How appropriate are volunteers as 'appropriate adults' for young suspects? The 'appropriate adult' system and human rights

This article discusses the use of volunteers as 'appropriate adults', who are intended to safeguard the rights of young people during the police investigation process. It maps the historical origins of using volunteers to fulfil the role. It then highlights the shortfalls of parents and social workers as appropriate adults and evaluates the suitability of volunteers for the role. Whilst the shortcoming of parents and social workers are not disputed, nor the benefits accrued by using volunteers in the name of administrative and financial efficiency, it is argued that the effectiveness of volunteers in protecting the vulnerable suspect could be impeded by poor selection and preparation. Consequently, this article argues that the effectiveness of volunteers in this role is dependent on prompt and effective regulation and guidance. It warns the Government that if it continues with its current line of inaction, it could result in breaching its obligations under international law. Current appropriate adult practice generally may breach human rights guaranteed under international and domestic law.This article concludes that the lure of resource savings should not come at the expense of less protection for the young suspect in police custody.     

The Commissioner cometh: The challenge for democratic policing in England and Wales

Public policing in England and Wales is currently undergoing and will undergo substantial changes to the way it delivers its services in the future. Consideration of the different proposals for change when viewed in isolation appears to produce uncertainty in terms of organisational structure. However, when considered as interdependent they provide a more clear and problematic issue that could undermine the current democratic model of policing utilised in this country. This article considers the ideas of the function of the public police within a democratic policing model and how changes such as the introduction of Police and Crime Commissioners, an apparent lack of engagement by the public with the democratic process, as well as the possibility of privatisation and outsourcing currently in vogue, may have a detrimental effect upon the policing philosophy that has underpinned policing in England and Wales for nearly 200 years.     

The Police Reporting Behavior of Intimate Partner Violence Victims

In the current research, we draw on Canadian national data to examine the police reporting decisions of married and cohabiting intimate partner violence victims. Our analyses examine how police notification decisions are influenced by the demographic characteristics of victims and incident-specific factors. We find that the victims who contact the police more often live in a cohabiting relationship and with children. In contrast to predictions, we find that visible minority women more often call the police. Income, education, and employment status do not appear to shape the police reporting decisions of women. Finally, women who call the police are also likely to have experienced severe forms of violence including threats with weapons, injury, and the destruction of their property.     

警察道德失范的心理因素及治理对策

警察道德失范是警察违法犯罪率逐年上升的重要原因。不良社会心理是导致警察道德失范的内在因素。主要表现在警察的不合理认识、不良社会意识和偏颇的角色意识三个方面。提高警察道德认知水平、加快警察道德立法进程是治理警察道德失范的根本对策。     

警察形象战略的基石：警察核心价值观

警察形象战略是在新形势下开展警察公共关系建设,促进警察机关和人民群众的沟通和理解,密切警民关系的有效载体。而警察核心价值观的确立和培育则是警察形象战略中最为重要的一个环节,它可以使警察形象建设达到事半功倍的效果。     

Protecting Eyewitness Evidence: Examining the Efficacy of a Self-Administered Interview Tool

Given the crucial role of eyewitness evidence, statements should be obtained as soon as possible after an incident. This is not always achieved due to demands on police resources. Two studies trace the development of a new tool, the Self-Administered Interview (SAI), designed to elicit a comprehensive initial statement. In Study 1, SAI participants reported more correct details than participants who provided a free recall account, and performed at the same level as participants given a Cognitive Interview. In Study 2, participants viewed a simulated crime and half recorded their statement using the SAI. After a delay of 1 week, all participants completed a free recall test. SAI participants recalled more correct details in the delayed recall task than control participants.     

Identifying and Managing Stress in Child Pornography and Child Exploitation Investigators

In the last decade, law enforcement personnel have increasingly been tasked to police the internet in an effort to staunch the production and distribution of child pornography and to investigate computer-facilitated child exploitation. These investigative personnel have encountered a range of assignment-specific challenges and strains as a result of their involvement in this taxing and novel investigative activity. In some cases, the cumulative effects of these strains, together with repeated exposure to highly disturbing images of abused children, have resulted in stress reactions that have commanded the attention of police managers and police psychologists alike. The present article is intended to provide an overview of the stresses unique to child exploitation and pornography investigations, common reactions to these stressors, procedural safeguards to mitigate the impact of this high-risk assignment, and two model programs designed to meet the needs of the current generation of “cyber cops”.

The New York City Police Department,its Crime Control Strategies and Organizational Changes, 1970-2009

Over the last two decades, New York City has witnessed historic drops in crime. Numerous explanations for this crime decline have been discussed, and the New York City Police Department (NYPD) has been central to that debate, most notably because of the adoption of order maintenance policing and the implementation of Compstat. While those developments in the early 1990s are clearly important for understanding the potential role of the NYPD in the crime decline, those changes did not occur in a vacuum. This paper adopts an historical framework that places the role of the NYPD in the crime decline in the larger context of the department’s history, culture, and key events over a nearly 40-year span. This perspective suggests that many of the crime control strategies implemented by the NYPD over that time have been driven by internal and external crises, and that these strategies have also produced unintended consequences. With the historical analysis as a backdrop, the paper considers the ongoing debate over stop, question and frisk practices, and their disproportionate impact on minority residents, as the next potential crisis for the NYPD. The paper concludes with a discussion of the historical framework as a foundation for initiating a comparative dialog across law enforcement agencies regarding crime control strategies, their impact, and their consequences.     

Governmental filtering of websites: The Dutch case

Following the example of Norway and other European Countries, such as Sweden and Denmark, in April 2007 the Dutch government started filtering and blocking web pages with child pornographic content. In this paper we present a research into the technological, legal and practical possibilities of this measure. Our study leads us to the conclusion that the deployment of filters by or on behalf of the Dutch government is not based on any founded knowledge concerning the effectiveness of the approach. Furthermore, the actions of the Dutch law enforcement authorities do not avail over legal powers to filter and block internet traffic. Consequently the Dutch filtering practice was found to be unlawful. The government could enact a law that provides the police with the relevant powers. However, child porn filters always cause a certain amount of structural overblocking, which means that the government is then engaged in structural blocking of information that is not against the law. This would be in conflict with basic rights as laid down in the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and in national legislation. Maintaining a blacklist that is serious in size (a necessary condition for being effective), and at the same time is up-to-date and error-free (which is needed to prevent overblocking), is very labour-intensive, if not impossible to maintain. From the Dutch national police policy perspective it follows that putting so much labour in maintaining a blacklist cannot be considered as a police task. Why then did the Dutch police start filtering? In a society where child pornography is judged with abhorrence, in which safety is rated higher then privacy, and in which managers and politicians frequently have a naive faith in technology, the advocates of internet filters against child pornography quickly find wide-spread support. Although this paper refers to the situation in The Netherlands, it includes a number of elements and issues that are relevant to other European States as well.     

天眼与天平:中西司法者的图像和标志解读

中国与西方为其理想的司法者所造的形象各有不同。中国作为理想司法者标志的是铁面三眼的包公,而西方作为理想司法者标志的则是蒙眼持秤的女神。本文首先分析了司法的目的(追寻个案判决的妥当、同类案件判决的协和以及终极的社会理想),其次讨论了中西文化特质对于追寻此目的的方法所生的歧异(比较详细地阐述了中国为了追寻此目的,在理论、制度和实践方面的演变过程),然后谈到司法工作本质上的限制和司法者的功能,指出中西两种图像所表达的期望都有问题,应该加以修正。     

A review of the literature on the aging adult skull and face: Implications for forensic science research and applications

This paper is a summary of findings of adult age-related craniofacial morphological changes. Our aims are two-fold: (1) through a review of the literature we address the factors influencing craniofacial aging, and (2) the general ways in which a head and face age in adulthood. We present findings on environmental and innate influences on face aging, facial soft tissue age changes, and bony changes in the craniofacial and dentoalveolar skeleton. We then briefly address the relevance of this information to forensic science research and applications, such as the development of computer facial age-progression and face recognition technologies, and contributions to forensic sketch artistry.     

Police Response to Crime

Abstract

Based on victim accounts provided by the National Crime Victimization Survey from 1992 to 1999, this paper examines issues related to police responses to reported incidents of assault, robbery, and rape. The primary goal was to determine the extent to which victim and offender race influence police responsiveness at various stages of the criminal justice system. The data indicate that overall, police exert more effort when victims are white. They arrive faster at the scene of the crime, and demonstrate more follow-up effort after the crime has taken place. However, they do not exert more, or less effort, during their initial visit to the crime scene, when there is proximate contact with the victims. This suggests that contextual factors may affect the penchant for discrimination. This relationship held even after controlling for other factors such as poverty, weapon use, injury to the victim, and location.     

警察执法的道德追问

警察执法不仅是实施法律的过程,而且也是实现道德价值的过程。忽视警察执法的道德追问,必然造成警察执法的道德缺失。警察执法应是法治化与道德化的统合。提高警察的道德素质,才能从根本上保证警察执法正当目的的确立和警察执法手段的正当行使。在依法治警的同时切实以德治警,加强对警察自由裁量权的道德约束,让“立警为公,执法为民”的道德价值理念照耀警察执法过程。     

Racial Threat,Social (Dis)organization,and the Ecology of Police: Towards a Macro-level Understanding of Police Use-of-force in Communities of Color

Abstract

In this paper, we examine use-of-force incidents as neighborhood processes to understand how rates and levels of use-of-force vary across New York City. We suggest that there are two distinct outcomes of force by the police: number of use-of-force incidents and level of force. Applying theories of racial threat, social disorganization, and Klinger’s ecological theory of policing, we conceptualize use-of-force as a neighborhood phenomenon rather than individual events. Our results suggest that rates and levels of force operate in some distinct ways. In particular, while we find that use-of-force is concentrated in Black neighborhoods, and is also more severe in Black neighborhoods, neighborhoods with higher racial and ethnic heterogeneity have decreasing force incidents, but with increasing severity. This may reflect different types of policing, with high rates of low-level police harassment occurring in primarily poorer, Black neighborhoods, and more isolated but severe incidents occurring in middle-income and wealthier mixed neighborhoods.     

‘Inappropriate but not crime’? Policing racial hatred in Sweden

ABSTRACT

Racial bias afflicts police practices across the globe. Police discrimination against and mistreatment of racial and ethnic minorities is indeed difficult to underestimate. While much attention has been thus paid to racially biased policing, fewer studies examine the question from the reverse angle, namely how the police themselves combat racist offences. This article offers empirical insights into the policing of racial hatred in Sweden, a relevant yet relatively understudied case. Drawing on interviews with police officers and crime investigators, I discuss law enforcement perspectives, e.g. perceptions and reasoning in relation to the investigation of racist offences. Findings evince a rather narrow approach as regards the constructions of racist motive that involves a relatively restricted use of bias labelling in identifying hate incidents, especially when the boundaries of racial hostility are perceived as blurred. I argue that while such an approach may reflect a legitimate effort to demonstrate the existence of a motive behind an offence, it may also lead to an underestimation of more mundane forms of racism and their harms inflicted upon racialized individuals and communities. The results have implications for ‘recognition’ and ‘belonging’ as benchmarks of democratic policing, and ‘the promise of inclusion’ associated with combatting hate crimes.