Use of Force

By the late 1800s, police officers were issued firearms to counteract the better equipped criminal. In recent years, there have been resurgences in the importance of non-lethal and less-than-lethal weapons for law enforcement use. However, the devices in use today are worlds away from in terms of technology compared to what their police forefathers used. Generally, the use of force by law enforcement officers is permitted and often necessary under certain circumstances, such as in self-defense or in the defense of another individual or group.

There are several different types of force. These types of force include verbal commands or persuasion, physical force (unarmed), force using weapons that are non lethal, force that involves using weapons such as the bean bag gun or taser, and lastly, deadly force. All officers have to give way to each force option before last resorting to the use of deadly force, unless of course if the officer is in a life or death situation. This may be the only way to use deadly force in the first and last resort. They have a couple of weapons that they carry in case the need to use them arises. They carry a baton, tasers, handcuffs, guns and they also have police dogs. Some police do follow the guidelines for using force. Others may abuse their authority and not use force properly. It is really only up to the officers to do the right thing. Some cops are great and live to protect our communities while others abuse their authority.

Police have the uncontested right to use force when necessary to apprehend a suspect. If the force exceeds that which is necessary it is defined as excessive force and is illegal. An officer’s discretion on use of force is a based on judgment. They do not know if a judge will later rule an instance of use of force as excessive or not. There is a fine line between what is considered acceptable force and what is considered excessive force. All an

Federal law protects law enforcement officers by using the same logic seen in the Graham vs. Connor case. Excessive force cannot be

The use of force is without a doubt an important aspect in policing. The decision to utilize any type of force comes from a multitude of recourses; department policies, training, situational variables and ethical systems. There are three major categories in which an officers use of force is categorized under; justifiable, excessive and deadly; with a thin line between justifiable and excessive. Cases where excessive force has been used, has lead to injuries, deaths, civil damages, officers convicted and sentenced to jail and police chiefs and elected officials being removed from office (Fyfe, 1988). It is an officer`s discretion in determining when the use of force is justifiable.

The use of force protocol authorizes the use of force in situations where force is appropriate and reasonable to affect a lawful arrest, to protect the person of the arresting officer or to protect the person of an innocent third party or officer. The purpose of a policy on use of force is to establish general guidelines for the escalation and de-escalation of force and to establish procedures for reporting use of force. This is to ensure the department has set guidelines for deputies put in different situations that requires a type of force. The use of physical force should be restricted to circumstances authorized by law and to the degree minimally necessary to accomplish a lawful police task (Mollenhauer, M. F. 2007). The issue with the use of force in policing is the procedure is not clear and can be personalized per each situation.

Although very little formal information is provided regarding the situation and the evidence surrounding it, I essentially chose this case because the media releases provided actual quotes from the officer’s testimony in court. The case was examined by an

This use of force matrix utilizes a graded approach whereas an officer will use only the force necessary to exercise and arrest. Law enforcement officers may use that amount of force necessary to effect the lawful purpose intended, provided that no reasonably effective alternative to the use of force appears to exist at the time the force is used. The privilege to use force is not limited to the amount of force necessary to protect themselves or others, but extends to that amount reasonably necessary to enable officers to effect the arrest or otherwise neutralize the resistance of a subject. If a suspect refuses to be arrested the officer will have to utilize a higher level of force dependent upon the suspects actions. For example, if a suspect is resisting arrest, the officer may use a taser or other force methods to arrest the individual. An officer cannot simple resort to higher levels of force without proper justification. Officers must utilize only the force which is necessary and justified. There are times when an armed suspect may prompt an officer to use the highest level of force, deadly force, if he feels him or another person’s life is in jeopardy. The result of not going utilizing his weapon on this use of force scenario could mean death to the officer or the public.

The kid was in the streets with hands in his pocket, and a police officer approached him at gun point. The teen put his hands in the air and then the officer shot him dead. Major controversy occurred due to this tragedy. Only for the reason that the teen did not deserve to die and did nothing wrong, but still paid the price. How could this have been prevented? If the officer knew or was reminded of the steps to take in a situation like that, then the whole thing would have been handled way better. And the only way for officers to learn their training is in the police

“Deadly force is a force that, when used, would lead a reasonable officer objectively to conclude that it poses a high risk of death or serious injury to its target (p.266). The only justifiable means for an officer to use deadly force is in self-defense or when protecting the lives of others. Deadly force can be used in order to prevent an individual from escaping only if the officer has probable cause to believe that the individual poses a significant threat of death to the officer or another individual. However the “feeing felon” rule that allows officers to shoot individuals attempting to escape is no longer permissible. The use of deadly force on a suspect fleeing is only acceptable if the officer believes the suspect poses a significant

Until a law changed this in 1985, most of the country had something called the “any felony” policy (Justice, 2002). This policy supported that police could use firearms or any other means of deadly force to arrest a person suspected of committing any felony (Justice, 2002). Some states even permitted police to shoot a fleeing victim (Justice, 2002). Although, there were several states that put limits on when an officer can use deadly force (Justice, 2002). 12 states had no view or stand at all on police use of deadly force (Justice, 2002). Our police force is the way it is now because of a lawsuit that was placed against a case, Tennessee VS. Garner. The supreme court 's decision in this case in 1985, placed restrictions on the use of deadly force (Justice, 2002). This ruling according to the US Department of

The use of police force has been a controversial topic in the media recently. This topic is controversial because of the issues surround why force has been used, the type of force used, and if using force was necessary at all. At times there is reason to use force. For instance, in the cases of Edward and Eric Garner the use of police force was deemed at least by society as unnecessary. In the case of Edward Garner, the Supreme court addressed his death by determining that it is unconstutional to shoot at an unarmed suspect as a means of stopping them from fleeing. They even passed a law supporting this ruling. (Marcus, 2016). As for Edward Garner's death it was deemed unworthy of prosecution by the justice system. The grand jury refused to

The use of force is hard to distinguish in law enforcement. The use of force and the laws of it vary from state to state. (National Institute of Justice, November 29, 2016) broadly defined the use of force as, police officers use of force actions become necessary under certain circumstances, like self-defense or protecting another individual from harm. In law enforcement, they usually have steps officers have to take before they can use the higher violent techniques. There are times where people do not agree with the use of force in certain situations. And excessive force does happen at times, and most of the time the police officer involved will get punished for his actions.

The use of force, with regards to law enforcements use of it, is a complex topic that should be looked at in all perspectives. There is tension between the police and the community they work for, on whether this is a power that the officers should have or not. There are ambiguous laws that do not give law enforcement offices much guidelines on what is exactly permissible when it comes to force, and all the different situations it could occur. The line that the use of force leis on is often a fine one. It is teetering between excessive force and never being able to enforce the laws. The use of forces is a conversation that is worth having with all the pros and cons that it brings to the discussion board.

The general approach is that, police officers should not use more force than is necessary to maintain control of an incident, to carry out an arrest, or to protect the public and/or themselves from imminent danger (NIJ, 2012). There are a lot of factors