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Thursday, April 9, 2015

Criminal Justice Admin - What would be your first actions as Chief?

As the police chief, I am going to assume a great deal of autonomy until local political forces seek to hinder my policies, at which point I will use technicalities to bypass their interference. I will immediately implement two changes to the department with the understanding that these changes will not affect budgeting for the department or coverage on the line based on the changes made, unless the reorganization returns money to the general budget, or reassigns manpower to the line. These two changes will aid me in the analysis of the department's efficiency and ethical levels and final organization decisions.

My first priority will be to organize a Chief's Office. The Chief's Office will be a reorganization of IAD, Planning, Training, PR, and R&D operations, by whichever names they are known as presently. The Chief's Office will be organized on an organic basis; “Organic organizations have flexible networks of professional staff who may perform a variety of tasks “ (Stojkovic, 2014, p.27) and work on a peer-to-peer basis. All officers assigned to the Chief''s Office will hold the same rank (Inspector; if there is a current rank with this nomenclature, it will be temporarily re-designated as Commander during the re organizational process), and will be expected to work together to accomplish the missions the former departments carried out. Officers assigned to the Chief's Office will be selected on proven excellence in patrol, investigation, and supervision. In addition, these will be officers who have been judged as capable of understanding organizational tasks, but more importantly as understanding the missions of the department and how to best achieve them. One benefit to this reorganization will be the pooling of departmental staff resources, and the reassignment or elimination of administrative positions as necessary. The purpose of the Chief's Office is to maintain the efficiency and ethics of the department, and I chose the organic model for the Office because I want the best and brightest officers aiding me in this effort.

The second immediate change will be a focus on preventing and solving actual crime; this means an immediate moratorium on the enforcement of mala prohibita “crimes” and regulatory “duties”. This can be revisited in the future, but for the present the public and the politicians will be informed that the police have real work to accomplish, and don't have the time to be bully boys for culture conflict issues. Police will not waste time shutting down children's lemonade stands, although Forbes notes that across the country, “these lemonade stand shutdowns seem to be getting more and more common “(2011, para.1) This means that crimes protected by political interests, such as illegal immigration, will be dealt with as the law states they should. This also means that the “War on Drugs” comes to an immediate end in my city, and I will be able to reallocate resources to the police function. The lack of any benefit to society is compounded by actions such as the following: “In Georgia, a SWAT team broke into a house searching for drugs and threw a flash-bang grenade inside a child's crib. The excessive force was disgusting to begin with. Even worse is the fact that the police had the wrong house and there were no drugs.” (Rasmussen, 2014, para. 4) I will for brevity's sake, postpone the subjects of police militarization and civil rights violations related to the drug war for a later date. However, that does not mean that drug dealers are off limits; if they engage in other illegal acts such as gang wars or extortion (debt collection) then they will be dealt with on the violation of those laws...actual crime. Quality of life crimes will still be enforced as these are property crimes. Traffic functions will be continued as traffic is a public order function.

I understand that there will be immediate political conflict due to the second policy change, if not the first. However, there is no point in my having this position unless it is done correctly; if push comes to shove, I find that law enforcement agencies don't do their duty in confronting the actions of politicians who act illegally. For example, if I were to undertake these policy changes in a “sanctuary” city for illegals, I could expect to be fired for my enforcement of law...unless I were to have the politicians arrested for Obstruction of Justice and/or Malfeasance in Office. Of course, I should have arrested them for such acts when they first declared a “sanctuary” city in the first place. Corruption in any political system comes when the checks and balances of that system are not maintained, and politicians find they can act without being confronted by law enforcement or the public for their actions.





References

Kain, E. (2011, August 3). The inexplicable war on lemonade stands. Forbes. Retrieved August 8, 2014 from http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/08/03/the-inexplicable-war-on-lemonade-stands/

Rasmussen, S. (2014, August 4). Nanny-state mindset leads to police brutality. Real Clear Politics. Retrieved August 8, 2014 from http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2014/08/04/nanny-state_mindset_leads_to_police_brutality_123537.html

Stojkovic, S. (2014). Criminal justice organizations [VitalSouce bookshelf version]. Retrieved August 8, 2014 from http://digitalbookshelf.southuniversity.edu/books/9781305465695/outline/2

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