Physical Standards In Law Enforcement

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The use of physical standards in law enforcement is necessary to make sure police departments are hiring people capable of the work. A police officer needs to be able to run well, see well, and be strong enough to carry or restrain someone. If a law enforcement officer cannot keep up with a running criminal, they would not be successful at their job and should not be a law enforcement agent. The use of physical standards are not meant to be discriminatory towards women but some police departments take advantage of these standards to legally discriminate against female candidates. There are four components to Vermont’s physical assessment. These include: a 1.5 mile run, one repetition maximum bench press, one minute of bent knee sit-ups, and …show more content…

Professor Rolando V. del Carmen determined four components that must be present for an arrest to happen. These factors are: the intent to arrest, the authority to arrest, seizure or detention, and the understanding of the person that he/she is under arrest. (Miller 190) So, is it possible for a person to be legally under arrest without a law enforcement officer telling them that they are? The Supreme Court defines an arrest as a situation when a suspect is in custody and also when any reasonable person believes that he/she is not able to leave at any time, even if a police officer does not inform the suspect that they are or are not under arrest. (Miller 189)
Law enforcement officers are required to make sure the suspect they have in custody understands that they are in fact under arrest. If a person is handcuffed and put into the back of a police car, the officer does not need to say the words, “you are now under arrest,” because a reasonable person would know that if they are not able to walk away, that they are indeed under arrest. If this person is intoxicated, mentally disabled, or unconscious; their competency may be impacted. (Miller …show more content…

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, in 2009, violent assault offenders, who had an average maximum sentence length of 80 months, only served an average of 40 months in prison. (Bureau of Justice Statistics ) This means most of the offenders are only serving half of their jail time. This could be because of a few things but the most significant reason is; the jails and prisons in the United States are becoming over populated, resulting in letting the less violent of the violent offenders go. There was a study done by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), through this study, they found that federal prisons were 39% over capacity as of September 2011. The report also predicted that overcrowding would reach to more than 45% above the Bureau of Prison’s maximum capacity by 2018. (Gilna) This limitation set by the Bureau of Prison, is a great example of the primary relationship in the courts being between the idea of justice and the reality of bureaucratic

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