Use of Force by Police

¶ … Manage Use of Force Ethical Issues

HOW TO MANAGE USE-OF-FORCE ETHICAL ISSUES

This objective of this study is to examine how criminal justice and private security managers and executives are addressing use-of-force issues from an ethical point-of-view.

There is a growing problem in the United States with law enforcement officer's use-of-force under the color of law and their authority requiring that criminal justice and private security managers understand the ethics in relation to police use-of-force.

The research questions in this study include those which ask the following questions: (1) What is being done to ethically address wrongful police use-of-force in their line of duty? (2) What more should be done to ethically address wrongful police use-of-force in their line of duty?

Literature Review

It is reported that ethical misconduct "taints the public perception of police" and that this is extremely "detrimental.to the profession." (Beech, nd, p. 3) It is reported that "Total ethical commitment from the leader of the organization was the overriding theme" that emerged from the police symposium in Washington DC in 1996, organized by the United States Attorney General." (Beech, nd, p. 2) Police administrators understand that it is predictable that police officers will show use-of-force since they are "trained to use force progressively along a continuum and policy requires that officers use the least amount of force necessary to accomplish their goals." (U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, 1999, p.3) However, it is reported that "many debates over excessive force will fall into gray areas where it is difficult to decide whether an officers acted properly given credible evidence that use-of-force was necessary." (U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, 1999, p.9) Reported is a major gap in the knowledge concerning police agency characteristics "that facilitate or impede this conduct" and it is reported that there is a need for systematic research in this area. Noted as having an impact on police use-of-force are the elements of training of recruits, hiring criteria, in-service programs, supervision of field officers, mechanisms for discipline, internal affairs operations, and "specialized units dealing with ethics and integrity." (U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, 1999, p.24) Beech reports that while a good understand of this is critical applying a definition to the term is difficult. However, ethical behavior on the part of police officers is not so difficult to understand since they are only to use the amount of force necessary when making an arrest. For example, when the police officer has the subject being arrested handcuffed and contained and the subject is no threat to the police officer or the public and the police officer places both hands around the neck of the suspect and chokes the suspect simply because the police officer does not like something the suspect says, this would constitute police use-of-force in violation of criminal justice ethics.

Conclusions