and take charge of many different situations such as car accidents, flooding, and hurricanes. Police

Police officers have played a major role in society by protecting us from crime. Their responsibilities include not only preserving the peace, preventing criminal acts, enforcing the law, investigating crimes, and arresting those who violate the law but also directing traffic, community relations work, and controlling crowds at public events.

The role of police officers is very significant to American history. Police work toward protecting citizens’ rights and helping America become the land of the free. The United States of America is built from the U.S. Constitution Bill of Rights and police play a major role in making sure American rights are met. Evolution has changed many of American history for the better; policing is part of those changes. As new issues in society arise, police must change and adapt to protect and serve the public.

For as long as there have been Police Officers society has had to deal with misconduct and corruption in the institution. Through the nineteenth century, police officers became muscle employers used to violently end strikes. The rough police officiating and the racist Klu Klux Klan prompted the Civil Rights Act of 1871. The “anti-Klan bill”, intended to enforce both the Fourteenth Amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which was the first federal law passed defining United States citizenship and affirm that all citizens are equally protected by the law. The 1871 Civil Rights Act, “Section 1983 makes an officer liable for deliberately depriving any citizen of the United States of his or her Constitutional Rights.”(Prusinski,

Are police ever justified in committing illegal acts that violate others rights are they ever justified especially when there is no personal gain but for reasons that may seem to be about a higher purpose. This is the argument for noble cause corruption. This idea brings it to the end justifies the means thinking. If we start down this line where can it lead us? The idea that we can justify any action that would violate civil rights and other laws because we feel that our cause is noble and it is not being done for personal gain but the good of others can lead us into some dark places. The noble cause thinking is

Throughout history, there has been very few careers that require such a high degree of an ethical standard such as the one required for law enforcement. There is, however, a multitude of careers that require the dedication and heart such as required for a police member. Where this dedication and heart differs relies solely on the difference in the job. Officers are required to be aware of their surroundings nearly all the time as if something were to happen they would be required to navigate through the situation successfully. Somebody such as a CEO for a multimillion dollar company would not require this same quality due to the fact it is not part of their job description and the only individual that he/she needs to be worried about is themselves. However, in today’s society, and with media being an ever growing aspect, some police officers have decided on their own personal way to handle justice. So unfortunately, this small percentage of police contract a huge amount of negative eyes to the profession. This small number of individuals bring a negative view to the police department as a whole and for this cause an issue in the public’s eye. Regardless of what many individuals believe, many of the police officers decide on the ethical side of the job and are hardworking professionals who seek out to just serve the public. However, being an African American male myself the main issue I have and want to combat is the punishment officers should face if

Police officers are individuals who enforce the law upon their community to ensure that their citizens remain safe. In the past couple of years, officers of the law have been involved in acts of brutality that seem to go beyond the proper measurements of protection for their citizens. Policemen are supposed to protect their citizens from danger and from harm, not impose a threat on them. The fact that officers have a history of abusing their power indicates that their trust amongst the community has been corrupted. Those who have been affected of police brutality feel as though they have been deceived. They no longer feel that police officers will protect them, but rather abuse them, and that is a problem. We have began to live in a community in which an individual feels frightened when seeing a cop, rather than feeling protected. Some individuals may argue that police brutality is not a problem due to the fact that it is not consistent enough to catch the attention of needing a solution. However, that idea means little when the level of brutality has led to the death of several innocent victims in some cases. We must not wait for there to be a pattern of death at the hands of police officials to consider this a problem. One death indicates that preventive measures must be taken to ensure that these officers are no longer put in the position to abuse their power to begin with.

Police have many roles to take on an everyday basis. The main goal for an officer is to keep criminals off the streets and to try and maintain a safe environment for people to live. Many people disagree with some of the decisions officers make to enforce these rules and causes a lot of controversy. Today many people don't respect our police officers because of actions made by others. A major issue today is police use of force, stop and frisk.

Have you ever asked yourself what it would be like to become a police officer. Becoming a police officer isn’t an easy take because they have to risk their life everyday to protect and serve the community. They have to go through the dangers of arresting criminals when there is a chance that they could die. However, in today’s society only a small amount of police officers actually serve their community and protect citizens from danger. Right now, most police officers abuse their power to the point where they don’t seem to care for the safety of the community. They would usually arrest innocent people, make accusations, and even use their power as a source to show their dominance. If you think about, whenever you are stuck in traffic some

Have you ever asked yourself what it would be like to become a police officer. Becoming a police officer isn’t an easy take because they have to risk their life everyday to protect and serve the community. They have to go through the dangers of arresting criminals when there is a chance that they could die. However, in today’s society only a small amount of the police officers actually serves their community and protect citizens from danger. Right now, most police officers abuse their power to the point where they don’t seem to care for the safety of the community. They would usually arrest innocent people, make accusations, and even use their power as a source to show their dominance. If you think about, whenever you are stuck in traffic

New officers need to know that no profession demands a higher ethical standard than law enforcement. Whether or not there are other careers that require a similar dedication to doing the right thing, it is undeniable that there is a tremendous degree of expectations placed upon police officers. Every officer knows, or at least should know by now, that they live in a fishbowl. Friends, relatives, neighbors and strangers watch every move law enforcement officers make, both on and off duty. The fact is that the public scrutinizes police officers more than most other professions, either because they are cynical or hope to catch them screwing up or because they are hopeful

A great deal of society views law enforcement officers as heroic and honorable individuals, whose main purpose is to protect and serve the community. For many officers, this description is accurate, however for others; violence and brutality against innocent citizens is part of getting the job done. For years, minorities have fallen victim to police brutality based on racial profiling, stereotypes and other

Law enforcement leaders must be continually vigilant to ensure that the actions of their officers do not violate civil rights and do not compromise public support. The individual officer is granted a tremendous amount of authority and discretion to enforce the law. Their ultimate duty is to protect individual rights from being infringed upon by others in the community. They must never consider themselves above the law while executing their responsibility to enforce the law. This commitment is what distinguishes police in constitutionally based, democratic societies like ours from police in nondemocratic countries, where they are perceived as oppressive agents of a government whose main purpose is to restrict, rather than protect, the rights of civilians (International Association of Chiefs of Police, 2006).

To me, the mission of police officers is to protect and serve citizens of the community, not just “prevent crime and disorder” (Dempsey & Forst, 2016, p.7). Furthermore, I believe police officers making neighborhoods safe, getting drugs off the street, solving an array of criminal cases, among other duties shows the public the extent to which their local and state law enforcement officers are efficiently performing their job duties, not just crime being absent (Dempsey, 2016). If this was the case, police officers would never be perceived has having acceptable job performance. Crime is inevitable.

In this country we are seeing an increase in ethical violations in the field of law enforcement. I will go into detail about some of the main ethical issues we are seeing today and what can be done to prevent such acts from happening. When one officer is being unethical it has a huge effect on how the public views law enforcement as a whole. Many officers go undetected for a long time before getting caught, but an officer committing ethical violations will have their day it’s just a matter of time. In order to improve this growing problem we must first understand why there is such a problem in the field of law enforcement.