Ethical Violations

Ethical Violations Paper

Whitney Cervantez

CJS 211

Janet Evans

Hearing when a police officer violated ethical law is not new to the masses however happens more than it should. I will be using the instance when a Texas police veteran was fired after bodycam video reveals what was deemed as 'absolutely unacceptable' conduct. The behaviors of an officer have to be aligned with ethical practices and police procedures, the use of force and investigative protocols. To start I will discuss the role and value of ethics in policing. Second go over what methods or training are in place currently. Third I will end by elaborating on an idea to prevent the unethical behavior from occurring again.

The behaviors of an officer have to be aligned with ethical practices and police procedures along with knowing the limits to use of force and how to go about investigative protocols. According to Dallas News (2017) “A veteran Fort Worth police officer was fired Monday for his role in escalating a situation in which a woman who had called police for help was tased and arrested outside her apartment. Police Chief Joel Fitzgerald dismissed Sgt. Kenneth Pierce, a 22-year veteran of the department, after supervisors completing a mandatory use-of-force review of the August incident discovered the conduct, police said. “ (Para 1 and 2) The behavior of Sgt. Kenneth Pierce was unethical because he began to become impatient with the deputy he was with when ordering commands. The Sgt. Was ordering for unnecessary initiated confrontation and told the rookie he was with to tase victim. The video on the Dallas News shows that the woman was cooperating, at one point you can hear that the cops were even trying to antagonize her by saying comments that would trigger an already angry, scared, upset citizen. The woman was tased her 5-year-old was in the apartment and because of their ego the officers “jumped the gun” because of her attitude. An officer kept mentioning how she was being nice but kept blaming the woman for her sour attitude. Use of force in this case was no rational. Later in the video the police officer kept saying “The taser is still on.” Using her words as intimidation. Intimidation fuels fire with fire, police officers need to know how to de escalate and not instigate, use deceit or unnecessary use of force. Officers need to know the difference between compliance and non compliance.

Methods for assessing the levels of force are in ethical terms are intentions, seemliness, proportionality, minimization and practicability. Methods for reducing levels of force include the 1969 Violence Reduction Unit, Metro- Dade Police Citizen Violence Reduction Project, The New York Police Department began a 1969 project aimed at assessing and reducing the incidence of police shootings, The Portland, Oregon’s 1990’s created PARC; Police Assessment Resource Center which was to engaged to assess shooting incidents. Methods such as these are created to gather data, results for said incidents to track the statistics from unlikeliness to likely occurrences.

A way that officers can remember to be ethical is to remember the role, officers are not judges or lawyers. An officer’s duty is to serve and protect according to their orders. With the way the world is and being that everything is situational, natural instincts kick in regardless of all the ethical training and methods that officers may test in. This is apparent, I do feel like every so often at least a decade people should have to take an ethics test to see where people are at as a society. I will further this idea by saying officers, government officials should also take the test to see how far from thinking the are with the society they are serving and protecting. Rookies want to prove themselves, SGT.s want to be respected. The hierarchy alone internally plays a role on an officer’s way of thinking too. The case where the woman was unnecessarily tased is an example of roles, ego and lack of confidence kicked in. The use of open-ended questions is important, being able to speak to people in a relating tone while still showing that you mean business is possible is the same way the officers, government officials can work with the media and produce credible and useful news.

Resources

Sakamoto, R. (2017). Texas police veteran fired after bodycam video reveals 'absolutely unacceptable' conduct. Retrieved from https://abcnews.go.com/US/texas-police-veteran-fired-bodycam-footage-reveals-absolutely/story?id=51878654

Cardona, C. (2017). Fort Worth officer fired after body-cam video shows he escalated call where woman who sought help was Tased. Retrieved from https://www.dallasnews.com/news/fort-worth/2017/12/18/fort-worth-officer-fired-after-body-cam-videoshows-escalated-situation-woman-called-help-tased