Police Discretion Research Paper

Everyday police officers are faced with two difficult decision to make. Whether to intervene in the situation and how to intervene when they observe something suspicious or illegal happening. Police discretion is defined as having the power to make decision, and choosing how to respond to a given situation depending on the circumstances. Even though, there are law in place it is still up to a police officer own discretion. Ultimately, police officers have the choice to enforce the law and how to carry it out in public. In the text book “Policing America” by Ken Peak he states that there are two criminal law in discretion. “the formality and the reality. The formality is found in the statute books and opinions of appellate courts; the reality is found in the practices of enforcement officers” (82). He also, demonstrate when should each criminal law be use. However, there are negative and positive aspects of police discretion. Also, there are pros and cons of allowing patrol officers to make discretionary decisions.

When enforcing the law, for police officers not two situations they encounter are ever the same, even when examine a large number of situations over an extended period of time. The officers are usually in the

To illustrate this imagine that two men get into a fight in Times Square. A nearby police officer notices the disturbance and attempts to separate the two men instead of arresting them on the spot. In this hypothetical situation the police officer needed to use discretion to decide how to best handle the situation. At times however, police discretion causes more problems than it resolves. There have been reports of police being called to a scene were a husband is being extremely aggressive towards his wife. The police feel as the situation that is occurring is not severe, and therefore leave the scene. The next day, the police station receives a call that there was a homicide. As they arrive to the scene, the police realized it was the same couple from day before.” The report details in-depth reviews of 84 cases in which 135 people died, including some instances of homicide-suicide — cases when abusers killed victims as well as themselves. In 48 of those 84 cases, police had previously responded to a domestic-violence call”- (WA Report: Criminal-Justice System Fails Domestic-Violence Victims). At times the unfettered use of discretion can lead to the denial of citizen rights, at times the unfettered use of discretion can lead to the denial of citizen rights, and cause many flaws in the justice system; for example, many communities might have different definitions of what constitutes criminal behavior or what

"Proper use of discretion is probably the most important measure of a police officer or department." -- Rich Kinsey (retired police detective)

In this essay a discussion will be explored about the benefits and problems associated with police use of discretion. Which current policing strategies have the most potential for controlling officer discretion and providing accountability, and which have the least, and why is that the case? And finally, how might these issues impact the various concerns facing law enforcement today?

Discretion is defined as the authority to make a decision between two or more choices (Pollock, 2010). More specifically, it is defined as “the capacity to identify and to document criminal and noncriminal events” (Boivin & Cordeau, 2011). Every police officer has a great deal of discretion concerning when to use their authority, power, persuasion, or force. Depending on how an officer sees their duty to society will determine an officer’s discretion. Discretion leads to selective enforcement practices and may result in discrimination against certain groups of people or select individuals (Young, 2011). Most police officer discretion is exercised in situations with individuals (Sherman, 1984).

Discretion is not doing as you please. Discretion is bounded by norms. The future of policing as a profession depends upon whether discretion can be put to good use. Two problems impending police professionalization, however, in that there are few uncontroversial areas in police work, than in other professions. Sometimes the public wants no enforcement, and other times they want strict enforcement. Citizens will scream false arrest in the first case, and some groups may file a write of mandamus in the second case.

Discretion in policing and the court system is a necessary and unavoidable facet of criminal justice work, yet it is still very controversial. Discretion exists when courtroom actors (police officers, attorneys, judges) have the flexibility to choose an appropriate response to a situation. Police discretion is defined as “The opportunity of law enforcement officers to exercise choice in their daily activities” (Nowacki, 2015). This means that actors with a great deal of discretion at their disposal may allow biases to affect their decision-making. These decisions lead to important implications throughout the criminal justice process, especially in the courtroom. The process begins with the decision to arrest by a law enforcement officer in the field. Once the case is forwarded to the prosecuting attorney, multifarious avenues of discretionary decisions are available to resolve a case. Potential issues that could arise and that are ever-present in everyday policing include racism, sexism and socialism (Miller, 2015). These issues ultimately have a negative affect on the criminal justice process, leading civilians to not trust the one process and actors that are there to help them. While discretion should play a role in the actions a courtroom actor takes and cannot be eliminated entirely, instead it should be limited and controlled throughout the criminal justice environment so that citizens can once again trust the process and so that there will be no disparities.

In my personal opinion, I think that the use of police discretion is very effective when enforcing laws. Sometimes when there is an emergency, it can look like a violation of some sort, but not until all the information is acquired by the officer is when he makes his decision based upon the facts in the situation. Police discretion is controversial, but the power granted to police officers makes the system and job more efficient. As long as police discretion is used adequately, it will be a proper form of enforcing the law.

The amount of force an officer use is influenced by police discretion (Wilson 1968). Discretion is when an individual use their own judgement to decide what the best course of action to take is.

But police officers are also taught to not use discretion all the time so that society can also learn to follow the law, so discretion cannot always be practiced because then it will give people the idea that they can do whatever they want. According to “Criminology Articles” on police discretion, it talks about there are three categories or variables on how it is used such as, offender’s variable, situation variables, and the system’s variables. Offender variable is when “aspects-are directly linked to the offender including their age, race, economic status, gender, and health among others” (Scott 1). This means when a police officer is using discretion, they are making decisions based on what someone looks like, what their financial background seems like, if they are young or if they are older, and if they are healthy. When it comes to situation variables, this depends on the “seriousness of the crime, the type of property involved in the crime, and who initiated the investigations” ( Scott ). This means depending on what crime was committed police will use discretion to make a decision depending on how serious the crime is and to see if any property damaged is involved. The last

Police officers are given a significant amount of discretion simply due to the nature of the job. Officers are faced with many threatening situations forcing them to react quickly, yet appropriately. They have the power to infringe upon any citizen’s rights to freedom and therefore they must use this power effectively. One major concern with the amount of discretion officers have is their power to decide when to use force or when to use lethal force. Manning (1997) argues that it is generally accepted that police should be allowed to use force. He also explains that there are an uncertain amount people who agree on as to what constitutes excessive force. The line

Police discretion by definition is the power to make decisions of policy and practice. Police have the choice to enforce certain laws and how they will be enforced. “Some law is always or almost always enforced, some is never or almost never enforced, and some is sometimes enforced and sometimes not” (Davis, p.1). Similarly with discretion is that the law may not cover every situation a police officer encounters, so they must use their discretion wisely. Until 1956, people thought of police discretion as “taboo”. According to http://faculty.ncwc.edu/toconnor/ 205/205lect09.htm, “The attitude of police administrators was that any deviation from accepted procedures was extralegal and probably a source of corruption.

In the United States of America, law enforcement has the ability to make their own judgement, while encountering criminals. Although discretion is at all levels of the police department, law enforcement agencies can easily make unlawful decision. Researchers determined that police officers are prohibited from using offensive language or speaking discourteously, abusing their authority, and using unnecessary force (Carroll, Kovath, & Pereira, 2004). Law enforcement officers are expected to respect their community and ensure that all citizens are kept safe. Some police activity can occur in a private view without supervision from the public, which allow police officers to make a reasonable decision. Police often make quick reaction when it comes

One aspect of the criminal justice system that has been debated for many years is that of police discretion. Police discretion is defined as the ability of a police officer, a prosecutor, a judge, and a jury to exercise a degree of personal decision making in deciding who is going to be charged or punished for a crime and how they are going to be punished. This basically is saying that there are situations when these law enforcement officers have to use their own personal beliefs and make choices coming from their own morals and ethics. The subject of police discretion was discovered in 1956 by the American Bar Foundation and has been an important problem in criminal justice since that time. When it