Stuart’s Argument, Essay Example

In the article of Robert D. Stuart about “Social Media: Establishing Criteria for Law Enforcement Use,” Stuart starts the topic by giving his stand and makes use of realities to support the topic (Stuart, 2013). The article highlights the importance of understanding social media, the application of social media in law enforcement, challenges encountered by law enforcers in their daily use of social media platforms, and finally highlights the main solutions used to solve these problems.

In today’s world, many people, including police officers, are using social media. According to Stuart (2013), more than 78% defendants in law enforcement keep social media accounts, and almost 38% identify themselves as police officers in their profiles (Stuart, 2013). Stuart also stated that there are risks and advantages of such clear identifications of officers on social media platforms. “Missteps in social media use can endanger the safety of officers and compromise criminal cases, resulting not only in embarrassment to the department but exposure to civil and criminal liability” (Stuart, 2013). According to Stuart, law enforcement champions ensure they have a clear cut between their professional and public lives to avoid dishonoring their divisions. Consequently, this information is by far supportable, owing to the sensitivity that comes with the position of a law enforcer. However, there are still a number of benefits that come with use of social media as it will be highlighted below.

In the article, it is evident that social media is used mainly as a tool of communication that applies a comprehensive audience approach. Through social media platforms, people subscribe and share any information they wish worldwide (Stuart, 2013). With such an easy-to-use communication tool, law enforcers can greatly benefit from social media, especially during this time and era. Some of the advantages that law enforcement would gain if they deploy social media in their services include; enhancing public relations and easing investigations into different crimes. For instance, law departments can rely on this social media to allow people to share information and provide information regarding different occurrences in the country (Stuart, 2013). This implies that social media can act as an investigation agency; since criminals may use social media to share their locations and expose their illegal acts by sharing videos via social media.

On the other end, Stuart emphasizes that law enforcers need to be more vigilant before exposing any information on social media platforms. For instance, the author states, “Officers posting information about how sleepy they are on duty can call into question their fitness for duty in the event of a deadly force situation or a serious traffic accident” (Stuart, 2013). He also warns the enforcement agents from posting photos with detained evidence because they can cause serious harm during the persecution of a case. The officers should first consult the Public Prosecutor before sharing any information that has evidence in the social media (Stuart, 2013). Once an agent shares information that causes public attention from social media users, it will be necessary for the agent to face disciplinary actions. The author used the example of Arizona in 2011 that was directed to find DISC to describe the risk of law enforcement agents from sharing information in social media that can draw public attention.

A review of ICJE research showed that about 45% of Law enforcement agencies use social media during their duties (Stuart, 2013). As a result, this shows that most police are always in touch with their social media accounts, and there are high chances of them sharing their professional responsibilities on shared media. Stuart suggests that it will be significant for the police to identify the use of social media in the current world and the coming days to better their services (Stuart, 2013).

In conclusion, it is evident that the author facilitates the use of social media among police, more so during these changing times. This will harness crime prevention and criminal investigation” (Stuart, 2013). Once the police and law enforcement departments use social media, it will open a positive revenue and opportunity for the public to share information related to crime in their areas of residences (Stuart, 2013). Therefore, it helps people access actual-time information and make necessary strategies to help them solve and examine complaints in their areas without any difficulties (Stuart, 2013). However, Stuart still believes that the law enforcement department should regulate the use of social media accounts by enforcement agents; because often it can affect the prosecution of cases if agent officers share sensitive information regarding a particular case. Since it involves individuals in the forces, monitoring each of them to know if at all they are on social media becomes very difficult: Hence, the only sure way to achieve this, is by implementing strategies and principles on how enforcement these officers operate their social media accounts.

Reference

Stuart, R. D. (2013). Social media: Establishing criteria for law enforcement use. FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, 82(2), 1-3.