In reviewing my lifestyle and daily routine activities, I am very aware of how criminal think due to my career in law enforcement. I feel that the most dangerous things that I do in terms of exposing myself to criminals and entering hot-spot zones are traveling late at night or in the early morning. By being in law enforcement for the past twenty years, I try to alleviate coming into contact with a lot of people. I mostly travel early in the morning (2:00 a.m.) before the highway becomes crowded or a road rage. This allows me to enter the hot-spot zones or become victimized. Due to constantly being around people on my job, I feel as if I can maintain control of a situation when fewer individuals are involved. I really should reduce the risk
According to Kelling, Pate, Dieckman, & Brown (1974), patrol is the “backbone” of police work. This belief is based around the premise that the mere presence of police officers on patrol prohibits criminal activity. Despite increasing budgets and the availability of more officers on the streets, crime rates still rose with the expanding metropolitan populations (Kelling et al., 1974). A one year experiment to determine the effectiveness of routine preventive patrol would be conducted, beginning on the first day of October 1972, and ending on the last day of September 1973.
This error goes for both you and the suspect one. When you are confronted with a suspect and are complacent you don’t watching the person like you are supposed to be doing and didn’t see his hands go in his pocket he can then pull out a weapon and kill you. But also you can ignoring the danger signs that you may be complacent and not know. People get so fixed in there routine that it becomes more of a subconscious thing because you are going through the motions every day not even think about what you are doing in till it’s too late and the guy you just asked for his paperwork pulled out a gun and got two rounds of on you. Most people are set on auto pilot, you get up go to work, at work you do the same thing you been doing for 10 years so you don’t even have to think about it you just do it, then you go home and wait till the morning to do it all over again. That routine is deadly in law enforcement because you should always be on your toes and thinking about what dangers are around you so you can at least see it coming and defend yourself from it to go home at the end of your
I try not to let things get to me and I try not to let problems I’m having influence my work. This is good so that my personal life doesn’t interfere with my work life.
What should police be doing at crime hot spots? There are still concern about the effectiveness of hot spot policing, and what police officers should do in order to effectively reduce crime. Because police officer should be spending some time in these places it is essential to know what they should d...
First, stress in the lives of police officers often result in poor performance from sleep deprivation and panic. Sleep deprivation is one effect that stress can have on officers. The fatigue that stress causes can very literally kill the affected officer. Many times, officers hold anxiety inside them. When they are in bed, they are oftentimes let alone to think, which leads to many “racing thoughts” and “what if’s” (Koeling). Thinking about such things can keep officers awake for hours, leaving them fatigued and sleep-deprived when they report for work the next day. More causes of sleep deprivation are due to stressful, long shifts and odd hours (Casey). As a third-shift security guard for four years, Carl Koeling has had his share of sleep deprivation. In a recent interview, he said that when he stood a sleep-deprived watch, he remembers feeling “lightheaded and woozy” (Koeling). As a psychologist for thirty-eight years, Koeling also knows that fatigue caused by stress can also affect officers’ judgement, balance, and physical health (Koeling). It is vital that these three things be working properly for those in law enforcement, as the work they do often depends on good decision-making, decent balance, and high levels of physical fitness and well-being (Miller “Law Enforcement”). Panic is another effect that stress can have on police officers.
The use of discretion in the profession of law enforcement has shown to be an inevitable practice. Police officers routinely use their own beliefs and judgments to make critical decisions that include the life and liberty of the citizens in the community they serve in. Although discretion has both negative and positive sides to it, discretion is impossible to be eliminated from law enforcement. The best way to use discretion in a safe manner is to practice using discretion while on and off duty as well. While practicing discretion, officers should keep their own beliefs and prejudice to themselves and out of line of duty. When police officers are on duty, they must have knowledge of what is going on around them and eliminate discriminatory factors and use confidence to make a lawful
Unfocused and indiscriminate enforcement actions will produce poor relationships between the police and community members residing in areas. Law enforcement should adopt alternative approaches to controlling problem areas, tracking hot persons, and preventing crime in problem regions. Arresting criminal offenders is the main police function and one of the most valuable tools in an array of responses to crime plagued areas, however hot spots policing programs infused with community and problem oriented policing procedures hold great promise in improving police and community relations in areas suffering from crime and disorder problems and developing a law enforcement service prepared to protect its nation from an act of
Arguably computer crime mapping has helped mitigate the negative perception held about the effectiveness of police in fighting crime. According to Goldstein & McEwen (2009), perceived confidence in police abilities largely decline in the 1970s and 1980s. Studies conducted at the time, established that the existing policing strategies needed an overhaul. For instance preventive patrol and rapid response to police call (which were the predominant strategies) did very little in crime prevention. Also in line with the findings, available statistical figure clearly pointed out, crime rates-even in areas patrol by highly qualified police forces-were rising at an alarming rate. Police scholars were affected by the negative perception as much as the police; therefore they intensified their search for a solution, by carrying out various studies (Goldstein & McEwen, 2009).
Just the thought that they might be caught is a powerful deterrent for would-be criminals. There are several ways that police deter crime: visibility, warnings, tickets, fines, and arrests are a few of them. Police visibility is a great way to deter crime. A criminal would be less likely to commit a crime if they had seen a police officer in that area recently. Robert Apel’s paper, published in the Journal of Quantitative Criminology, stated that the visibility of the officers, sometimes called cops on the corner, projects a credible threat of detection and apprehension. (Apel, 2013). Another way that police deter crime is by increasing their arrest and tickets. “Police deter crime when they do things that strengthen a criminal’s perception of the certainty of being caught.” (Five Things, 2016). When police have “crackdowns” on certain crimes, the general population begins to avoid committing those crimes, because the increased possibility of being caught. For example, when the click it or ticket law was enacted and the police were very strict about everyone wearing their seatbelts. Lots of people were pulled over and given tickets. More and more people began wearing their seatbelts, especially if that was an area that a cop was known to wait
A police officer’s duty is to maintain public order, preventing, and detecting crime. The concept of police officers, also known as cops, and law enforcement has been around ever since the ancient Romans had a theory that an organization of “peacekeepers” would reduce the crime and violence being committed. This theory stuck with society and is still around today. People of law enforcement have a mission when they step into their police car, that mission is to enforce the rules of conduct or law. Of course, accomplishing this mission can be dangerous. Often when a cop leaves his or her house to go to work worries start to set it, such as “will I be coming back home when my day is over” or “will a simple traffic stop go sour and someone ends up dead?” These thoughts are apart of the stress that comes with the job and most people are trained to deal with this stress.
Sherman, Lawrence and David Weisburd, “General Deterrent Effects of Police Patrol in Crime Hot Spots: A Randomized Controlled Trial,” Justice Quarterly 12 (1995): 625–48.
In today’s society there is a high fear of crime by society. Society actions show that there is anxiety and fear about crime. Therefore, anxiety and fear about crime has placid our cities and communities. Society express fear of being victimized by crimes, criminal activities, and behaviors. Therefore, according to, (Crime, 1999) states that “ the level of fear that a person holds depends on many factors, including but, not limited to: “ gender, age, any past experiences with crime that a person may have, where one lives, and one’s ethnicity.” All of those factors have a huge impact on one’s fear level.
Situational crime prevention reduces the opportunities for criminals to commit crime by making changes to or altering the environment with the assistance of the police, neighbors and other agencies (Worrall, 2008). The main theories of situational crime prevention are: environmental crime prevention, rational offender perspective, and routine activities (Worrall, 2008). Environmental crime prevention basically states that four elements must be present for a crime to occur: a target, a place (opportunity), a law, and an offender. Environmental crime prevention is designed to prevent people from breaking the law by altering street and building designs, or altering the environment to make it safer (Worrall, 2008). An example of this that is used by law enforcement is to place a sign at the public trash dumpsters informing the public that the area is being videotaped. This method is used to alter the publi...
If you decide to become a Police officer you must be available for shift work at any time of day and any day of the week, including holidays. Some Shifts can be longer than the standard eight-hour office day. The routine of the job can also be dangerous, as well as physically and e...
It is also vital to get a grip of the situation besides being able to identify and recognise emotion. When one is able to take control of the situation, they will be able to reflect on the situation without acting impulsively. Different people react differently to the same situations. This is due to different experiences, varied cultural background or different level of