USE OF DISCRETION IN POLICE WORK Introduction

Peak (2003) has pointed to the fact that the law is simply unable to cover every situation a police officer faces and that, given this fact, there are numerous times when police must make choices about the enforcement level required of a given situation. This option of personal choice is commonly referred to as "police discretion. The purpose of this paper is to examine the nature of police discretion. Discretion is defined and discussed. Further, ten situations are evaluated as to whether they are reasonable uses of police discretion or an abuse of power. The paper ends with the formulation of conclusions about police discretion based on the material covered.

O'Connor (2005) states that police discretion is informed choice in which a police officer exercises autonomy in terms of discerning whether or not a given situation is, in fact, a violation of the law that requires standard procedures such as arrest, booking, and so forth. He points out that these choices are not made blindly by police officers but are based on the judgements of their professional knowledge of the law, skills, experience, and insight into a host of relevant factors.

Concerning police discretion, Calderon (2005) points out that it is a myth to believe that police officers enforce the law in all incidents which they encounter that is commonly referred to as "the full enforcement myth." The fact is that police offers do have considerable discretion in whether to enforce the law by issui

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and while she technically broke the law, the likelihood was very high that she did it out of ignorance and not malicious intent. The courts did not need to be further clogged by such a case. Example #3 A police officer arrests a man for a certain behavior. When the man is brought into the station, the officer finds out that the rule upon which the decision to arrest was made is now considered to be inappropriate and outdated. The man should not have been arrested. This is a mistake in terms of police discretion but it is not an abuse of power. Police, like all others, are subject to human error. Example #4 A police officer is interacting with a man a neighbor accused of stealing something from him. There is no evidence that the man has stolen anything but the officer feels that the guy is "the type" who has no respect for those who are in positions of authority over them. He feels that the man needs to be "taught a lesson" in how to respect those who have more power than he does. He threatens the guy until he gets a response showing a great deal of fear and deference. Satisfied, he leaves. This clearly is an abuse of power. The citizen has been coerced and threatened into a specific behavior because the officer was on a powe

Category: Government - U