The Police Discretion, Essay Example

Introduction

All police officers are provided with a high degree of power and professional responsibility. An integral part of this is that of police discretion when making arrests.  It is essential that that they have a broad overview of the law in order to determine what constitutes the arrest i.e. felony or misdemeanour and what element of the law has been broken.  The police discretion is the determination of whether a caution should be given or an arrest made. A Traffic Violation is an example of Police Discretion at work. If a person goes through a red light the policeman might let the person off with a caution provided there is no detection of alcohol or substance abuse.

Areas of Discretion

Another broad are of discretion is in the use of the Police Officers time. Whilst on Patrol he observes a stranded motorist.  If he decides to offer his time that would be a service call. He may also, at his discretion, not offer help because there is a more urgent or pressing matter requiring his time elsewhere. The ultimate act of discretion is whether or not to use force at an incident.  In general terms force may be used where a person is resisting arrest, threatening or endangering the lives of the public, using firearms or other weapons in a threatening way or participating in a civil riot therefore endangering the lives of others.  Controversy occurs when the police officers are considered to abuse their powers and use excessive force. . The Serious Organized Crime and Police Act (2005) defines the powers of arrest. A police officer may constitute an arrest without a warrant where he/she believes the person is about to commit a crime; is in the process of committing a crime; where there exists reasonable grounds of suspicion for the person committing a crime.

The Act of reasonable suspicion is a difficult area of policing in regards to a person’s constitutional rights under the 4^th Amendment and the right to reasonable privacy.  The Officer needs to act upon more than a mere hunch that some criminal act is or about to take place.  Ornelas vs. United States, 517(Doyle, C.  2006). A court order or warrant takes into consideration ‘reasonableness’ and whether such action is warranted and in the best interests of serving the law. The Officer needs to ensure that in the interpretation of reasonable suspicion he is acting within the required legal framework.  (Doyle, C.  2006). The evidence that Police Officers provides at Court plays a significant role in terms of whether the accused indicted or not. (Lyons, P.M.  2005). Where there is considered to be an indictable offence, or an offence that is triable only on indictment  e.g. Murder, Manslaughter, Rape, Kidnap, Robbery etc. It is normal for a warrant to be issued for the arrest. The arresting officer is expected to maintain a written log of recorded information concerning details of the arrest and this may be called upon as evidence in a subsequent trial.

Other discretionary difficulties arise when an Officer makes a decision not to investigate a reported disturbing event; this particularly where it is believed that a criminal act has been carried out.  This often has a wide ranging ramification where a subsequent crime is proven to have taken place. Investigations carried out into one large municipal police force indicated that the police made a wide range of discretionary decisions when it came to deciding whether or not to invoke the criminal process. Most of the items investigated were basic honest decisions but perhaps not the best policy decisions in all circumstances. Much of the decision making process being governed by the Police Manuals in terms of responsibility for the purpose and prevention of crime. (Goldstein, J. 1960).

Conclusion

There has been some criticism on the standard of police discretion and whether these are adequate for modern police work. This has been particularly focused at items like: failure of not to arrest for reported crimes, arrests on suspicion, release of subjects after preliminary interrogation and the governance of the discretionary standards.

Works Cited

Doyle, C. (2006, 1 30). Memo to Congress. Retrieved 5 18, 2011, from Congressional Research Service: http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:0vnpKI0QLzAJ:www.fas.org/sgp/crs/intel/m013006.pdf+Police+discretion+reasonable+suspicion&hl=en&gl=ca&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEEShpFXEk9cdA9Ln_HeRdEQ2yOeMmw3oG2caureMpCYhGU2Bfkrp71xmWvxZbINXUug1o0IxyEg1bLjnpXQLawGTv_2aXz3

Goldstein, J. (1960, 1 1). Police Discretion Not to Invoke the Criminal process. Retrieved 5 17, 2011, from Yale Law School: http://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3417&context=fss_papers&sei-redir=1#search=”Police+discretion+and+indictment”

Phillip M. Lyons, J. e. (2005). Police Judgments of Culpability and Homophobia. Applied Psychology in Criminal Justice, 2005, 1(1), 2-13.

Rynard Law. (2011). Police Discretion. Retrieved 5 18, 2011, from Rynard Law: http://rynardlaw.com/Article6.aspx