One of the greatest challenges law enforcement faces in today’s age is public scrutiny. Law enforcements actions are being placed under the proverbial microscope on an unprecedented scale and only from a single view point, what the media chooses to display. Often times the public will make snap judgments against law enforcement based solely on what they see from a 60 second news clip.
While law enforcement cannot control misguided views from media sources, law enforcement can influence the reaction from the public we serve. Law enforcements first objective is to build a strong foundation of trust amongst the citizens. This can be accomplished by conducting business in a transparent manner. Concealing internal investigations or appearing to …show more content…
Yes, the higher level members of a department can make speeches and shake hands. However, they are not the officers responding to a crime scene. It is the officer in a patrol car or a detective who is sitting down and helping a citizen with an issue in their life. If the first time a neighborhood has contact with a law enforcement officer is because of a crime then there was a failure on law enforcement’s part. The neighborhood should have been contacted by law enforcement long before they were called upon. The first law enforcement contacts should have come in the form of sitting down and talking with local business owners and home owners about their neighborhood, discussing the positives and negatives of their area. Educating law abiding citizens on what suspicious activity looks, things they can do to help us help them, using active listening to understand citizen concerns. This puts a name and a face with the badge so when things do go wrong citizens know the officer pulling up to their home and have confidence law enforcement will do what is right. Local officers need to get out of their vehicles and have positive interactions with citizens to develop a rapport with community members. These types of activities will aide in the removal of barriers between the public and law
While law enforcement cannot control misguided views from media sources, law enforcement can influence the reaction from the public we serve. Law enforcements first objective is to build a strong foundation of trust amongst the citizens. This can be accomplished by conducting business in a transparent manner. Concealing internal investigations or appearing to …show more content…
Yes, the higher level members of a department can make speeches and shake hands. However, they are not the officers responding to a crime scene. It is the officer in a patrol car or a detective who is sitting down and helping a citizen with an issue in their life. If the first time a neighborhood has contact with a law enforcement officer is because of a crime then there was a failure on law enforcement’s part. The neighborhood should have been contacted by law enforcement long before they were called upon. The first law enforcement contacts should have come in the form of sitting down and talking with local business owners and home owners about their neighborhood, discussing the positives and negatives of their area. Educating law abiding citizens on what suspicious activity looks, things they can do to help us help them, using active listening to understand citizen concerns. This puts a name and a face with the badge so when things do go wrong citizens know the officer pulling up to their home and have confidence law enforcement will do what is right. Local officers need to get out of their vehicles and have positive interactions with citizens to develop a rapport with community members. These types of activities will aide in the removal of barriers between the public and law