Understanding Police Use Of Force

Publisher Description

Provides a critical understanding and evaluation of police tactics and the use of force Police violence has historically played an important role in shaping public attitudes toward the government. Community trust and confidence in policing have been undermined by the perception that officers are using force unnecessarily, too frequently, or in problematic ways. The use of force, or harm suffered by a community as a result of such force, can also serve as a flashpoint, a spark that ignites long-simmering community hostility. In Evaluating Police Uses of Force, legal scholar Seth W. Stoughton, former deputy chief of police Jeffrey J. Noble, and distinguished criminologist Geoffrey P. Alpert explore a critical but largely overlooked facet of the difficult and controversial issues of police violence and accountability: how does society evaluate use-of-force incidents? By leading readers through answers to this question from four different perspectives—constitutional law, state law, administrative regulation, and community expectations—and by providing critical information about police tactics and force options that are implicated within those frameworks, Evaluating Police Uses of Force helps situate readers within broader conversations about governmental accountability, the role that police play in modern society, and how officers should go about fulfilling their duties.

Police culture has been widely criticized as a source of resistance to change and reform, and is often misunderstood. This book seeks to capture the heart of police culture-including its tragedies and celebrations-and to understand its powerful themes of morality, solidarity, and common sense, by systematically integrating a broad literature on police culture into middle-range theory, and developing original perspectives about many aspects of police work. The first section addresses the definition of culture and the understanding of police culture, while section two moves on to themes of police culture.

A comprehensive collection on police and policing, written by experts in political theory, sociology, criminology, economics, law, public health, and critical theory.

Although the prevalence of police-citizen conflict has diminished in recent decades, police use of excessive force remains a concern of police departments nationwide. This timely book focuses on what is known and what still needs to be learned to understand, prevent, and remediate police abuse of force. The topics covered include: a theory of police abuse of force; the causes of police brutality; measures of its prevalence; the violence-prone police officer; public opinion about police abuse of force; the issue of race; officer selection, training, and attitudes; police unions and police culture; administrative review; procedural justice and the review of citizen complaints; the role of lawsuits; and a survey of police brutality abroad. In the final chapter Geller and Toch suggest new directions for research and practical innovations in law enforcement, from which both police and citizens can benefit. The contributors to this volume are scholars of criminology, criminal justice, social psychology, law, and public administration; former police managers; a police union leader; civilian oversight agency administrators and analysts; civil liberties advocates; police litigation expert witnesses; and media commentators. The combination of theoretical and practical perspectives makes this book ideal for students and scholars of democratic policing and for those in police departments, government, and the media charged with addressing and understanding the problem of improper exercise of force.

Political Sabotage may not be the answer for all in understanding social crime and violence or police use of force to control it, but it does provide a focus and single source toward that goal. Want to know about Ruby Ridge and Randy Weaver, Rodney King and a truer story about the fiasco at Waco, Texas? Did law enforcement do it right? Maybe, but maybe not. These questions are also answered: What facts and experience create the subtleties for "the mystique of police culture?" Is a true unprofessional "code of silence" part of it? Is that culture a closed club for those wearing the badge of the Los Angeles Police Department? Is its "culture" and its use of police force in the attempt to control crime and violence responsible for the LAPD's downfall? Does diversity and affirmative action exist as co-conspirators in that downfall? Or will it all remain as the unknown result of the influence and impact of the emotional and ideological attitudes found in our American society and its sometimes politicized, attorney dominated, and unjust justice system? What part did political sabotage play in orchestrating what academic isolation and a supporting media label "the ineffective administration of a corrupt LAPD?" And what led that leadership through a moderate level of hesitation and silence to a federal consent decree and various "commission investigations," and to every activist and media embellished blame, to forgo the effort to retain the best parts of what had once made the LAPD the most innovative, respected, effective and efficient police organization in America? These questions have truthful and experienced answers. But the overall question is yet to be answered: Will the American citizen ever truly understand enough to make a difference?

Police culture has been widely criticized as a source of resistance to change and reform, and is often misunderstood. This book seeks to capture the heart of police culture—including its tragedies and celebrations—and to understand its powerful themes of morality, solidarity, and common sense, by systematically integrating a broad literature on police culture into middle-range theory, and developing original perspectives about many aspects of police work.