skadden law firm new york
At no time in our modern history have more demands have been based on the law enforcement officer. Communities are very concerned about the crime, and they demand that the law enforcement authorities" do something about it. " "
It seems that every day, violent crime and drugs take the title of any newspaper in America. Politicians at local, state and national level, as the impression that "hard crime" committed and philosophies, which, at least outwardly, seems to support that the toughness.

At the same time, the public (via the media) is examining the actions of law enforcement agencies more than ever.

The public wants results and, more importantly, to feel safe. But that same public will not tolerate an abuse of suspects "in the process.

Primarily due to the increased cost of incarceration, a concerted pressure is made by prisoners from jails and prisons, with the resultant increase in the sample and parolees.

Probation / parole officers have cases with no end in sight.

Youth crime is sky-prices.

Younger, more fearless criminals are the norm, with the media, the sad story after story in our house on a nightly basis.

If I were the new recruits, I tell them that what the public wants in a policeman is simple: We want applicants who are warm, loving people who are able to speak to public groups, the carrying out of events in schools counseling troubled youth, rendering first aid, dealing with problems and the evaluation from the perspective of the community.

In addition to all these admirable qualities, we want more.

If a bad guy tries to get in our house, we want an absolutely fearless gladiator who want risk his life to understand the suspect (without injury to the intruders, of course) and to protect our property.

We want, expect and demand all of this for a salary that is far less than the company pays a plumber!

Whether a person is a probation / parole officer supervising office 100 felon, a policeman in a patrol car, a Fish and Wildlife Officer to work alone, 50 miles from a back-up, a military law enforcement authorities or a federal agent in a structured environment, as a law enforcement officer is an extraordinarily difficult and complex work that requires that we all have our skills and training.

How has the law enforcement agencies with the ever increasing need for training interview?

Bad, I'm afraid. Here's how it works ...

In almost all modern law enforcement, much care and consideration for the allocation of training, especially that the training, both the expenditure of time and money.

Traditionally, different segments of the agency (patrol, detectives, administration, etc.) have to get a feeling for their part in the formation of the almighty U.S. dollars budget.

As a result, it is the duty of agency administrators to prioritize the available training money.

Training in most modern law enforcement has taken on the semblance of a triage system in an emergency. Administrators want to send all the training so that they are at the end throws some money into those who "bleeds" the most. Due to the civil liability regime, especially patrol officers receive training, with special emphasis on motor skills areas (firearms, arrest techniques, emergency driving tactics, hand firearm retention skills, etc.), said most areas, the opportunity for the misapplication and the resulting court proceedings.

Investigators receive training geared to their central focus (interview and interrogation, crime scene investigation, investigative specialties, etc.).

Ironically, an objective analysis of the components of the work of the Patrol Officer Survey shows skills are used much more frequently than any other skill. Think about what skills is often referred to as the ability to communicate with people and elicit information?

Conversely, what will be an officer in trouble with the public faster than the inability to communicate?

* How often in an officer's life, he or she will use deadly force?
* How many times in a month, he or she is in a language exercise?
* How many instances of dealing with hazardous materials harvested in an average month?

Contrast in the frequency of such incidents against the absolute certainty that we interact with people in each stratum.

We routinely qualify in the shooting, and hazardous materials safety courses annually, to fire trucks Operations courses and the like, but most patrol officers are not in formal interview and interrogation statement after a first exposure, in the basic academy.

Consider the following sobering statistics:

• police academies in the United States offer an average of only 4 hours of training in interviewing techniques during basic training.

• 60% of law enforcement training facilities in the U.S. do not offer interview training at all during basic training.

• Less than 20% of all law enforcement agencies have in education and training in interviewing techniques.

Unfortunately, in most law enforcement agencies, the investigators repeatedly in interview and interrogation training, while the patrol officers who apply to participate in the rule is rejected. In the bureaucracy for training U.S. dollars stretch a long way, administrators often prioritize training requests, and sometimes even on outdated or incorrect information.

The need exists for inexpensive, simple methods to benefit police officers without regard to the assignment of jobs, all in an affordable manner.

Compounding the problem is the current training nationwide push toward "community policing" and all the responsibility that system. Simply put, community policing can best be described as a philosophy of empowerment, the beat officer to solve problems. Through a collaboration with others in the community, police are responsible for actually resolving the community, not only the measures for enforcement.

While the philosophy sounds good, the average law enforcement patrol officer does not have the tools with which the conduct of investigations, interviews people, public presentations, and collaboration to solve problems. Federal Republic of grant money was distributed over the country in an effort to promote community policing.

Officers were terminated, the equipment was purchased and Public Relations have been extensive efforts in this area. Unfortunately, the officers who are not on the creation of investigative training can be in an uncomfortable position.

A community policing officer told me recently, "If I wanted to interview the neighbors, show photo television audience, speak for the public and work intensively with other public institutions, I would have a detective. What happened to good old police work? ""

One of the most important components of community policing is the ability to interact with people in a non-threatening manner, elicits maximum information.

The most basic academies teach a block of instructions for "interviewing and interrogation." "But these traditional systems to the structured interview approach to interview. The new trainees quickly realizes that he or she will have hundreds or thousands of street children interviews while on patrol and will be relatively few formal, structured interviews in an interrogation room setting.

There are some very nice formal "Interview and Interrogation" type training for law enforcement officers are (a polygraph examiner, I have worked on some of them), but they tend to emphasize the structured interview aspect of the situation and focus more on an investigator as a patrol officer.

Find interview training, not only dealing with structured interviews / interrogation setting. Also an analysis of a patrol officer in the daily work shows that the vast majority of the contacts that he or she experiences are not in a structured environment, a formalized method of interviewing and interrogation.

The survey targeted system is not entirely on the basis of a theory, but on the practical application. These techniques are used successfully every day, are very easy to learn and require no reference texts in the field.

In this system, we will see what is wrong (or at least ineffective) with typical street-interview techniques, what has given us the techniques that does not work, what works and how to develop techniques that dramatically increase the "confession" or "" incriminating evidence "in dealing with offenders and will be of great value in the clarification of statements from victims and witnesses.

This is the first in a long series of articles, the law enforcement first responder questioning and interrogation.

Stay tuned!

Get the best law enforcement training site on the Internet! Law Enforcement Article