Elizabeth Hall
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| LOS ANGELES, CA - APRIL 30: Rodney King arrives at the EsoWon books store to sign copies of his new book, 'The Riot Within: My Journey From Rebellion to Redemption,' on April 30, 2012 in Los Angeles, California. King is best known as the victim of a brutal police beating that took place in Los Angeles. Its been 20 years since the Rodney King verdict that sparked infamous L.A. Riots. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife) |
Introduction
When
considering the importance of ethics in our modern world, there are several
areas in our society that require that the employees possess the most ethical
standards. We will explore one of these
areas, the criminal justice system, more specifically the law enforcement
portion of the system. According to
Delattre (2011), character and ethical standards come from a passionate desire
to be a moral, upright, respectable person.
This is not to say that some of this does not come from environment and
upbringing, however in reality, these qualities come from within.
Particularly
in the law enforcement field, ethical behavior and character are important
because these people are charged with upholding and enforcing the laws of our
country. Almost all of us are taught
from a young age that law enforcement members are trusted members of our
society. We are taught that if we are in
trouble, find a police officer, and they will help us. Because of this public trust, any discrepancy
in this violates not only the police code, but also the entire law enforcement
population of the nation. When one bad
officer makes the nightly news for misconduct, the
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| LOS ANGELES, CA - APRIL 30: A new book, 'The Riot Within: My Journey From Rebellion to Redemption,' by Rodney King is displayed at EsoWon bookstore on April 30, 2012 in Los Angeles, California. King is best known as the victim of a brutal police beating that took place in Los Angeles. It’s been 20 years since the Rodney King verdict that sparked infamous L.A. Riots. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife) |
public reacts and it takes
years to undo the damage to that trust.
In
this analysis, we have interviewed two law enforcement professionals to
determine what they feel on the subject of ethics and character in law
enforcement. One of these officers, Jeff
Smith, works for the Lexington Police Department as an officer in the school
enforcement division, and the other, Christine Zien, works for the Okaloosa
County Sheriff’s Office, as a Deputy Sheriff.
We discussed topics such as the importance of ethics and character in
law enforcement, ethical improvements, reasons for police misconduct, the
training quality they receive in ethics at the academy, and if better ethical
training would affect the rate of police corruption, the following essay is
based on their viewpoint of this discussion.
Importance of Ethics
and Character in Law Enforcement
According
to Officer Christine Zien (personal communication April 18, 2012) and Officer Jeff
Smith (personal communication April 10, 2012), ethics and character are
important in law enforcement for several reasons. The most important reason is to maintain the
standard of ethics set forth by their agencies. Another reason is that in order
to uphold the law, officers have always had to be held at higher standards than
those held for the public. If one has no
ethics, then it is easier to take the shorter route than to do the right thing,
as often it is the harder choice to do the right thing.
For law enforcement members it is also
required to maintain this standard in their personal lives as well, because
whether on or off duty, the public still expects you to maintain that ethical
standard and officers are not above the law (C. Zien, personal communication,
April 18, 2012). This is different from
other professions such as a computer specialist, because when they go home,
they can act whatever way they please.
Officer Smith (personal communication, April 10, 2012) noted tha
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| Ethics and Technology (Photo credit: Center for the Study of Ethics at UVU) |
t if you
do not conform to the ethical standards, you would have a hard time getting
what you need done. For example with
this, suppose an officer goes on Facebook and slanders someone, cyber stalks a
female, or talks bad about his agency, that information is usually public
information, and will not only get you fired these days, but who will respect
your authority after seeing something like that?
Delattre
(2011) holds that officers like Frank Serpico, who refused to act unethically
have been pushed out of agencies, lost their jobs, or plain quit, as he
did. It is very disheartening to be an
honest officer amidst a sea of dishonest officers on the take. Many rookies that would have otherwise been
fine on the job have been turned into dirty cops within their first weeks. This is partially due to the culture of
police protecting their fellow officers, and, because seasoned veterans are the
ones teaching them to get their share of the proceeds immediately.
Have Ethics Improved or
Deteriorated in the Last Decade?
The
c
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| U.S. Customs and Border Protection :original caption: CBP Officers pay tribute to fellow fallen officers during a Law Enforcement memorial service in Washington D.C. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
onsensus on this is yes, ethics have improved over the last decade, and that,
ten years ago officers would not have thought twice about issuing roadside
justice as noted by Officer Smith. The
reasons that ethics have improved in the last ten years, has a lot to do with
technology advancing. Everyone has a camera
and a cell phone and have no problems whipping them out to take video of any
police impropriety. Law enforcement
officers are involved in many lawsuits over political correctness, police
brutality, and other issues (C. Zien, personal communication, April 18, 2012).
One
of the problems with this change is that law enforcement has had to step back
in roles that would have otherwise been accepted (C. Zien, personal
communication, April 18, 2012). Another
issue is that this is making officers victims with increased officer
shootings. This is because officers are
more worried about ethical violations and political correctness causing
lawsuits instead of the job at hand. Some
of this is due to media broadcasts of high profile cases like Rodney King and
OJ Simpson, because as these things take hold, and are sensationalized by the
media, it causes knee jerk reactions in those responsible for making
policy. These reactions often result in
poorly thought out policies (C. Zien, personal communication, April 18, 2012).
Reasons for Police
Misconduct
There
is no single reason why police become caught up in misconduct. There are, however several reasons that this
may happen. Officer Smith (personal
communication, April 10, 2012) offers up that sometimes it is easy to be
“caught up in the moment”. Another
reason offered by Officer Zien is that sometimes the officers get so caught up
in the unit that they forget that they also have a life outside of work. Even more than this, officers sometimes think
that because they are the law that makes them above it, which could not be
further from the truth. Another additional problem with this is that
these officers often develop a larger than life attitude, and a fictional sense
of security, contributing to the misconduct problems of the agency (C. Zien,
personal communication, April 18, 2012).
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| ST. LOUIS, MO - MARCH 8: A woman, who did not wish to be identified, cries at the scene where two U.S. marshals and a St. Louis police officer were shot while trying to serve an arrest warrant March 8, 2011 in St. Louis, Missouri. According to the U.S. Marshals Service a gunfight broke out when two the U.S. marshals and a St. Louis police officer were serving an arrest warrant at the house on the city's south side. At least one other person was wounded and police are currently in a standoff. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife) |
Police Academy Ethics
Training
Officer
Smith notes that there was not enough training a two-decades ago, but that now
there is plenty, maybe too much training in general, as the time in the academy
is double than when he attended training there.
The actual count is twenty-two weeks in the academy and thirty weeks
before the officer is on his own.
Officer Zien paints a much more detailed picture, agreeing that there
might be too much training. She goes on
to say that
when it was her time in the academy in 1985, “ethics training was
roughly four hours, and now the amount has increased by five times. This includes training on discussing
lawsuits, video cameras, misconduct, policies, etc.” so she says “Yes; there is
enough if not too much training at the academy level. Let’s get back to basics” (C. Zien, personal
communication, April 18, 2012).
Should Ethics Training
be an Ongoing Process for Law Enforcement Officers?
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| English: High School for Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Español: Escuela Secundaria para Fuerzas de la Ley y Justicia Penal (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
Both
officers agree that there should be ongoing ethics training but differed on how
much. In Lexington, officers receive 40 hours in service training. In Okaloosa County, officers receive four hour
mandatory training every four years.
Officer Smith did not say the frequency that the training occurs,
however when it does occur, they receive substantially more training
hours. It has been said before, that
Lexington Kentucky has one of the top law enforcement-training center in the
country, and usually followed by, “they come here, get trained, and leave for
better pay elsewhere”.
Would Ethics Training
and Education Reduce Police Corruption?
Officer
Smith feels that training or ethics have absolutely nothing to do corruption,
but that circumstance plays the bigger role.
Officer Zien thinks that the ethics training does instruct members of
law enforcement, however if a person is truly intent on ethics violations, they
will behave unethically whether they receive training or not. Officer Smith suggested that it would be good
to look up the Bluegrass Conspiracy, which turned out to be that a former
member of the narcotics division, in Lexington, was smuggling narcotics
(Brammer, 2010). On September 11, 1985,
Andrew Drew Thornton II, of Lexington, KY is found dead in Knoxville. He had a failed parachute, and a large amount
of narcotics, when he was found that morning, in a driveway in Knoxville, TN
after his plane must have crashed nearby (Brammer, 2010). This just goes to show that unethical police
conduct could happen anywhere.
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| English: High School for Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Español: Escuela Secundaria para Fuerzas de la Ley y Justicia Penal (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
Conclusion
When
interviewing members of law enforcement we found several things that stood
out. The first thing is that officers
now are more concerned with political correctness and ethics, but there are
some drawbacks to this, such as officers are now victimized more than they used
to be. The other thing that stood out in
the interview process is that Officers Smith and Zien, working in different
states still had much of the same answers to the questions. Ethics and character in law enforcement are
important because one bad officer affects all officers when the public trust is
damaged. In order for officers to do
their jobs effectively, the public has to be willing to cooperate with them
otherwise this puts officers lives in jeopardy unnecessarily.
References:
Brammer,
J., (2010). “Bluegrass Conspiracy” tale
never gets old. Retrieved From: http://www.kentucky.com/2010/09/11/1429813/25-years-ago-former-narcotics.html
Delattre,
E. J., (2011). Ethics in Policing: Character and Cops. Sixth Edition. The American Enterprise Institute Press. Washington, D.C.
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