...Policing Functions Sara Powell CJA/394 February 7, 2012 Patrick Daulton Introduction Law enforcement agencies in the United States have numerous different functions. There are three basic levels of law enforcement; Federal, state, and local level. Each level of law enforcement is organized to deliver effectively the services that meet the public’s needs. Collectively these levels and agencies work together to achieve many duties. Whereas each level of law enforcement has its own responsibilities and procedures, their functions are very comparable. Research reveals the various roles of each police agency at its perspective level, how these functions compare to each other, and the impact these roles have in a community. Basic Functions of Policing First, the basic functions of police agencies include law enforcement, arresting offenders, crime prevention, maintaining order, and providing other services to community members in need. Many of these functions may coincide with each other. As an example while enforcing the laws, officers are often required to arrest the offender, which results in the maintenance of order. These functions in turn help prevent future crime. Federal Level of Policing The Federal level of policing includes organizations such as the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). The FBI, for example, is the Nation’s premier law enforcement organization and...
Words: 1380 - Pages: 6
...Policing Functions Policing Functions Policing functions are learning from experience, these functions follow current policing functions as well as those from the past. Policing functions at any level, whether it is local, state, or federal can be difficult at times because each level was made by someone or a few individuals carrying out their own ideas and responding to the circumstances that were present at that time. The way the police agencies are functioning now still needs improvement, but it has improved from the way they were functioning in the past. “Law enforcement in the United States is a large and extremely complex enterprise. There are almost 18,000 federal, state, and local agencies, along with a private security industry that employs over a million additional people” (Walker & Katz, 2008). Policing agencies implement many functions in order to protect society. Law enforcement agencies are responsible for maintaining the peace, preventing crime, and to provide the public with a service. These agencies are split up into local, state, and federal levels. These levels can work together, but they mainly work independently from the each other. Even though they may work together, each level has its very own set of responsibilities, techniques, and guidelines. Before society can understand how policing function has changed, society needs to understand what policing function means and how police functions came about. Police functions were identified by Goldstein...
Words: 1373 - Pages: 6
...Policing Functions Paper Dana Gurley CJA 394 April 29, 2013 Don Frederick Policing Functions Paper According to The Free Dictionary (2013), policing is defined as to regulate, control, or keep in order with or as if with a law enforcement agency. Policing is at city, county, state, and federal levels with the United States, each have different roles and responsibilities. Policing has advanced so much from starting with night watchmen who were just citizens, to community policing being an occupation. Society is always advancing making the criminal justice system which includes policing to keep up with the advancements. As a police officer whether it be at a city, county, state, or federal level risk their lives daily to keep society in order by protecting and enforcing the laws. There are also private security industries that employ law enforcement officers as well. Local police department is a general purpose law enforcement agency which consists of both county, and town or city (Bureau of Justice Statistics, n.d.). Tribal police are also classified as local police. Municipal or city police are the most important component of American law enforcement. Municipal police play a more complex role than any other type of law enforcement agency. As a city police department has the heaviest responsibility for dealing with serious crime which is located within the cities (Walker & Katz, Chapter 3, The Contemporary Law Enforcement Industry, 2008). Not only with the responsibilities...
Words: 1049 - Pages: 5
...Policing Functions Policing in the U.S. is unique to any other part of the world today or in anytime in the past. Near the turn of the century there were so many individual police departments and agencies in the U.S. that it could easily seem very strange to people in other countries why there was a need for this huge number of entities. Most often in other countries law enforcement is ran by a central agency or ministry that is over all local branches. Unlike the US system in which local departments are largely responsible for themselves, for example currently the US has around 18,000 different agencies ("United States", 2014). While the UK has 46 agencies ("United Kingdom", 2014) and Japan has 47 agencies ("Japan", 2014). The almost 18,000 agencies in the US are individually governed, so to speak. Each agency answers to a higher power, our local law enforcement that is managed by and answers to the mayor and the City Council. Larger cities or metropolitan areas often also have a federal law enforcement agency branch in the city. The federal enforcement agency located there reports to the federal office of that particular agency. The common local law enforcement handles the simple day-to-day tasks of keeping the town running and in order, while the federal law enforcement handles issues like kidnapping and bank robbery. Then there are specialty departments with in these agencies. Such as departments that are over parks or airports, there are also federal agencies...
Words: 1163 - Pages: 5
...The roles of policing from the local, state, and federal all have several roles, that they must take part in everyday. Law enforcement has different branches that oversee a variety of jurisdictions. All of these variety jurisdictions have a main purpose, to protect citizens and enforce laws that have been passed. Depending on your jurisdiction and what you are doing will decide on what type of law enforcement will be assisting you in the activity. The various policing functions of local, state and federal all have their own roles and are important for each jurisdiction. The most common law enforcement that we see in our daily lives is the local police department. The main goal for the local law enforcement is to uphold the laws on streets and in their neighborhoods that they patrol. Our local police department consists of 83.5 employees, which of these 57 are sworn police officers (City of San Luis Obispo, 2012). Local law enforcement provides service to their community and to special assignments. Special assignments can include field training, crime scene investigator, SWAT, and others. Many individuals look at their local law enforcement as people who do not respect their community members. This is not the case in many situations. Law enforcement is in place to help communities and the individuals who live there. If there was no local law enforcement in communities, criminal activities would be out of control. If an individual respects a police officer...
Words: 1062 - Pages: 5
...Individual Policing Functions Paper Monica Robinson University of Phoenix CJA/394 Individual Policing Functions Paper Policing has come a long way from the way it was decades ago. It has changed for the better even through there is still some room for more improvement. In policing today there are more officers, detectives, and other officials accounted for then there was in the past. Having all of these individuals within the criminal system, it has shape the government to provide better protection for its people. In policing in past and now in the present there are many different perspectives of policing functions. These functions stem from different levels of law enforcement which includes the local, state, and federal organizational levels. These are very important parts of the criminal justice system, because every individual within these levels must be sure to protect citizens, enforce law, and perform the duties that are required of them in order to keep the United States safe from criminals and terrorist attacks from other foreign countries that might try to attack the United States. As years have passed on within policing, there are many possible future changes that will have an effect in the field of policing. Within each level of policing there are many different roles in which every individual in the policing field must take part in if they are going to be on the law enforcement team. I say this because this is a very serious 24/7 operation...
Words: 1074 - Pages: 5
...Community Policing: Past, Present, and Future By: Travis B. Anthony JADM 260-Community Policing Professor McIntyre DeVry University Abstract Community policing has surged forth since the 1970s as an increasingly important strategy for investigating and preventing crime activity, and enhancing community involvement and safety. It is a philosophy and an organizational strategy that helps the police and the community to work closely together in many different and inventive ways to solve the problems of crimes, illegal drugs, fear of criminal activity, physical or social disorder, neighborhood decay, and the quality of life in the community. Community policing is rather difficult to define. Although community policing does not have a singular definition, there are several various elements of community policing. A major definition used to define community policing is: Community policing is more of a philosophy than a specific tactic; a proactive, decentralized approach designed to reduce crime, disorder and fear of crime by intensely involving the same officer in a community for a long term so that personal links are formed with residents (Champion, 1997). This definition helps to explain the key elements of community policing. The most common features involve cooperation between police and community residents, willingness to work toward mutual goals, and a general desire to improve community safety through more effective crime control. Introduction The overall aspect...
Words: 2491 - Pages: 10
...Community policing abroad has been popular, especially in democratic countries. The police from more democratic nations preferred community policing more than zero tolerance (Lum, 2009). The similarities that community policing share with democracy are citizen authorization, power citizens have to contest the police such as citizen review boards, complaint processes, media complaints, serving the people. It takes 10-15 years for full implementation of community policing (Trojanowicz, & Bucqueroux, 1992). South Korea has recently hit this 15 year mark which makes it a prime country to study (Kang et al, 2014). South Korea is a country that has implemented community policing. Community policing was introduced in Korea during the Grand Reform...
Words: 916 - Pages: 4
...Community-oriented policing is a system that addresses the top concerns of the community which implies there would need to be more communication between members of the community and police officers. The article Policing on Bicycles and Horses by Sam Swindell focuses on two types of community-oriented policing. The two types being bicycle and mounted patrol of C.O.P. Bicycle patrol is a type of community policing patrol serves well in that the police have the opportunity to encounter more citizens and extend their contacts in the community. Many police departments have been adapting bicycle patrols into their community policing programs due to the positive response given by the community and the officers. Mounted patrol has been around for centuries and will continue to be around as there is always a positive response from the community. Police on bicycles seem more approachable and attractive to citizens especially the youth. The officers tend to dress informal so they can be better recieved by the community. These officers have the same advatages as those on foot patrol have, but they are able to get move faster. They can hear, see and smell the community around them. The bicycles can go where cars can not. In the Los Angeles Police Department they enhanced mobility crowd control when bicycle patrol was first deployed in 2000. The article also states that bicycle patrol is quieter than any car. The article tells about the disadvatages of bicycle patrol. It states that eleven...
Words: 1023 - Pages: 5
...have learned about community policing specialist is that they work flexible hours to patrol the community and solving problems at the same time. Community policing normally consists of about four or five officers on each shift. Community policing consist of the community's effort combined to with the police. They job is to stop crimes. The community and the police works together to solve community problems to stop crimes from happening. They come up with strategies for the organization and the community. " It is clear that community policing has become a specialist function. A preponderance of medium and large police agencies designate at least some proportion of their officer as full-time specialist in community policing. Willis (2011) notes that not once of six sites he...
Words: 474 - Pages: 2
...According to Cole and Gertz (2013), community oriented police focuses on maintaining order in local neighborhoods (p.103). Their presence helps ease problems within the community such as domestic violence, rowdy teenagers, and drug houses. But the role of community police is changing as they face new challenges such as immigration, protest movements, and terrorism (Cole & Gertz, 2013). The 9/11 attacks added a dimension to policing that expanded their role beyond maintaining order. They have new responsibilities that include “fixed geographic responsibilities” as a method of preventing local terroristic threats. Police now examine their areas of responsibilities and help to determine the possible areas for attacks. In addition, they help to...
Words: 1206 - Pages: 5
...Community Policing focuses on building a personal relationship between police officers and the community members they protect and serve. Police officers get involved with the school systems, local businesses and organizations in the community. (Lincoln Police Department) The goal of community policing is to build a partnership of trust between police officers and community member that will result in community members working together with police officers to better the communities they live in. (Scheider,2008 ) Research have shown that community policing programs have reduced crime in certain communities. “However, outcomes vary depending on program type and the circumstances in which the program is implemented. That is, not all community-based...
Words: 253 - Pages: 2
...Describe some ways in which community policing is more easily facilitated today with the use of technology. In a minimum 200 word response, outline some methods that police departments use in order to open the lines of communication with the public. Provide and describe some examples of these methods that are possibly being used in your community. In today’s world of social media and internet, community policing has become much easier. Twenty years ago it was much harder for departments to execute community policing. Now all the departments are using the social media like Facebook and Twitter to help engage the community in mass numbers. According to Dempsey and Forst (2011) community policing is a philosophy for police departments and the community to come together to solve problems. Before there was internet and social media, police would have to go door to door to engage the community and that could take hours just to engage a handful of people. In my community police are doing everything they can to keep the whole community informed on anything that can be useful from traffic to suspicious activity. Over the last couple years the police department and city have come together and created a city hall website. On the website you can do anything from file reports and see public documents on local criminals still living within the community. The police department also has a Facebook and Twitter account that is maintained and updated regularly. On the police departments...
Words: 287 - Pages: 2
...George Zimmerman Shooting and Killing of Trayvon Martin George Zimmerman is the 28-year-old neighborhood watchman who shot and killed unarmed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida, a month ago. He has been keeping a low profile. He is in hiding after reportedly receiving several death threats and, for weeks, all the world saw of him was an unsmiling 2005 mug shot. As investigators and reporters try to piece together why the Floridian shot a black boy 10 years younger and dozens of pounds lighter, a fuzzy picture of Zimmerman is emerging. Here's what we know so far: George Michael Zimmerman was born in 1983, the third of four children of Robert and Gladys Zimmerman. Robert, a retired military man and magistrate judge, describes the family as multiracial, telling the Orlando Sentinel that "George is a Spanish-speaking minority with many black family members and friends." Gladys is of Peruvian descent. George grew up in Manassas, Va., where neighbors describe the Zimmermans as very religious — George was an altar boy and evening receptionist at the family's parish, All Saints Catholic Church. The Zimmerman children attended Catholic school through eighth grade, then public high school. The family moved to Florida about a decade ago. George married Shellie Nicole Dean, a cosmetologist, in 2007. For a living, at the time he shot Martin, Zimmerman was working as an underwriter at mortgage risk-management firm Digital Risk. He had also been working on an associates...
Words: 1260 - Pages: 6
...Community Based Policing DeVry University Prof. B. Griffin April 5, 2012 Introduction “Community institutions are the first line of defense against order and crime…”Thus it is essential that the police work closely with all facets of the community to identify concerns and to find the most effective solutions. This is the essence of community policing (Kelling, 1988). Community policing is a value system in which the ultimate goal is working cooperatively with individual citizens, groups of citizens, and both public and private organizations to identify and resolve issues which potentially affect the livability of specific neighborhoods, and areas within the city (Cassady, 2012). Community-based police departments recognizes that that the police cannot effectively deal with such issues alone, and must partner with others who share a mutual responsibility for resolving problems. Community policing stresses prevention, early identification, and timely intervention to prevent issues before they become a problem. Community policing is both a philosophy (a way of thinking) and an organizational strategy (a way to carry out the philosophy) that allows the police and the community to work together in new ways to solve problems of crime, disorder and safety issues to improve the quality of life for everyone in that community (Wilkerson, 2006). Community policing consists of two core components, community partnership and problem solving which is the foundations of a successful...
Words: 2095 - Pages: 9
