Situational and officer-based determinants of police coercion

Using data collected as part of an observational study of the police in Indianapolis, Indiana, and St. Petersburg, Florida, this article examines police use of force to gain a better understanding of why the police resort to force. Like analyses from previous observational studies, the present inquiry borrows from both sociological and psychological theoretical orientations to explore various determinants of force. Unlike previous examinations, the universe of behaviors considered is substantially expanded to include numerous types or levels of force, ranging from verbal commands and threats to the use of impact methods. An ordered probit analysis of 3,116 police-suspect encounters shows that officers often respond to legal stimuli (e.g., suspects' resistance, safety concerns) when applying force. Countering previous findings, it found that officers were not more coercive toward disrespectful suspects. However, the analysis revealed that officers were also influenced by extra-legal factors. Male, nonwhite, poor, and younger suspects were all treated more forcefully, irrespective of their behavior. In addition, encounters involving inexperienced and less-educated officers resulted in increased levels of police force. The implications of these findings, for both policy and future research, are considered.     

Explaining suspects' resistance and disrespect toward police

The importance of suspects' resistance toward police officers has almost always been described in terms of its influence on police behavior. Given the centrality of citizens' resistance in the literature on police behavior, it is surprising that so little attention has been focused on explaining suspects' resistance independent of its influence on police behavior. This research examined the factors influencing multiple measures of suspects' resistance using systematic observation data collected in 1977 from twenty-four departments in three metropolitan areas. The findings show that non-White suspects were more likely to be noncompliant toward White officers but were not more likely to show more aggressive forms of resistance (e.g., verbal aggression, physical aggression, or disrespect). In addition, female suspects were more likely to be disrespectful toward officers compared to male suspects. The relevance of these findings for future research is discussed.     

Experience,quality of life,and neighborhood context: A hierarchical analysis of satisfaction with police

We test three different conceptual models—“experience with police,” “quality of life,” and “neighborhood context”—for directional accuracy and ability to explain satisfaction with the police. We also investigate whether these models help to explain the common finding that African-Americans are more dissatisfied with the police than are Caucasians. To do so, we use hierarchical linear modeling to simultaneously regress our outcome measure on clusters of citizen- and neighborhood-level variables. The analysis was conducted using recently collected information from the Project on Policing Neighborhoods (POPN). The data file consisted of survey responses from 5,361 citizens residing in 58 neighborhoods located in Indianapolis, Indiana and St. Petersburg, Florida. At the citizen level, the psychologically based “quality of life” model accounts for the greatest proportion of explained variance and provides the greatest directional accuracy. Also, residents of neighborhoods characterized by concentrated disadvantage express significantly less satisfaction with the police. In addition, neighborhood context reduces the negative effect of African-American status on satisfaction with police when a sparse citizen-level specification is used; racial variation in satisfaction with police persists, however, when citizen-level hierarchical models are specified more fully.     

Officer proactivity: A comparison between police field training officers and non-field training officers

This article examines the behavioral differences between police field training officers (FTOs) and non-FTOs in problem-focused efforts and aggressive preventive patrol. The former refers to officer-initiated security checks and attempts to locate citizens, while the latter includes officer-initiated field interrogations and traffic stops. Data used were collected from Indianapolis, Indiana and St. Petersburg, Florida during the summers of 1996 and 1997. Findings show that FTOs, especially those in St. Petersburg, are more proactive than non-FTOs in attempting to locate suspects and witnesses, but they do not differ in the level of proactivity with respect to security checks, field interrogations, and traffic stops. Implications for future research and policy are discussed.     

NEIGHBORHOOD DISADVANTAGE AND POLICE NOTIFICATION BY VICTIMS OF VIOLENCE*

This research uses data from the Area‐Identified National Crime Victimization Survey to examine the influence of neighborhood socioeconomic disadvantage on the likelihood of police notification by victims of violence. The results indicate that neighborhood disadvantage does not significantly affect the likelihood of police notification among robbery and aggravated assault victims. However, a significant curvilinear effect of neighborhood disadvantage is observed for simple assault victims. The implications of these results for community‐level crime research and for theoretical perspectives on police notification are discussed.     

POLICE SUSPICION AND DISCRETIONARY DECISION MAKING DURING CITIZEN STOPS*

This study examines the influence of racial, demographic and situational variables on types of police suspicion and the ancillary decision to stop and question suspects. Data were drawn from an observational study of police decision making in Savannah, Georgia. Based on the literature, we hypothesized that minority suspects will be more likely to be viewed suspiciously by the police for nonbehavioral reasons. We also hypothesize that minority status will play a significant role in the decision to stop and question suspicious persons. The findings from this study provide partial support for these hypotheses. The results indicate that minority status does influence an officer's decision to form nonbehavioral as opposed to behavioral suspicion, but that minority status does not influence the decision to stop and question suspects. We discuss the implications of these findings for understanding race and its role in police decision making.     

An analysis of how the police ‘caution’ is presented to juvenile suspects in England

In England and Wales, suspects must be given a police caution before they are questioned. The purpose of the caution is to explain a suspect's right to silence as a protection against self-incrimination. However, the evidence on whether the caution fulfils its purpose is limited. The aim of the present study was to describe how cautions were delivered in interviews with juvenile suspects in England. First, the study set out to describe how the caution was delivered to suspects during actual police interviews. Second, the study examined whether suspects claimed or demonstrated understanding of the caution. Third, the study analysed how the caution was explained by police officers. In total, the study examined 38 cautions from 31 interviews. The results indicated that police officers delivered the caution at a speed that is likely to be too fast for juvenile suspects to comprehend. Juvenile suspects often claimed to understand the caution, but when asked, failed to demonstrate comprehension. On the other hand, police officers often explained the caution to juvenile suspects, but not always correctly. Both suspects’ and police officers’ explanations of the caution revealed several misconceptions. The results suggest that the caution may not safeguard suspects as intended.     

POLICE CULTURE AND COERCION*

Researchers have long noted the link between police culture and coercion. To date, however, there have been no empirical studies of this relationship. Using data collected as part of a systematic social observation study of the police in Indianapolis, Indiana, and St. Petersburg, Florida, this research examines the relationship between traditional views of police culture—from an attitudinal perspective‐and coercion—from a behavioral perspective. After developing a classification scheme of officers' outlooks in the context of police culture, we examine the extent to which officers' alignment with cultural attitudes translates into differences in coercive behavior. The findings indicate that those officers who closely embody the values of the police culture are more coercive compared with those that differentially align with the culture, suggesting that police use of force is a function of officers' varying attitudinal commitments to the traditional view of police culture. The implications of these findings for policy and future research are considered.     

Neighborhood and the Police: The People's Republic of China

The neighborhood police station of the People's Republic of China is examined as a form of self-policing. It is an expression of the PRC ideology that is not to be extrapolated directly to the circumstances of Western policing, but the neighborhood police station does illustrate the tendency of law enforcement to emphasize the vertical axis of the community that advances the interests of external power over service to the needs of the neighborhood as conceived by the residents. This conclusion is given substance by analysis of the neighborhood police station's functions in household registration and relationships with public security committees.     

Police interviewing techniques at two south london police stations

Abstract

This paper analyses the techniques used by police officers at two South London Police Stations: Orpington and Peckham. Audio tapes of 161 police interviews were analysed with regard to their duration, type of techniques employed, suspects' reactions, and the number of confessions obtained. The findings reveal that the great majority of the interviews are short, non-confrontational, and that exchanges are conducted with polite and compliant suspects. The Orpington suspects were significantly more ‘co-operative’ than their Peckham counterparts which may reflect quite different social and demographic conditions. In only a fifth of the cases did the police employ any challenging tactics to question the suspect's version of events. Overall, there were fewer coercive or manipulative tactics employed compared with earlier studies although the number of confessions or admissions obtained has remained relatively constant. Recommendations are made for police interview training to reflect these findings.     

SOURCES OF INFORMAL SOCIAL CONTROL IN CHICAGO NEIGHBORHOODS*

Why do youth in structurally disadvantaged neighborhoods experience lower levels of informal social control? To answer this question, we examined multilevel data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods. Using hierarchical regression, we found that (1) neighborhood attachment and satisfaction with police contributed significantly to neighborhood levels of informal social control; and (2) neighborhood attachment and satisfaction with police mediated a substantial portion of the association between informal social control and neighborhood levels of concentrated disadvantage and immigrant concentration.     

General Kramarev: They Brought up the Reform of the MVD to the Elections and Miscalculated

The former head of the Chief Directorate of Internal Affairs for St. Petersburg and Leningrad oblast believes that little has changed in Nurgaliyev's ministry.     

EFFECT OF SUSPECT RACE ON OFFICERS’ ARREST DECISIONS*

Many respondents to opinion surveys say that the citizen's race influences how police officers treat the public, yet recent expert social‐science panels have declared that research findings are too contradictory to form a conclusion on whether American police are biased against racial minorities. We perform a meta‐analysis of quantitative research that estimates the effect of race on the police decision to arrest. Screening nearly 4,500 potential sources, we analyze the results based on 27 independent data sets that generated 40 research reports (both published and unpublished) that permitted an estimate of the effect size of the suspect's race on the probability of arrest. The meta‐analysis shows with strong consistency that minority suspects are more likely to be arrested than White suspects. Depending on the method of estimation, the effect size of race varied between 1.32 and 1.52. Converting the race effect size to probabilities shows that compared with the average probability in these studies of a White being arrested (.20), the average probability for a non‐White was calculated at .26. The significant race effect persists when taking into account the studies’ variations in research methods and the nature of explanatory models used in the studies. Implications for future research are presented.     

Integration Policy in the Contemporary Megalopolis

The author assesses the effect of migration on St. Petersburg and discusses the evolution of the city government's policy for the adaptation and integration of migrants.     

Public Satisfaction with Police Control of Disorder Crime: Does the Public Hold Police Accountable?

This study expands the research on public satisfaction with the police by attempting to disentangle the relationships among disorder crime incidents reported to the police, residents' perceptions of disorder, and citizen satisfaction with police performance on order maintenance. The police accountability model and the demographic model are utilized to predict the variation of public satisfaction with police control of disorder (SWPD). The data used in this analysis were derived from a random-sample telephone survey of 1,215 Houston residents. Crime data were provided by the Houston Police Department and further extracted from the area surrounding each individual respondent's residence surveyed by using Geographic Information Systems technology. The main findings are that while the actual incidence of disorder crime had no direct impact on residents' perceptions of police performance on order maintenance, it did have a significant direct impact on their perceptions of disorder. This shows the utility of the accountability model in future research. Moreover, it was found that global satisfaction with police crime prevention was an important predictor of public SWPD in their immediate neighborhood.     

Women Police Officers and the Use of Coercion

Abstract

Despite numerous advances in the last thirty years, women police officers continue to face acceptance issues in a male-dominated occupation. Qualitative accounts of policewomen have noted that many of the integration barriers stem from traditional assumptions about police work, much of which revolves around the cultural mandate to display one's coercive authority over citizens. Female officers are often perceived as unwilling (or lacking in ability) to use coercion when encountering citizens. Unfortunately, little empirical evidence is available to support this claim, as gender studies that specifically examine the use of coercion have tended to focus on excessive force. Using data collected as part of a systematic social observation study in Indianapolis, Indiana, and St. Petersburg, Florida, this research examines both verbal and physical coercion that policewomen use in day-to-day encounters with citizens. The results of this study challenge one of the most fundamental stereotypes levied against women police officers. Contrary to traditional assumptions, female police officers (compared to their male counterparts) are not reluctant to use coercive force, and examinations of both verbal and physical force reveal few differences in not only the prevalence of each behavior, but also in the commonly associated explanatory factors. The article concludes with the implications of these     

Citizens' perceptions of police misconduct: Race and neighborhood context

One of the most controversial issues in policing concerns allegations of police abuse of members of minority groups. This article examines African Americans' and whites' perceptions and experiences of three types of police misconduct: unjustified street stops of citizens, verbal abuse, and use of excessive force. The study is based on in-depth interviews with residents of three neighborhoods in Washington, DC, which vary in racial and class profile. Findings support the thesis that neighborhood context conditions residents' attitudes and reported experiences with the police. Residents of both the white and the black middle-class neighborhoods were less likely to perceive or experience police abuse in their neighborhoods than were residents of the black lower-class neighborhood. Neighborhood class position thus may be an important, but often overlooked, factor shaping citizens' attitudes and experiences. In encounters with the police outside the neighborhood, however, individuals' race becomes salient. Implications are discussed for understanding the role of race, class, and neighborhood context in police-citizen relations.     

Race and Officer Decision Making: Examining Differences in Arrest Outcomes between Black and White Officers

Since the 1960s, one of the major reform efforts in law enforcement has been to increase the number of Black Americans within police agencies and on patrol in the streets. The general premise behind these efforts has been that increased diversity will improve police–community relations and will decrease biased police behavior, particularly against Black citizens. Policies seeking to reform policing through increasing the numbers of African American officers have been implemented with little empirical evidence that an officer's race (or ethnicity) is actually related to their behavior towards citizens, in particular arrest decisions. Using data from systematic social observations of police–citizen encounters in Cincinnati, OH, this study examines the influence of officer race on arrest outcomes, focusing on the behavior of Black officers. Findings suggest that officer race has direct influence on arrest outcomes and there are substantive differences between White and Black officers in the decision to arrest. In general, White officers in our study were more likely to arrest suspects than Black officers, but Black suspects were more likely to be arrested when the decision maker was a Black officer.     

When Both Sides are Mistaken: Layperson and Legal Professionals’ Misconceptions of Canadian Suspects’ Legal Rights Upon Arrest

Canadian criminal suspects have notably limited access to legal counsel upon arrest compared to suspects in the U.S. Additionally, prior research has shown significant misunderstanding of police warnings informing suspects of their rights upon arrest. This paper presents three studies on Canadians’ comprehension of criminal suspects’ rights upon arrest, with a focus on the right to counsel. Study 1 (N=80) and Study 2 (N=377) examined Canadian layperson’s comprehension, knowledge, and perceptions of legal rights upon arrest. In turn, Study 3 (N=78) investigated Canadian legal professionals’ perceptions of laypersons’ knowledge of those rights. Results from these three studies indicated there is substantial confusion about the right to counsel for Canadian criminal suspects. These results also support previous research demonstrating problems with comprehension of Canadian police cautions. Taken together, the findings of the present research pose significant concern for an increased risk of false confessions from Canadian suspects who enter an interrogation with limited knowledge and understanding of their legal right to counsel.