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From a presentation given by David C. Williams, former police officer & Village Manager, Village of Itsaca, IL
Current economic troubles are leaving law enforcement with less resources to do the job that the community expects from them. But with fewer resources, how does law enforcement keep the same level of service? Increased taxes? Increased fees? Need-based, government grant money that has already run out? The answer lies in reaching out to community members to help police their own communities.
The Community Belong to the Community Members
The community belongs to the community members. As such, community members should take some responsibility in keeping their own community safe. Given that law enforcement officers are not the majority or those committing crime in the community (hopefully they represent 0% of the crime in the community), they should not be the only people keep communities safe.
Instead of investing more money in officers and more staff to cover the community, start investing time in volunteer community partnerships. Community partnerships are a force multiplier, and they cost nothing but time and effort. And when community members volunteer, they take ownership in their communities.
Engage Your Community
There are many people in your community that want to help you keep their communities safe, but many of them don’t know what programs are available, how they can help, or even where to start. Many don’t volunteer simply because they have not been asked and don’t know that there is a need. The key to solving that problem is engaging your community.
Community Policing is an Integral Part of All Policing Efforts
As Sheriff Lee Baca, Los Angeles County Sheriff, has said: community policing efforts should go hand in hand with CompStat. That is, community policing efforts are not just an aspect of policing—a program of the department—they are an integral part of all policing efforts.
Creating an integrated community volunteer partnership make take some extra work and may require the chief to wear two hats: one for sworn officers and one as a citizen volunteer manager. But the effects of a community partnership are a more engaged citizenry that has a stake in its own community and a voluntary force multiplier that allows law enforcement to provide the same level of service that community members expect without spending all the extra dollars.
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Wrongful convictions are a controversial topic. The media loves to jump on them and play the blame game almost as much as they like covering serial killers. As such, it may not be a topic that a lot of law enforcement agencies want to talk about because it calls into question our very ability to remember the past and get accurate, non-coerced confessions. At the same time, discussing the principles and practices that lead to false testimony and wrongful convictions can help us determine the tools law enforcement needs to use to change those practices.
In the session, Steven Drizin, Legal Director, Center on Wrongful Convictions, Northwestern University School of Law, pointed out 3 practices that lead to false testimony and wrongful convictions: misclassification, coercion, and contamination.
Misclassification
Although this is not true of all police officers, Drizin points out that many investigators have the attitude of “we only interrogate guilty suspects.” Simply put, investigators will often use verbal and non-verbal cues given by the suspect—the something’s-fishy factor—to assume that a suspect is guilty before interrogation. In essence, with this attitude, interrogators will misclassify a suspect as guilty and then work toward proving that assumption to get a confession or conviction. For example, in cases that Drizin cites, people have been assumed guilty both because the were not emotional enough, or were too emotional. The perception that a suspect reacts slightly differently than the officer expects might automatically classify that suspect as guilty in the mind of the officer.
As well, many suspects lie, but not always about their guilt. Officers can pick up on lies—especially bad ones— and assume that if a suspect lied about one aspect of a crime, then they must be lying about their guilt as well. Lies told by a suspect can also misclassify a suspect as guilty before the evidence actually plays out.
Coercion
Drizin spent little time on this aspect, except to say that coercion is increasing the pressure on a suspect to give the testimony or confession that the interrogating officer expects to get. Coercion usually take the form of threats or reward (i.e., “If you don’t confess, I’ll make sure you get the death penalty” or “If you confess now, I’ll make sure you don’t serve any more than 2 months in jail).
Contamination
Normally, when I think of contamination, I think of crime scene contamination; however, false confessions and false witness accounts can also be contaminated. Drizin points out that many times a false confession will contain information that only the perpetrator or the police would know. But that information can leak to suspects through media coverage, being present at the crime scene, or at the crime scene at another time, rumors, and from the police themselves. This type of contamination is facilitated by the power of suggestion. Drizin gives an example of a police chief who got a false confession from a suspect that contained details about the crime scene only the police knew about. In amazement, the chief went back to a videotape of the confession and realized that he had inadvertently fed information to the suspect, and the suspect then used that information in the confession. In fact, after a thorough review, the chief found that absolutely no original information came from the suspect at all. All information had been inadvertently given to the suspect through leading questions, and even a map drawn by the chief himself of the crime scene.
Solution: Video Recording Interrogations
Drizin was certainly an advocate and the other panelists whole-heartedly agreed that many of the problems currently associated with false witnesses and false confessions could be done away with through the practice of video recording interrogations.
Although some members of law enforcement are resistant to video recording interrogations, the entire panel was in agreement that not only did video recording simply give a record of an interrogation, but it also protected police officers. If there is a video of a confession, any defense attorney can examine the recording themselves and see that there was no misconduct and no coercion. In fact, once Illinois passed a law requiring video recorded interrogations, motions to suppress confessions dropped to almost zero, and allegations of misconduct and coercion lowered significantly.
As well, Drizin points out that video recording helps catch the real bad guys, by providing law enforcement with a way to review their own work. If a confession is not caught on video, officers cannot look back at it, glean new information or make sure that they were not leading the witness or suspect to say certain things.
If our goal is to catch the guilty party, and not just to put someone in jail, video recording interrogations may be the best tool law enforcement has to double-check itself, provide transparency, and prove to courts that everything they did in the interrogation was legal and ethical.
Panelists:
Rob Warden, Executive Director, Center on Wrongful Convictions, Northwestern University School of Law
Steven Drizin, Legal Director, Center on Wrongful Convictions, Northwestern University School of Law
Thomas P. Sullivan, Retired U.S. Attorney
Lt. Jonathan Priest, Denver Police Department
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American Police Force
I recently read an opinion piece by Officer.com Editor, Frank Borelli, discussing the scary implications of Hardin, Montana, employing America Police Force, a private, for-profit police force similar to government security contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan:
Here’s why it bothers me: this is a private corporation; a FOR PROFIT company that has taken over both a police agency (the moment the first officer is sworn in) and a jail. Such a company wouldn’t have done so unless there was a PROFIT to be made.
I believe Borelli’s objections are valid. He expounds upon the profitability issue by illustrating that American Police Force will be charging the city a rate far above its operating costs so that it can make money. As well, since the private police force will be taking over the brand new, empty jail, it is in American Police Force’s best interest to fill the jail and keep it full to maximize its profit.
But under Borelli’s main objections lies the apparent conflict of interest that any private, for-profit police force has at its very center. That is, a private police force only makes money where there is crime. And if there is more crime, there is more profit to be made. In essence, a for-profit police force would actually hurt itself if it reduced crime.
Let me put it this way: What city wants to dole out more cash to a private police force in a city where there is little to no crime? On the other hand, what city doesn’t want to throw money at a police force in a city where crime is a large problem that threatens their homes and families?
Okay, maybe I’m being a bit paranoid. Most private companies in America provide goods and services to American citizens out of the goodness of their hearts and for the betterment of society, with little thought of actually making a profit, don’t they? Why should this private business be any different?
Granted, I have greatly oversimplified the issue. There are many other layers of accountability, transparency, and free-market competition that come into play when talking about a company’s desire to reduce costs and fulfill its stated mission for the benefit of the community. But the Mercedes SUVs, with police insignias on the sides, carrying company executives into Hardin give me a bit of pause.
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Winter Haven, Fla., Police Sgt. Bradley Coleman talking about the benefit of sharing crime information with the public through CrimeReports.com.
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Check out the latest video of CrimeReports in action. (Keep an eye out for the sweet smart board they use with Command Central—it’s like we’re in the movie Minority Report.)
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I just saw that Stockholm, Sweden, now has a crime map. (Of course, the website is in Swedish, but that’s what Google Translator is for.) The site only lists 99 crimes for the last 2 months, but I imagine that if the map grows in popularity and local law enforcement sees the benefits of a public crime map, more and more information will appear.
Right now, the map is just a basic Google Map with only one marker type, and it’s not searchable, or filterable. But you can click a marker to find out more details about an incident; however, if you don’t speak Swedish, you might have to take your laptop to IKEA and see if you can get some help.
Check out the map here: http://eskapism.se/stockholmcrimemap/
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Deborah Osborne, of Analysts’ Corner, just posted this great webinar for police managers about intelligence-led policing. She admits that the audio is off in some places, but overall the information is good and provides a great introduction to intelligence -led policing for law enforcement command staff and decision makers. Visit her website for more information on webinars like this: AnalystsCorner.com
Vodpod videos no longer available.
more about “Intelligence Led Policing for Police …“, posted with vodpod
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Over the weekend, QuieroPaz.org launched its Venezuelan crime map. I have argued in the past that implementation of crime mapping in third-world countries could help cut crime by giving the people access to crime information, and I think this is a step in the right direction.
Unless you speak Spanish, the site may be a bit hard to understand, but it does offer the benefit of linking individual crimes to stories in the media about those crimes. I’m not sure whether the crimes on the map come directly from local law enforcement or whether the map is made of data culled from media sources. However, from the prevalence of homicides over any other crimes (by a wide margin), I’m guessing that the site mostly collects data from media sources and does not display crime data directly from local law enforcement.
Still, this map is a start, and hopefully it will help local citizens and law enforcement track and stay informed about crime in their area so that they can keep themselves and their communities safe.
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In a recent post titled, “Traditional Media Loses Grip on Local Crime Information,” I hypothesized that with the increase in law enforcement agencies providing citizens with direct access to crime data through Facebook, Twitter, CrimeReports, and other web tools the public may not need traditional media as a crime-reporting source anymore.
But I believe that the issue of direct data vs. traditional crime reporting is more complex than my simple conclusion seemed to express. The core of the debate is this:
If I (as a citizen) already have a direct feed of official crime data pertinent to my neighborhood through Twitter, CrimeReports, Facebook, etc., what would make me tune in to the nightly news or read the daily crime blotter in my local newspaper for crime information?
My first response is—nothing.
If I receive daily crime alerts from CrimeReports, and religiously check my local police department’s Facebook page, I would feel relatively informed about the crime situation in my neighborhood. But this does not mean that traditional media does not hold any value.
Context
First of all, print and broadcast media provide context to the data that law enforcement provides to citizens through these new web tools. As a citizen, I can track the handful of crimes that may happen in my neighborhood on a weekly basis, but I don’t know how my neighborhood fits into the bigger picture of crime across the city or the state. Traditional media has the time and resources to do the analysis and paint the bigger picture.
In addition, although many law enforcement agencies provide basic data through crime mapping and social media tools (i.e., Breaking and Entering, 9/5/09, 10:04pm). Traditional media has the ability to elaborate on those incidents (i.e., “Resident called 911 after hearing glass break. Neighbors report seeing a young woman in late teens or early twenties, fleeing the scene through the victim’s backyard,” etc.).
Contrast
Besides providing complex analysis that most citizens cannot or will not do on their own, traditional media can serve as a counter balance to the direct data coming from a law enforcement agency. Granted, most law enforcement agencies are more concerned with informing citizens than they are about providing a positive spin on the information they release, but traditional media can provide a different perspective on crime than one would get from just following the local PD on Twitter. And although newspapers and broadcast news are supported by advertising and have an incentive to increase readership/ratings, the perspective they provide can shed a different light on the data given out by local law enforcement agencies.
The Bigger Picture
Lastly, traditional media can offer a broader picture of crime than basic-level crime information. Although it has been my experience that most people are more directly concerned with crime on their block than they are with crime in the neighboring town, getting a broader picture of crime can also help raise awareness of trends in crime both locally and nationally. And awareness of broader crime trends is, as well, helpful in keeping citizens vigilant and safe.
A Difference in Scale
All-in-all, the main difference between using social media to get crime data and following traditional media for crime information is scale. CrimeReports and other crime mapping resources are very good at giving citizens a picture of crime in their neighborhood. Twitter and Facebook are excellent tools for local law enforcement to use to disseminate information and interact with a city, county, or town. But traditional media is probably the most useful for large-scale crime reporting.
Only one question remains: If citizens have a direct line to crime data on their street, will they still tune in to or read traditional forms of crime reporting to get the bigger picture? Since social media is only being used by a relatively small number of law enforcement agencies currently (although more are joining everyday), it’s too early to predict citizen’s reactions to these new information streams. My only hope is that citizens will access crime information on whatever level they feel comfortable so that they can stay informed and keep their neighborhoods safe through the greater vigilance that comes from increased access to crime information.
[Special thanks to an unnamed journalist for helping me tease out these ideas]
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Stumble It!
The Crime Map 