The police fulfill at least five roles forsociety



The police fulfill at least five roles for society. They are:

1. Social Servant

2. Crime Preventer

3. Order Maintainer

4. Crime Fighter

5. Crime Stopper

These roles in the social order allow the police to maintain order and stop crimes.

If we look at them in reverse order, they provide some perspective of the public view and the reality of police work. A Crime Stopper is what the public views the police as the most. They are there to interfere, to stop a crime that is occurring and catch the men or women committing them. This can best be seen in the story from the Associated Press on February 16, 2010 where Sheriff’s Deputies rescued a woman who had been kidnapped, was being held captive, and was being beaten and raped in a mobile home. In the process, the officers also found evidence of a drug sales operation in the mobile home, and detained the residents and released the woman being hurt for treatment. (AP, 2/16/10) By actually capturing the suspect in the act of committing a crime, officers will be better able to fulfill the other four roles that are needed by the public. This is a role, however, that television and the movies have embellished into the concept of “shoot ‘em up” events that the public sometimes thinks police work is really like. This role is just a support or an extension of the other four.

Crime Fighter is a more likely role. A couple of Cook County Sheriffs, husband and wife, totally forgot their married roles and worked together to fight a crime as it began, stopping a 15-year-old girl from being harmed by increasing violence that began with a mob throwing bricks and bottles at her. (Hussain) The wife, in 10 years with the department, had never used her firearm in the line of duty, yet she stepped up to serve as partner to her husband to fight the crime that was about to occur. The fact that this couple needs to be recognized for their action shows that this is the reality for most police officers, which recognized them for their actions as “Deputies of the Year” for their actions while off-duty.

The local police force also must maintain social order. Whether that involves people or not does not matter. In some cases it could be keeping the traffic flowing when a Zebra escapes on an expressway (WSBTV), in others, like the Salt Lake City officer who was on duty and realized there were pit bulls loose in the neighborhood and followed them until he had to act, preventing the dogs from attacking any people or animals. (SLCT) The officer did what needed to be done to protect the community, to help track the animals for the animal control people he had called, he chased them from people and animals, until they attacked, and he felt he needed to shoot one of the dogs to protect the people he took responsibility for. The officer here is in a real situation, but the article was written because of the potential harm to the image of the police department for his firing in a populated area, and perhaps too close to people who had done nothing wrong, to reassure the public in Salt Lake City that he would go through a professional review to make sure procedures were followed.

Crime prevention is next to discuss, and it is something that crosses several layers of the five different roles for the average police officer. In the article about Idaho police forming Crisis Intervention Teams to help with mental illness calls is an example. It is crime prevention. It is also social servant and order maintainer in this instance. With increased study and information, along with the human genome project, increasing possible cases of mental illness are being recognized in more different people. To help these people when they need assistance can be very trying and quite difficult. They may not be entirely verbal. They may lack the ability to even give their name, address, or phone number. And while many of them do well in society in general, they also must be recognized as soon as possible because they will not do well in some prison situations, and their reactions to being arrested could result in more danger to the officers and to the person they are dealing with.

Yet being able to assist these people, to stop them from doing things that they shouldn’t do, to keep them on a safe and even keel as they go about their lives, can make a major difference to the police force and to the citizens they serve. Moreover, the best way to teach these skills to the officers is through repetition and role-playing until they understand and can react, and if possible, avoid criminal incarceration, for people who, in some cases may not know that they are committing a crime.

Whether it requires wellness checks on individuals or treating them reasonably in public, the training covers so many different layers of police work; it seems unusual to not have had such training and programs in all jurisdictions.

Police officer as social servant is shown best in the article about the Maine police making more of a presence and knowledge of the schools and making themselves known in the schools, many of which have no police department that serves them and others that have lost all of their funding to have a police officer providing services to the school. It will increase school safety, will allow the police to have a handle on every school’s emergency plans, and by getting the plans electronically loaded into the state police computers, if another officer than the one who first called on the school should be the first responder, it allows them to be able to see the plans and a diagram of the school so that he can act and react appropriately to anyone or anything that could be causing trouble in a school. (Hench) And rather than have it become a major drain on an officer’s time they are asking them to stop by for a minute or two when they drive by one of these schools, to make the police something the students are used to seeing from time to time. Let the kids see the uniform and the car and NOT have it be because something bad has happened.

These many roles are what help define a police force that is well trained, well equipped and able to handle and help with whatever comes any officer’s way.

REFERENCES

The Associated Press. (AP) “California deputies rescue kidnapped, beaten, and raped woman.” Updated 2/16/10. Retrieved 2/18/10. .

Hansen, Jocelyn. Idaho Falls Post-Register. “Idaho cops training to respond to mental illness calls.” Updated 2/13/10. Retrieved 2/18/10. .

Hench, David. Portland Press Herald. “Maine police to boost visibility in town schools.” Updated 2/13/10. Retrieved 2/18/10. .

Hussain, Rummana. Chicago Sun-Times. “Crime fighting couple honored for preventing Illinois Attack.” Updated 2/12/10. Retrieved 2/18/10. .

Salt Lake City Tribune. (SLCT) “Utah officer shoots pit bull after it harasses kids, dogs.” Updated 2/17/10. Retrieved 2/18/10. .

WSBTV. (2/18/10). “Runaway Zebra Captured On Downtown Connector.” Retrieved 2/19/10. .

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