Curbing Police Brutality Analysis
The author(s) shown below used Federal funds provided by the U.S. Department of Justice and prepared the following final report: Document Title: Curbing Police Brutality: What Works? A Reanalysis of Citizen Complaints at the Organizational Level, Final Report Liqun Cao Ph.D. 192518
Author(s): Document No.:
Date Received:
Award Number:
February 09, 2002
98-IJ-CX-0064
This report has not been published by the U.S. Department of Justice. To provide better customer service, NCJRS has made this Federallyfunded grant final report available electronically in addition to traditional paper copies.
Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. …show more content…
While the authority to use such force is not a problem, its proper application is “the central problem of contemporary police misconduct” (Kerstetter 1985). Empirical research on this central problem, however, is scarce. This is particularly true at the organizational level. Most previous studies on citizen complaints have been conducted at the individual level and focused on a limited number of jurisdictions, and the measures have not been consistent across studies (Dugan and Breda 1991; Kerstetter 1985; Littlejohn 1981; Pate and Hamilton 1991; Toch 1995; Wagner 1980; Wagner and Decker 1993; Worden 1995). The current report includes two empirical studies examining the two related issues of police brutality at the organizational level: citizen complaints about police use of physical force and citizen complaints about police use of nonphysical force’. Police use of excessive force is also called police brutality. Both terms refer to any unnecessary use of force by police. Reiss (1971 :334) defines police brutality as any practice that degrades citizen status, “that restricts their freedom, and that annoys or harasses them,” or that uses unnecessary and unwarranted physical force. Building on Reiss, Decker and Wagner (1 982) modify the definition of police brutality as the …show more content…
Given the importance of the issue in improving police and community relations, many theories have been proposed for curbing the damaging behavior of police. Wilson (1 968), advocating police professionalism, identifies two models for controlling police misconduct: the professional model and the bureaucratic model. The professional model works by ensuring that only the best-trained, most honest candidates are employed as police officers. The bureaucratic model depends on the issuance and enforcement of rules and regulations through close supervision of police officer activities. Lundman (1 980) criticizes professionalism as a control on police misconduct. He suggests that professionalism, by focusing on the individual officer, ignore the social and organizational correlates of misconduct. Furthermore, professionalism is an obstacle to citizen control, since by definition a professional is one who has special knowledge and skills that the average person lacks. Instead, Lundman (1 980) maintains that most police misconduct is a product of organizational deviance, so that what needs to be controlled is not individual behavior, but organizational climates. According to this thesis, police departments may have different rates of citizen complaints. The difference varies with the particular departmental
Author(s): Document No.:
Date Received:
Award Number:
February 09, 2002
98-IJ-CX-0064
This report has not been published by the U.S. Department of Justice. To provide better customer service, NCJRS has made this Federallyfunded grant final report available electronically in addition to traditional paper copies.
Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. …show more content…
While the authority to use such force is not a problem, its proper application is “the central problem of contemporary police misconduct” (Kerstetter 1985). Empirical research on this central problem, however, is scarce. This is particularly true at the organizational level. Most previous studies on citizen complaints have been conducted at the individual level and focused on a limited number of jurisdictions, and the measures have not been consistent across studies (Dugan and Breda 1991; Kerstetter 1985; Littlejohn 1981; Pate and Hamilton 1991; Toch 1995; Wagner 1980; Wagner and Decker 1993; Worden 1995). The current report includes two empirical studies examining the two related issues of police brutality at the organizational level: citizen complaints about police use of physical force and citizen complaints about police use of nonphysical force’. Police use of excessive force is also called police brutality. Both terms refer to any unnecessary use of force by police. Reiss (1971 :334) defines police brutality as any practice that degrades citizen status, “that restricts their freedom, and that annoys or harasses them,” or that uses unnecessary and unwarranted physical force. Building on Reiss, Decker and Wagner (1 982) modify the definition of police brutality as the …show more content…
Given the importance of the issue in improving police and community relations, many theories have been proposed for curbing the damaging behavior of police. Wilson (1 968), advocating police professionalism, identifies two models for controlling police misconduct: the professional model and the bureaucratic model. The professional model works by ensuring that only the best-trained, most honest candidates are employed as police officers. The bureaucratic model depends on the issuance and enforcement of rules and regulations through close supervision of police officer activities. Lundman (1 980) criticizes professionalism as a control on police misconduct. He suggests that professionalism, by focusing on the individual officer, ignore the social and organizational correlates of misconduct. Furthermore, professionalism is an obstacle to citizen control, since by definition a professional is one who has special knowledge and skills that the average person lacks. Instead, Lundman (1 980) maintains that most police misconduct is a product of organizational deviance, so that what needs to be controlled is not individual behavior, but organizational climates. According to this thesis, police departments may have different rates of citizen complaints. The difference varies with the particular departmental