The study of police powers forms a significant part of many law courses. This book should prove helpful to a wide readership, including new members of the police service, and those studying civil liberties and constitutional law.
Public police forces are a regular phenomenon in most jurisdictions around the world, yet their highly divergent legal context draws surprisingly little attention. Bringing together a wide range of police experts from all around the world, this book provides an overview of traditional and emerging fields of public policing, New material and findings are presented with an international-comparative perspective, it is a must-read for students of policing, security and law and professionals in related fields.
Proactive policing, as a strategic approach used by police agencies to prevent crime, is a relatively new phenomenon in the United States. It developed from a crisis in confidence in policing that began to emerge in the 1960s because of social unrest, rising crime rates, and growing skepticism regarding the effectiveness of standard approaches to policing. In response, beginning in the 1980s and 1990s, innovative police practices and policies that took a more proactive approach began to develop. This report uses the term "proactive policing" to refer to all policing strategies that have as one of their goals the prevention or reduction of crime and disorder and that are not reactive in terms of focusing primarily on uncovering ongoing crime or on investigating or responding to crimes once they have occurred. Proactive policing is distinguished from the everyday decisions of police officers to be proactive in specific situations and instead refers to a strategic decision by police agencies to use proactive police responses in a programmatic way to reduce crime. Today, proactive policing strategies are used widely in the United States. They are not isolated programs used by a select group of agencies but rather a set of ideas that have spread across the landscape of policing. Proactive Policing reviews the evidence and discusses the data and methodological gaps on: (1) the effects of different forms of proactive policing on crime; (2) whether they are applied in a discriminatory manner; (3) whether they are being used in a legal fashion; and (4) community reaction. This report offers a comprehensive evaluation of proactive policing that includes not only its crime prevention impacts but also its broader implications for justice and U.S. communities.
Police detention is the place where suspects are taken whilst their case is investigated and a case disposal decision is reached. It is also a largely hidden, but vital, part of police work and an under-explored aspect of police studies. This book provides a much-needed comparative perspective on police detention. It examines variations in the relationship between police powers and citizens’ rights inside police detention in cities in four jurisdictions (in Australia, England, Ireland and the US), exploring in particular the relative influence of discretion, the law and other rule structures on police practices, as well as seeking to explain why these variations arise and what they reveal about state-citizen relations in neoliberal democracies. This book draws on data collected in a multi-method study in five cities in Australia, England, Ireland and the US. This entailed 480 hours of observation, as well as 71 semi-structured interviews with police officers and detainees. Aside from filling in the gaps in the existing research, this book makes a significant contribution to debates about the links between police practices and neoliberalism. In particular, it examines the police, not just the prison, as a site of neoliberal governance. By combining the empirical with the theoretical, the main themes of the book are likely to be of utmost importance to contemporary discussions about police work in increasingly unequal societies. As a result, it will also have a wide appeal to scholars and students, particularly in criminology and criminal justice.
The police force in Ireland - known as the Gardai ("Guardian") - are required to combine technical and legal proficiency in the prevention and detection of crime. Expected to intervene in every kind of emergency, Gardai investigate a diverse array of offenses, combining skills in crowd control, crime scene management, intelligence-gathering, and the collection and analysis of forensic evidence. In order to fulfill their various functions, the Gardai are vested with an extraordinary array of powers - powers which facilitate surveillance; the taking of forensic samples; photographs and fingerprints; stopping, searching, and arresting individuals; as well as searching homes and vehicles. Suspects are detained and questioned, children are taken into emergency care, mentally ill persons are taken into custody. Each situation is not only complicated on a human level, but on a legal level as well, as the powers exercised intersect with constitutional and legal rights to liberty, privacy, bodily integrity, freedom of association, and expression. In England and Wales, the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 is accompanied by extensive PACE Codes of Conduct. There is a core framework of police powers and safeguards - clearly laid out - around stop and search, arrest, detention, investigation, identification, and interviewing detainees. However, in Ireland, an unwieldy array of legislation and case-law must be sifted through to decipher the applicable principles. The pace of legislative change in Irish criminal justice, combined with the practice of amending Acts piecemeal rather than by consolidation, makes identification of the extent and scope of the powers of the Gardai a challenge which is grappled with by Gardai and legal practitioners alike. This book examines Garda powers and the legal issues which arise in their exercise, with an emphasis on the practicalities of policing. The law is distilled to determine the origin of key powers and the pre-requisites and practical aspects of their lawful exercise. The approaches of the courts and police forces of other common-law jurisdictions to particular policing questions are considered. Best practice guidance has been incorporated, grounded in human rights principles and international standards.
The law relating to the British constitution is both complex and far-reaching, with future reforms having an increasing effect on every person living in Britain. This book aims to promote better understanding of a complex subject and to cover administrative law and judicial review.
This book argues that communities need better planning to be safely navigated by people with mobility impairment and to facilitate intergenerational aging in place.