Policing and Discretion
by Examines and discusses the use and abuse of police discretion.
Investigation
Officers can also exersice discresion by choosing what investation tacts to use or not to use in response to a situation. Officer may choose to employ or not to employ special investigation tactics, units, and equeptment. For example, and officer may discover a minimal amout of narcotics on a suspect and choose not to make an arrest, but to remove the narcotics from the suspects posestion and use the suspect as a decoy to make an arrest that could potentally remove a larger quantity of narcotics off the streets. During the course of the mentioned senerio, an officer may additonally make a discretion based discision as to whether or not to seek authorization for such practices (Scott, 2005).
Traffic Violations
Discresiton exersiced during minor traffic stops may be the most common situation in dealings with law enforcment. Most individuals suspected of commiting a traffic violation cling to the hope that the responding officer may exert their discrestionary authority in their favor. An officer has the authority to issue a citation for speeding, improper movement, seat belt violation, vehicle damage or malfuction, or all of the above. At the same time an officer has the authority to issue a warning as a response to traffic violaitons in lieu of issuing a citation (Dantzker, 2003). In regard to ethical concerns pertaining to discretion, this particular use of discretion may fail to make it under the microscope.
Public Safety
In situations that involve the safty of the public as a whole and do not call for individualizaition, the police must use discretion to determine the proper course of action to take or not to take (Scott, 2005). For example, in a riot situation officers may find it necessary to control the crowd as a whole instead of controlling individuals; therefore, implementing tactical equiptment and measures to assist in asserting such controll. Officers must weigh the specific public safety situation against the desired outcome, which is to avoid mass disruption and possible injury to officers and citizens alike.
The above examples are reasonable uses of discretion from a realist standpoint. Jails and correctional institutions are overcrowed with offenders serving lengthy sentence; the majority being drug related offense (Gebelein, 2004). The concept of full enforcment, in action, would be too far fecthed taking into account the realistic outcome of implementation. The funding and resourcfulness required to enact and maintain full enforcment on a nation wide scale would prove to be astronomical. The only element of discretion realistically worthy of control would be the use of force and deadly force, which currently have regularoty and accoutabilty attachments and repercussion pertaining to missuse (Dantzker, 2003).
References
Gebelein, R., S., (2004). Drug Courts Are a Promising Solution to the Drug Problem. In Tamara L. Roleff Opposing Viewpoints: The War on Drugs.San Diego: Greenhaven Press. Retrieved May 1, 2008, from Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center via Gale: http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS
McCormick, C. (Jan 1993). Police Intervention in Marital Violence. Canadian Journal of Criminology, 35, n1. p.79-83. Retrieved September 16, 2008, from General OneFile via Gale:http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS
Scott, M.. (2005). Police Discretion. In Larry Sullivan & Marie Rosen (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Law Enforcement, Vol. 1: State and Local (pp. 337-339). Thousand Oaks: Sage Reference. Retrieved September 13, 2008, from Gale Virtual Reference Library via Gale:
http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS
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