By James D. Sewell

Since 2000, law enforcement executives have become increasingly aware of the impact of occupational stress on the safety and wellness of their sworn and civilian employees. As a consequence, agencies have devoted increased attention to enhanced leadership practices, a greater emphasis on physical fitness, and the expansion of programs that support the psychological and emotional health of their personnel.

Included among the latter efforts have been a proliferation of employee assistance programs; increased use of in-house and contract psychologists, especially in assessing fitness for duty; expanded use of agency chaplains; and better paraprofessional support for their personnel through the development and use of peer support teams.

The idea of peer support dates back to the early 1970s with efforts within agencies—such as those in Boston, New York, and Chicago—to deal with alcoholism in their police ranks. Citing the successes of groups such as Alcoholics Anonymous, Police Officer Ed Donovan, who had been attending AA meetings to deal with his own abuse issues, formed the Boston Police Stress Program. Donovan and his colleagues were able to convince the Boston Police Commissioner to implement what we would now call a peer support program for police officers and their families, perhaps the first of its kind in the nation.

The peer support concept holds that police employees are more likely to discuss psychological and emotional issues with someone who understands their job and the types of stress they may undergo than with a psychological professional who brings expertise but no such understanding to the conversation. This approach at ensuring the emotional health of law enforcement personnel assumes that a basic level of training is necessary—and empathy is particularly critical—in allowing the paraprofessional to provide necessary support and to be able to listen, assess, and (as necessary and appropriate) refer a troubled colleague to proper and professional assistance. As Kamena and his co-authors have noted:

The mission of a peer support program is to provide emotional, social, and practical support to police personnel during times of personal or professional crisis. It may also offer peer-to-peer assistance in anticipating and addressing other potential challenges or difficulties. (Kamena et al. 2011, 80)

The literature discussing the use of peer support programs to effectively deal with the stress of police employees points to the strengths and weaknesses of such programs. In an early work on using peer supporters, Finn and Tomz (1998) identified benefits and weaknesses of peer supporters. Among the positives, they suggest that peer support personnel

• provide instant credibility and ability to empathize;

• assist fellow employees who are reluctant to talk with mental health professionals;

• recommend the program to other employees by attesting credibly to their confidentiality and concern;

• provide immediate assistance due to accessibility;

• detect incipient problems because of their daily contact with coworkers;

• are less expensive than professionals. Yet, they caution, peer support members

• cannot provide the professional care that licensed mental health practitioners can;

• may try to offer full-scale counseling that they are not equipped to provide;

• may be rejected by employees who want to talk only with a professional counselor;

• may be avoided by employees because of the fear that problems will not be kept confidential;

• require time, effort, and patience to screen, train, and supervise;

• may expose themselves and the department to legal liability.

Recognizing that peer support programs offer an effective complement to the provision of professional mental health services in contemporary law enforcement agencies, this paper will examine three areas:

1. The elements of an effective peer support program

2. Confidentiality in such a program

3. The activities of five existing peer support programs

Washington, DC: Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. 2021. 88p.

By Timothy Hsiao

Critics of American policing often make the claim that it is a direct descendant of antebellum slave patrols, the mostly voluntary groups organized to capture runaway slaves and stifle slave rebellions in the early eighteenth century. Consider just a few examples:

• “The origins of modern-day policing can be traced back to the ‘Slave Patrol.’” — NAACP

• “Policing itself started out as slave patrols. We know that.” — Rep. James Clyburn.

• “Slave patrols . . . morphed directly into police.” — Nikole HannahJones.

• “[M]odernized police actually emerged in the South during slavery— they literally were slave catchers.” — Scalawag Magazine.

Even pro-law enforcement organizations such as the National Law Enforcement Memorial and Museum in Washington, D.C. have come to accept this claim. According to one criminal justice textbook, it is “widely recognized that law enforcement in the 20th-century South evolved directly from these 18th and 19th-century slave patrols.”

While it is true that slave patrols were a form of American law enforcement that existed alongside other forms of law enforcement, the claim that American policing “traces back” to, “started out” as, or “evolved directly from,” slave patrols, or that slave patrols “morphed directly into” policing, is false. This widespread pernicious myth falsely asserts a causal relationship between slave patrols and policing and intimates that modern policing carries on a legacy of gross injustice. There is no evidence for either postulate.

In order to demonstrate causation, one must show that modern policing drew its distinctive practices and structure from slave patrols. But the evidence shows that American law enforcement—whether in the form of sheriffs, town watches, constables, or police—all emerged from distinctly English influences. Both slave patrols and modern police departments drew from these influences. The fact that the latter did so after the former does not mean that the latter emerged from the former.

New York: National Association of Scholars, 2023. 6p.

By HM Inspector of Constabulary and HM Inspector of Fire & Rescue Services

This report focuses on the police response to antisocial behaviour. It also highlights examples of positive practice and joint working between the police and other organisations to address antisocial behaviour.

We drew on evidence from academic research, national guidance and findings from:

• our police effectiveness, efficiency and legitimacy (PEEL) programme;

• force management statements (self-assessments that chief constables and their London equivalents prepare and give to us each year);

• a request for promising practice to all forces by the College of Policing; and publicly available data.

HM Inspector of Constabulary and HM Inspector of Fire & Rescue Services 2024. 60p.

By Eon Kim, Kate Bowers , Dan Birks Shane D. Johnson

If and how policing affects crime has long been studied. On the relationship between police force size and crime, different authors come to different conclusions. This study examines the relationship between police resourcing, including workforce size, structure and stability over time using data for 42 police forces in the UK over a 13-year period.

We construct two novel panel datasets. The first comprises measures of police workforce Size, Structure and Stability. The second provides measures of both crime frequency and crime severity. Issues of endogeneity make the modelling of the police-crime association complicated. Consequently, we analyse the data using a panel vector autoregression (PVAR) model which is capable of forecasting a temporal sequence of the interdependencies between police-crime relationships.

Changes in total police personnel play an important role in reducing both crime frequency and severity, but the findings are more nuanced than this. Results highlight that the structure and stability of police organisations are important although these impacts are not always the same for crime volume and crime severity. We find that increases in frontline (non-sworn) support staff are associated with reductions in crime, while turnover rates of police staff are associated with increases in crime. In contrast, changes to the number of sworn police officers do not appear to be a good predictor of crime volume.

The findings suggest that investment in frontline support staff and the development of strategies to retain skills and knowledge by reducing staff turnover may be efficient approaches for Police Forces to maximise the impact on crime of their workforce in resource-pressed policing settings. While previous research has found that police force size has a limited effect on crime, our findings indicate that more nuanced measurements of police resourcing are necessary to understand how police impact upon crime risk. The idea of police forces using basic officer-to-population ratios to make staffing decisions appears outdated and over-simplistic.

Journal of Criminal Justice, Volume 95, November–December 2024, 102291

By Rick Muir

This report, produced in partnership with Virgin Media O2 Business, provides a strategic roadmap for police forces to make the most of digital systems, data and technology. It addresses the challenges with using technology, including upgrading outdated technology and unifying data management systems – both of which will be critical to modernisation.

We found that police forces are grappling with outdated legacy systems, complex procurement procedures, fragmented data-sharing, and a lack of digital knowledge and skills at all levels of policing. These challenges are stifling the full potential of data, digital and technology to transform modern policing.

With expertise from an advisory panel of leaders across national policing, the report makes a number of recommendations to enable officers to work more efficiently and use data to empower them with real-time insights:

• Develop a national strategy for interoperability enabling all 43 police forces to integrate their technology and share data.

• Invest in modern, scalable technology to transition from outdated systems to cloud-based platforms, real-time data and AI insights.

• Change the leadership culture to promote technological literacy at senior and executive leadership levels, ensuring that decision-makers understand the benefits of innovation and act accordingly.

London: Police Foundation, 2024. 28p.

By Mia Karisa Dawson, Asia Ivey and Shani Buggs

Community violence—defined as unsanctioned violence between unrelated individuals in public places—has devastating physical, psychological, and emotional consequences on individuals, families, and communities. Immense investments in policing and incarceration in the United States have neither prevented community violence nor systemically served those who have been impacted by it, instead often inflicting further harm. However, the logics that uphold policing and incarceration as suitable or preventative responses to community violence are deeply ingrained in societal discourse, limiting our ability to respond differently. In this perspective, we draw from interviews with leading voices in the field of outreach-based community violence intervention and prevention to consider alternative ways to address community violence. We begin by demonstrating that policing and incarceration are distinguished by practices of retribution, isolation, and counterinsurgency that are counterproductive to the prevention of community violence. Then, we identify alternative practices of outreach-based community violence intervention and prevention that include (1) fostering safety nets through relationships among individuals, families, and neighborhoods, (2) fighting poverty and increasing access to resources, and (3) building political capacity among organizations to transform the broader systems in which they are embedded. They also include accountability practices that are preventative and responsive to the needs of those who are harmed. We conclude that elevating the language, narratives, and values of outreach-based community violence intervention and prevention can transform our responses to violence, interrupt cycles of harm, and foster safer communities

Front Public Health 2023 Apr 17:11:1143516. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2023.1143516. eCollection 2023.

By BARRY VAUGHAN

The problem of policing is often portrayed as providing sufficient personnel to sate demand. Pluralism, however, complicates the issue since the public disagree among themselves over which activities or individuals should be policed. In turn, police priorities may differ from these demands, inciting public discontent. In these circumstances, how can public policing sustain its legitimacy? Lessons can be learnt from how political theories have grappled with pluralism and legitimacy. This article analyses how three major political theorists, John Rawls, Michael Walzer and Friedrich Hayek, dealt with these issues. It mines their insights to nominate the principle of non- domination, defined as freedom from interference on an arbitrary basis, as best suited to justify policing in an era of pluralism.

Vol. 11(3): 347–366; 1362–4806

By: Joshua C. Hinkle, David Weisburd, Christine Famega, and Justin Ready

Background: Hot spots policing is one of the most influential police innovations, with a strong body of experimental research showing it to be effective in reducing crime and disorder. However, most studies have been conducted in major cities, and we thus know little about whether it is effective in smaller cities that account for a majority of police agencies. The lack of experimental studies in smaller cities is likely partly due to challenges of designing statistically powerful tests in such contexts.

Objectives: The current paper explores the challenges of statistical power and “noise” resulting from low base rates of crime in smaller cities and provides suggestions for future evaluations to overcome these limitations.

Research Design: Crime data from a randomized, experimental evaluation of broken windows policing in hot spots are used to illustrate the challenges that low base rates present for evaluating hot spots police innovations in smaller cities.

Results: Analyses show that low base rates make it difficult to detect treatment effects. Very large effect sizes would be required to reach sufficient power, and random fluctuations around low base rates make detecting treatment effects difficult irrespective of power by masking differences between treatment and control groups.

Conclusions: Low base rates present strong challenges to researchers attempting to evaluate hot spots policing in smaller cities. As such, base rates must be taken directly into account when designing experimental evaluations. The paper offers suggestions to researchers who attempt to expand the examination of hot spots policing and other microplace-based interventions to smaller jurisdictions.

By: John E. Eck and Tamara D. Madensen

Problem-oriented Policing is a theory of policing, but does not contain a theory of problems. Situational crime prevention is a theory of problems, but does not contain a theory of an implementing institution. The paper shows why without Situational Crime Prevention, problem-oriented policing would have difficulty working. An analogy is drawn to lichens and it is asserted that any useful theory of policing must be like a lichen.

January 2012, DOI: 10.4324/9780203154403

By: Federico del Castillo

In the broad context of Uruguay’s police reform, the Ministry of Interior is implementing a pilot Problem-Oriented Policing (POP) program in Montevideo since late 2012. This research examined the obstacles confronted by the program throughout its implementation. Using a grounded theory approach, qualitative data was collected through 20 semi-structured interviews with members of the Uruguay National Police (UNP) of different ranks. Findings were analyzed based on the following categories: a) contextual factors; b) theoretical and practical inaccuracies; c) characteristics, skills and actions of project managers; d) resistance and motivational issues; e) resources; f) external support and cooperation. Consistent with research conducted on POP in other settings, findings suggest the program confronted a diverse set of obstacles over its implementation corresponding to all but one of the proposed categories. The study concludes with a series of recommendations to inform future POP endeavors by the UNP.

November 2017

By: Mark Ungar and Enrique Desmond Arias

In every part of Latin America, unprecedented levels of violence have even led to questions about the underlying quality of democratic rule. In response to this crisis, governments have enacted an array of policies, ranging from repressive mano dura crackdowns and adoption of new technology to the reform of criminal justice systems. But one of the most popular approaches to reform efforts has been community-oriented policing (COP), a strategy popularised in the USA in the 1990s, which is based on close collaboration between the police and the neighbourhood residents. COP focuses on the causes of crime
rather than simply responsding to it by empowering citizens, building police
community partnerships, improving social services and using better crime statistics. Street patrols, policy councils and youth services are some of the many COP programmes being adopted in Latin America and other regions. As other authors emphasise, this reform also entails restructuring of police forces to make them more flexible and responsive. Skogan and Hartnett (1997), for example, stress decentralisation of authority and foot patrols to facilitate citizen-police communications and public participation in setting police priorities and developing tactics.

The results of these efforts, however, have been very uneven. Some programmes have shown considerable success while others have faced many difficulties and either been defunded or left to expire of their own accord. Why do some projects succeed where others fail? More importantly, what can Latin American policy-makers learn from past experiences in the region in order to develop more effective and successful policies for the future?

This edition of Policing and Society takes a step towards answering these questions by bringing together security officials, practitioners and scholars to offer detailed analyses of community reform efforts at the local, regional and national levels throughout Latin America. The articles cover programmes in Colombia, Chile, Venezuela, Honduras, the Dominican Republic, Argentina, Mexico and Brazil. By detailing the challenges facing reform and how to overcome them, these cases provide an important compendium about community policing in Latin America that will help practitioners and policy-makers build effective durable programmes. This introduction highlights critical issues that the individual articles develop further. Those challenges, as contributors discuss, fall along two main dimensions: support for community policing by key actors, from Presidents to neighbourhood residents, and a continuity of that support through the entire process of community policing creation, from initial proposals to programme evaluation.

Policing & Society, Vol. 22, No. 1, March 2012, 1
13

By: David Weisburd, Stephen D. Mastrofski, Ann Marie McNally, Rosann Greenspan, James J. Willis

This paper provides the first national description of CompStat programs, considered in the framework of strategic problem solving. Relying on a survey of American police departments conducted by the Police Foundation, we examine the diffusion of CompStat programs and the nature of CompStat models throughout the Untied States. We also assess the penetration of models of strategic problem solving more generally into American policing. Our findings document a process of “diffusion of innovation” of CompStat-like programs in larger police agencies that follows a rapid pace. At the same time, our data suggest that many elements of strategic problem solving had begun to be implemented more widely across American police agencies before the emergence of CompStat as a programmatic entity, and that such elements have neem adopted broadly even by departments that have not formally adopted a CompStat program.

CompStat holds out the promise of allowing police agenices to adopt innovative technologies and problem-solving techniques while empowering traditional polcie organizational structures. However, our analysis suggests that at this stage, what most characterizes CompStat department and distinguishes them from othrs is the development of the control element of this reform. This leads us to question whether the rapid rise of CompStat in American police agencies can be interpreted more as an effort to maintain and reinforce the “bureaucratic” or “paramilitary” model of police organization (that has been under attack by scholars for most of the last two decades) than as an attempt to truly reform models of American policing.

Volume 2, Number 3, 2003, PP 421-456

By Barry Friedman et al.

Recent events have brought to the fore longstanding concerns about the nature of policing in the United States and how it undermines racial equity. As an institution, policing needs significant reconsideration. It is time to rethink the structure and governance of policing. It is also time to engage in a deeper conversation about the meaning of public safety. In the meantime, however, the following is a list of urgently-needed reforms, compiled by a small group of law school faculty, each of whom runs or is associated with an academic center devoted to policing and the criminal justice system. The reforms are not intended as an entire agenda for what ought to happen around policing, or what American policing should look like. Rather, they offer immediate, concrete steps federal, state, and local governments can take to address enduring problems in policing. The authors are scholars who are also deeply involved in the daily practice of policing, and included among them are the Reporters for the American Law Institute’s Principles of the Law: Policing, which works with advisers from across the ideological spectrum in drafting high-level principles to govern policing, though the recommendations here go beyond the scope of the ALI project.

New York: NYU School of Law Policing Project (June, 2020).18p.

By Derek A. Epp & Macey Erhardt

This article asks if investigative police stops (1) help officers find contraband, and (2) serve as a bulwark against violent crime. We focus on the experiences of Fayetteville, North Carolina, which in 2012 mandated that police officers obtain written permission from motorists before conducting searches absent any probable cause. The effect of these mandates was a dramatic reduction in the use of so-called “consent searches.” Using traffic stops data available from the North Carolina Department of Justice, we show that after these reforms went into effect officers made fewer overall searches, but contraband continued to be recovered at pre-reform levels, indicating a reduction in low-quality searches with minimal substantive impact. Moreover, we find that homicide rates are statistically indistinguishable between the pre- and postreform periods. Thus, Fayetteville local government was able to implement community pleasing police reforms without jeopardizing community safety.

POLITICS, GROUPS, AND IDENTITIES https://doi.org/10.1080/21565503.2020.1724160

By Frank R. Baumgartner , Kate Bell, Luke Beyer, Tara Boldrin, Libby Doyle, Lindsey Govan, Jack Halpert, Jackson Hicks, Katherine Kyriakoudes, Cat Lee, Mackenzie Leger, Sarah McAdon, Sarah Michalak, Caroline Murphy, Eyan Neal, Olivia O’Malley, Emily Payne, Audrey Sapirstein, Sally Stanley, and Kathryn Thacker

We evaluate the factors associated with an officer’s decision to search a driver or vehicle after a routine traffic stop, and we compare the accuracy of these searches by looking at the share leading to arrest. Racial disparities in search rates by race and gender of driver are similar for all types of officers; all tend to search Black male drivers at higher rates than any other demographic. White male officers have higher search rates for all types of drivers. Further, they conduct the greatest share of “fruitless searches” (those not leading to arrest), and these searches are particularly targeted on those drivers with the greatest number of cumulative disadvantages

Policy Studies Journal, Vol. 49, No. 3, 2021

By Nancy Sullivan, Sharyn Adams, Eva Ott Hill, Jessica Reichert

Introduction

A significant amount of police engagement involves persons with multiple service needs, such as substance use treatment or mental health services. A public safety and public health partnership encourages police to “deflect” individuals from the criminal justice system by referring them to treatment and other service providers (Charlier & Reichert, 2020; Lindquist-Grantz et al., 2021). Individuals may face several barriers to treatment and services, but deflection can reduce barriers such as social stigma, waiting lists, and limited ability to personally fund treatment (Charlier & Reichert, 2020).

We evaluated the action planning process for a deflection program in Southwestern Illinois, later named Choices. The program serves the following counties: Calhoun, Greene, Jersey, Macoupin, Madison, Monroe, Montgomery, and St. Clair. The development of the program began with guided action planning sessions during which community stakeholders agreed that the focus of this program will be substance use and mental health. The program was then developed based on results of the action planning sessions. The two facilitators of the sessions were from Treatment Alternatives for Safe Communities’ Center for Health and Justice (TASC CHJ), and at least one researcher from the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority (ICJIA) attended each session.

Methodology

In conducting an evaluation of the action planning process, researchers attempted to answer the following research questions:

• Who participated in the action planning process?

• What transpired during the action planning process?

• What feedback about the action planning process did participants provide?

• What was the content of the final action plan?

• To what extent was there collaboration among the participants?

• What areas of collaboration can be enhanced to produce the most effective outcomes?

In order to evaluate the action planning process aimed at developing the deflection program, researchers examined multiple data sources, including field observations, supporting documents (e.g., sign in sheets, handouts), and participant surveys. We conducted field observations and took field notes during six action planning sessions in October and December 2022. At the end of each session day, we administered a survey to all participants to obtain their feedback on the program and action planning process. On the final day of action planning, we administered a survey to gauge the level of collaboration among participants. One study limitation was that not all participants completed every action planning session survey. The number of participants and surveys varied by session. In addition, as Chicago-based researchers, we may not understand the intricacies of the community area.

Key Findings

The action planning process for the Southwestern Illinois deflection program took place over six days. Fifteen representatives from 13 different organizations participated in at least one session.

During observations of action planning, participants appeared unsure about the deflection model as well as the overall action planning process. Facilitators did the bulk of the talking, and participation was consistent but low. When they joined in, participants were engaged and discussed community issues, needs, collaboration, and program design. The participants completed the action plan document detailing objectives and action steps for the program implementation. However, the participants struggled to produce measurable objectives when finalizing the Solutions Action Plan (SAP).

Based on the results of the surveys, participants felt that collaboration was strong and that those who should have been at the action planning sessions were already there. By the conclusion of the final session, the majority in attendance reported that they were confident this program would help their community and positively rated the action planning process.

Recommendations

Based on the findings of the evaluation, we offer four recommendations for future action planning sessions. First, increased collaboration is necessary in order to have an effective action planning session and, down the line, a successful implementation of the program. Team building as well as community engagement are recommended to improve collaboration among both groups. Second, increased participation is essential to the success of the action planning sessions. Not only is the number of participants important, but their diversity, as well. Moreover, action planning participants should be representative of the local communities they are serving. Third, it is essential that all participants in action planning have a thorough understanding of both deflection and the action planning process. Ensuring that all participants fully understand both of these items at the start of action planning will reduce the time spent explaining them throughout the sessions, resulting in more engagement and participation in actual planning. Finally, it is essential that all objectives created by participants are reasonably measurable. The use of a logic model is recommended to keep participants on track and to make sure that each objective is measurable and attainable.

Conclusion

We conducted an evaluation of the action planning process to develop a deflection program, Choices, to help persons with substance use and/or mental health disorders in Southwestern Illinois. The action planning sessions for the program identified community issues and discussed community needs, collaboration, and resources in order to draft the program’s structure, design, and implementation. These discussions led to the final action plan document, which laid out objectives and action steps for the implementation phase of the program. The program employs a police-led deflection model, with the help of multijurisdictional drug task forces, to refer individuals to services in their community. We recommend increased engagement of diverse community members, more clarity on the purpose of the action planning process, and the creation of measurable objectives.

Chicago: Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority, 2024. 57p.

By Barak Ariel, Alex Sutherland, David Weisburd, Yonatan Ilan and Matt Bland

Substantial evidence suggests that focussing police resources on hotspots of crime has a discernable crime-re duction effect. However, little is known about the efficacy of proactively policing areas with higher concentrations of more common low-harm problems in society. This study evaluates the first national double-blind randomized controlled trial in which clearly identifiable hotspots (n = 488) of low-harm ‘quality-of-life’ incidents nested in 31 participating police stations were randomized to be either actively policed by any available police officer or by ‘business-as-usual’ reactive policing over a 12-month period. A series of count-based regression models show a moderate and statistically significant reduction in the number of quality-of-life incidents in treatment versus control hotspots, with more than 2,000 quality-of-life incidents prevented, without evidence of spatial displacement to street segments nearby. However, we find no diffusion of benefits in terms of other crime types within the same hotspots, which may suggest that either low- and high-harm crime hotspots are not spatially aligned with each other, that focusing police officers on one type of crime does not produce a suppression effect on other types of crime, or both. We discuss the implications of these results for crime policy and future research.

Policing, Volume 17, pp. 1–23, 2023. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/police/paad040

By David Spencer, Sir Stephen Laws KCB KC (Hon) and Niamh Webb

We have entered a new era of increasingly disruptive protests. This report shows how decisions made by the police, prosecutors, courts, Parliament and Government mean that undue weight is being placed on the rights and interests of disruptive (and, at times, criminal) activists at the expense of the rights, wellbeing and interests of ordinary members of the public.

This report addresses two central questions:

• Do the police, and other authorities, use their existing powers effectively to deal with disruptive protest?

• Is the existing legal regime fit for purpose?

The answer to both questions, as we show in this report, is no.

As the new Government will soon commence their review of the legislation relating to protest and the Home Office continues their appeal in a high-profile protest-related court case this report is highly relevant to the contemporary policy making and legal context.

The report argues that the new Government must prioritise the rights, wellbeing and interests of ordinary members of the public – otherwise they risk finding themselves in the same difficulties as their predecessors.

In addition to a detailed analysis of the police approach to protest, this report also contains recent polling on the public mood and a detailed review of the current legal regime. The report has 26 recommendations for Government, police forces, the Crown Prosecution Service and the Mayor of London.

London: Policy Exchange, 2024. 157p.

By Andrew Eichen

Sanctioned by the courts and taught in police manuals, deceptive tactics are employed by virtually every police department across the country. Officers seeking to elicit a confession will routinely lie to suspects about the evidence and make statements that imply leniency. While effective at times, deception is ethically dubious and can result in severe consequences for suspects. The United States is an outlier in allowing police to deceive suspects, as the practice is prohibited or highly restricted in most peer nations, including England, France, Germany, and Japan. First, deceptive interrogation tactics frequently induce false confessions, which are a leading cause of wrongful convictions in the United States. Further, the acceptability of lying to suspects during interrogations seems to encourage deception in other, more troubling contexts. Research shows that testimonial lies, such as perjury in court and falsifying police reports, are commonly employed by officers to secure convictions and circumvent constitutional protections. While such practices remain illegal, testimonial lies are rarely identified or punished. As a result, the justifications and skills cultivated through deceiving suspects in interrogations naturally bleed over into other police work. Ultimately, the pervasiveness of police deception undermines the integrity and legitimacy of the criminal justice system. It leads to wrongful convictions, weakens civil liberties, and erodes public trust in law enforcement. While there are difficult trade-offs in regulating police deception, its negative consequences require policy responses. Contrary to contentions that deceit is a necessary tool of law enforcement, experiences in other nations suggest that restricting police deception does not hamper criminal investigations. Policymakers should consider measures to curtail police deception, such as requiring that interrogations be recorded, banning or limiting certain deceptive tactics, and increasing judicial scrutiny of interrogation practices

Cato Policy Analysis, no. 979, Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 2024. 32p.

By: Terry L. Whiting

Simple Summary: In any federation of states, societal oversight of farm animal welfare (agriculture policy arena, prevention) is more difficult to achieve than providing punishment of individuals abusing of companion animals (post injury). The constitutional division of powers and historical policy related to animal agriculture and non-government organization policing cruelty of companion animals may be entrenched. With changing societal expectations of agriculture production, each level of government may hesitate to take the lead, due to financial or ideological beliefs and simultaneously, obstruct the other government level from taking the lead, based on constitutional grounds. The tradition of private policing of companion animal abuse offences may be unworkable in the provision of protection for animals used in industrial production.

Abstract: In recent European animal welfare statutes, human actions injurious to animals are new “offences” articulated as an injury to societal norms in addition to property damage. A crime is foremost a violation of a community moral standard. Violating a societal norm puts society out of balance and justice is served when that balance is returned. Criminal law normally requires the presence of mens rea, or evil intent, a particular state of mind; however, dereliction of duties towards animals (or children) is usually described as being of varying levels of negligence but, rarely can be so egregious that it constitutes criminal societal injury. In instrumental justice, the “public goods” delivered by criminal law are commonly classified as retribution, incapacitation and general deterrence. Prevention is a small, if present, outcome of criminal justice. Quazi-criminal law intends to establish certain expected (moral) standards of human behavior where by statute, the obligations of one party to another are clearly articulated as strict liability. Although largely moral in nature, this class of laws focuses on achieving compliance, thereby resulting in prevention. For example, protecting the environment from degradation is a benefit to society; punishing non-compliance, as is the application of criminal law, will not prevent the injury. This paper will provide evidence that the integrated meat complex of Canada and the USA is not in a good position to make changes to implement a credible farm animal protection system.

Animals 2013, 3, 1086-1122; doi:10.3390/ani3041086