Police Misconduct Case Study the District Attorney

police Misconduct Case Study

The district attorney declines to press charges and both juveniles are released. They flee the jurisdiction and are never found. Your partner is brought before a police investigation Board and suspended from the Department after 20 years service.

Justification for Answer Choice #1

The District Attorney (DA) had no choice but to drop the charges and release the suspects because my partners actions apparently violated one of the most fundamental rights of all criminal defendants under the U.S. Constitution. It also created a very damaging appearance of improper conduct on the part of the police department that could undermine the respect for police authority in the community. My partner's actions demand serious professional consequences, especially because he is one of two detectives responsible for investigating homicides in the department. A slap on the wrist would not provide the guarantee that similar conduct will not be repeated. In addition to violating the constitutional rights of defendants, his actions already resulted in the unavoidable dropping of charges against subjects who were probably guilty and who would likely have been convicted, sentenced, and possibly rehabilitated if the department and the DA's office had the opportunity to prosecute them within the boundaries of all applicable laws and constitutional protections. Instead, his actions made prosecution impossible and caused the release of the two suspects.

The Fifth Amendment Issue

The Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right against self-incrimination (Zalman, 2008). The most important case in the area of self-incrimination was the landmark case of Miranda v. Arizona (348 U.S. 346) in 1966 that has required police to advise suspects of their constitutional right to remain silent before they initiate custodial interrogation (Schmalleger, 2009). The penalty for violating this requirement is that the evidence produced improperly may not be introduced at trial (Dershowitz, 2002). The Fifth Amendment also prohibits the police from coercing or threatening suspects during interrogation, from depriving them of food, water, or restroom facilities, and from preventing them from contacting a defense attorney pursuant to their Sixth Amendment right to competent legal counsel (Zalman, 2008).

The Appropriate Punishment Issue

Before the 1960s, it was routine practice for police authorities to extract confessions from criminal suspects by highly unconstitutional means (Freidman, 2005). Typically, such means included prolonged interrogation lasting many hours (or even days) without food or water or access to restroom facilities, and without the opportunity to contact legal counsel (Freidman, 2005; Zalman, 2008). It was not particularly uncommon for police to beat confessions out of suspects if they believed they "knew" were guilty of serious crimes (Friedman, 2005).