Policing Matters

A trend in retail sales is to instruct employees to not attempt to stop a shoplifter. Such “no pursuit” policies among retailers have implications for police. Principally, this turns a responding officer into little more than a report taker, not an enforcer of the law. Further, those same stores that refuse to prevent the loss of products to theft simultaneously demand that officers be more present in their neighborhoods to prevent criminal activity. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss the impact that private sector “no pursuit” policies have on public sector police.

While attending ILEETA 2018 in Saint Louis in late March, I heard from multiple reliable sources that at least one nearby restaurant had something of a “sick out” among employees when they learned that the hotel next door was hosting some 800 of the most elite law enforcement trainers and educators in North America. Subsequently, service at the restaurant was impossibly slow. I didn’t experience this first hand, but enough people told the same story, so I tend to believe it. Some restaurants and other establishments refuse to serve cops. Worse, some places serve the police, but with some pretty vulgar extra ingredients. Meanwhile, some big restaurant chains go out of their way to warmly welcome police patrons. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss the issues related to meals on your tour.

The year is 1983. A University of California Santa Barbara student named Marcy Nicholas is stalked by an ex-boyfriend and brutally murdered. A week after Marsy was murdered, her mother and brother are confronted by the accused murderer in a grocery store. They had no idea that he had been released on bail. Dr. Henry Nicholas — the key backer and proponent of Marsy’s Law — notes that criminals have more than 20 individual rights spelled out in the U.S. Constitution, while the surviving family members of murder victims have none. States such as California, Illinois, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Ohio are considering — or have already passed — laws and Constitutional amendments that address this disparity. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss issues related to victims’ rights (or lack thereof).

Recently, Sacramento police officers were investigating reports of a man who had been smashing car windows and was bounding fences in people’s backyards. In the body camera footage released soon after the OIS, one can hear an officer shouting, “Show me your hands! Stop!” The subject continued to flee. The officers continued their pursuit. Upon making contact with the individual, one cop shouted “Show me your hands! Gun! gun! gun!” Both officers opened fire. What Stephon Clark had in his hands was not a gun — it was a mobile phone — but in the dark during a rapidly unfolding, high-stress situation such as this, an objectively reasonable (Graham v. Connor) officer could easily have perceived a weapon. The family is calling for criminal prosecution of the officers. Protesters shut down an NBA game in Sacramento in response to the shooting. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss how the mainstream news outlets and social media — along with the efforts of organized groups — creates such an uproar after an o

United States Attorney General Jeff Sessions recently issued a one-page memo calling for death penalty for drug dealers when it is “appropriate.” Sessions asked prosecutors to seek the death penalty for drug-related offenses as part of an effort to combat the opioid crisis. The memo said, in part, “Drug traffickers, transnational criminal organizations, and violent street gangs all contribute substantially to this scourge. To combat this deadly epidemic, federal prosecutors must consider every lawful tool at their disposal.” According to a Quinnipiac University poll taken just days after the release of the memo, 71 percent of Americans queried on the subject oppose such a policy. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss whether or not such a policy targeting “large-scale drug dealers” might become a judicial quagmire.

April is Child Abuse Awareness Month. Police are among the people who are “mandatory reporters” of suspected abuse or neglect. Abuse can take many forms — from physical harm to emotional damage. One relatively unknown form of child abuse is Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) — the practice of the removal of a female’s clitoris and labia. Women in places like Dijibouti, Egypt, Guinea, Mali, Northern Sudan, Sierra Leone, and Somalia have undergone this brutal “procedure.” Astonishingly, this brutal form of child abuse is becoming prevalent in the United States. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss how police should respond to reports of FGM.

At a crime scene, patrol officers, investigators, and others need to do a lot of things simultaneously. They must create and maintain an inner and outer perimeter, ensuring that access is only given to those who warrant it. They must begin a crime scene log and maintain it all the way through. They must preserve evidence, and make note of how evidence may have been affected by responding EMTs and/or firefighters. In this podcast episode, Jim and Doug discuss the best practices for ensuring that the scene is processed thoroughly and properly.

A study by two professors from the School of Professional Psychology at Pacific University examined 47 officers with an average tenure of nearly 14 years from police departments around the Pacific Northwest who engaged in exercises designed to enhance their physiological and psychological resilience. They practiced body-awareness exercises, mindful movement, martial arts exercises, and meditating while walking, sitting, and eating. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss what “mindfulness” really is, and how it can benefit officers and organizations.

The most fundamental aspect of community policing is having cops personally and proactively interacting with the community. That’s mighty difficult to do when you have two thousand pounds of police cruiser wrapped around you, with the windows rolled up and the radio chirping. In recent years, we’ve seen many agencies increase their foot patrols, especially in downtown business districts where there is a lot of pedestrian traffic, and the sidewalk presence of police officers can help to prevent everything from cell phone theft to shoplifting. However, there are other alternatives to explore. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss the ways in which police can remain mobile for rapid response, and yet also remain available for affable conversation with the average citizen.

JD “Buck” Savage humorously taught officers to write accurate reports when he said, “Saw drunk. Arrested same.” Thorough, well-written reports get results. Sloppy reports with a dearth of information let the guilty run free. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss best practices for report writing, and ponder what the future holds, as artificial intelligence and body-worn cameras may one day lead to semi-autonomous report writing or even fully-autonomous report writing.

The shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida was a failure of law enforcement from start to finish. In January, the FBI received tips that the 19-year-old shooter had expressed a disturbing desire to kill people both verbally and in social media posts. The FBI did nothing. There are reports that as many as 39 calls were made to the Broward County Sheriff's Office about the kid-turned-killer. Many of those calls included details about how the gunman spoke of his desire to “shoot up the school.” In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss the fact that, while we cannot have cops snatching people up like “Thinkpol” did in Oceania, or looking for “Precogs” from Minority Report, with such an abundance of inbound calls about an individual, further action should have been taken.

Following the tragedy at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, there have been renewed calls for arming teachers who qualify mentally, emotionally, and physically to carry a concealed firearm. Any such program would require careful vetting, police training, constant re-evaluation of the people and the program itself. There would need to be budget put aside for everything from the guns and ammo to the administration of the program. That having been said, three states are now considering legislation to allow teachers to be armed. The president has called for arming teachers and has the power by executive fiat to make it happen. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss whether or not American schools should remain “gun free zones.”

Research from Force Science Institute reveals that in order to get the most accurate and detailed information from officer-involved shootings or other high-intensity events, officers should be allowed a recovery period of at least 48 hours before being interviewed in depth about the incident by IA or criminal investigators. Further, the manner in which the interview should be conducted should not be adversarial or confrontational — instead, a process called the cognitive interview should be used. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss some ways in which police agencies can improve the way cops are treated following a critical incident.

Until fairly recently, FAA regulations seemed somewhat unclear about exactly when and how law enforcement agencies can use UAVs. Now that there is a little deeper understanding of the legal parameters, police agencies are beginning to adopt the technology. The most obvious use for a UAV in law enforcement is for search and rescue operations. Drones can get under the canopy of thickly wooded areas and see what officers in a helicopter could not. Further, this technology can be helpful in standoff situations and other incidents where getting “eyes on” from a distance provides a tactical advantage for police. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss the ways in which police can use UAVs.

Recently, a news item appeared on PoliceOne about eight police cadets who were injured during defensive tactics training at their academy. This sort of thing is not terribly uncommon. Police training is necessarily difficult, and comes with some degree of danger. But the question becomes, how can police conduct training (both academy and in-service) that is as close to reality as possible, but still safe enough that injuries are minimized? In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss the different options police have at their disposal to mitigate this matter.

You have the right to free speech. But being a cop is not a right — it is a privilege. That privilege can be taken away from you in the event that you conduct yourself in any way deemed to reflect poorly on the department. This is particularly true of incendiary statements made on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and the like. Cops are held to a higher standard than other government employees and speech on social media is included in that higher standard. As Supreme Court Justice Holmes said way back in 1892, “The petitioner may have a Constitutional right to talk politics, but he has no Constitutional right to be a policeman.” However, the Court has also recently ruled in offices’ favor, saying that some agency policies contain unconstitutionally overbroad prior restraint on protected speech. Jim and Doug discuss some of the pitfalls of posting your opinions to the Internet, as well as some of the nuances of coming up with a solid policy that’s beneficial to all parties.

Most thoughtful police leaders know that they are in perpetual peril that something so monumentally ugly goes down in their jurisdiction that cable satellite trucks will rain from the sky and take up residence in the parking lot of the nearest big-box store. Whether it is an officer-involved shooting or an active shooter event, the cameras will be rolling and the story will be you and your agency. How do you prepare for this? Jim and Doug discuss some ways to ready yourself and your department.

Police officers at the line level can demonstrate leadership just as much as the chief in the big office. In fact, line level officers and their immediate supervisors are the raw materials from which the most visible forms of police leadership are formed. What does it take to turn street leadership skills into promotions in rank and responsibility? Jim and Doug discuss the traits of a good leader, no matter what rank they’ve attained.

Under federal law, marijuana is illegal. Meanwhile, 30 states and the District of Columbia currently have laws legalizing marijuana for either medical or recreational use. This discord puts the Justice Department in a legal bind. Under President Obama, Deputy Attorney General James Cole drafted a memo saying that the Feds would defer to state and local agencies to enforce their own marijuana laws, with federal involvement directed only at drug cartels and activity in states where pot was still illegal. But in the first week of 2018, the mainstream media reported that Attorney General Jeff Sessions plans to lift those Obama-era restrictions on Federal enforcement of drug laws in jurisdictions that have voted to legalize marijuana. However, Sessions stopped short of directly encouraging U.S. prosecutors to bring marijuana cases. Jim and Doug discuss the ramifications of the new position of the DOJ.

The gunman in the Las Vegas shooting in October reportedly had equipped several AR-15 rifles with what is called a bump stock, which effectively turns a semi-automatic rifle into a weapon capable of automatic fire. Following that tragedy, there has been a great deal of discussion around the legitimate purpose a bump stock might have, as well as the need for a gun owner to equip their firearms with a suppressor. In this podcast segment, Jim and Doug discuss those issues as well as the emerging threats posed by 3-D printers and so-called ghost guns.