Justice and Judgement

Kori Sandberg
Salt Lake Community College
Criminal Justice 1010 Final Paper

1
 Justice and Judgement

The practice of law enforcement and public safety is one of the key roles in our police

departments and officers today. The police enforce the justice system and help control the general

population. Without the justice system there would be an infinate number of crimes, drug use would

be worse of an epidemic, and there wouldnt be such an adequate emergency response available in our

society.

There are specific duties and responsibilities the police have to manage, on top of dangerous

and tretcherous tasks they endure. Using every skill they aquire in the acadamy throughout their

experience in the field, one of the most complicated components of the policemans job is his ability to

use his best judgement when it comes to specific cases and apply discrecion. Discrecion is the personal

judgement an officer can use to establish what to do next based on the situation and not by-the-book. I

believe without discretion there would be even more animosity towards the police than there already

is. The public wouldnt cooperate at all with the police during an incident, that every situation that

occurs is different and unique and the police need to excersise every option available to make sure they

are hadled accordingly.

With the population increasing rapidly, and more people to protect and serve, the police see an

extremely wide variety of people and cases. Do you think every single person be ticketed for any time

they are pulled over whether its a moving violation or a problem with their automobile? What about a

ticket for every person who dialed the emergency number as a joke or prank? Consider calling the

police for an accident and having everyone involved get

2
 Justice and Judgement

a ticket. First of all, Discretion can only be used in a minor crime. People that endanger the public or

commit felonies deserve to be locked up and have the book thrown at them. The ten year old who

steals a candy bar from the 7-11 shouldnt be prosecuted for theft, some would say a mere warning,

slap on the hand, and a good ole fashioned talkin too is in order. Without discretion, some would say

there would be less crime commited because people would not want a ticket and try harder to abbide

by the stricker rules inforced, but I say the crime would increase mostly towards the law officials

themselves.

The war on drugs is another problem our police have to fight daily. The number of drug users

and drug crime seems to get higher as the years go on, especially considering all the eduacational

information and truth about what effects the drugs have on our lives and bodies. As the number of

users increase the supply and demand, the police have their hands full with drug trafficing, illegal use

and selling to minors, as well as local problems involving the drugs that do make it through from

mexico. The U.S. International Narcotics Control Strategy reports that 90% of cocaine, for example,

reaches the United States through its southern border. This poses a huge problem for border control

and local officers also.

Mexican drug crime prompted Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair to declare last

week that the Mexican government had lost control of its own territory. If Mexico is loosing the war

on drugs, why isnt America? Because our police enforce the laws as well as care about the

community, the well being of the people in the community, and that every man

3
 Justice and Judgement

is innocent until proven guilty. Police discretion in any circumstance can be considered as the outer

limits of the law. As an officer they have power to use discretion on minor street conduct, or any

nonviolent crime, as they see fit and is agreeable.

Consider the emergency response team, lets say they accuse the first person confronted on the

scene of the crime without even hearing his side of the story or otherwise. If there was a lack of

descretion in this field I dont believe people would feel comfortable calling in the event of an

emergency. This isnt justice, especially if the person at the scene is truly innocent. The police must

use their best judgement and discretion in every instance within the current constitutional constraints.

Sometimes more than others considering how cooperative the suspects are and what sisuation has

occurred. If the emergency team only cared about writing tickets and whos guilty instead of who is

hurt, the system wouldnt be very effective at all.

The police are members of our community and live in our cities among us as our friends, they

have respect for the society, as we should for them. Discretion is the freedom to decide what should be

done in a particular situation, the police excersice this freedom with the interest of protecting and

serving.

4
Bibliography

"Criminology." Police Discretion. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Nov. 2013.

"World." TIME.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Nov. 2013.

"Discretion - Google Search." Discretion - Google Search. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Nov. 2013.