Once you are hired as a police officer and begin working, you realize that in order to deal with the stress and difficult times on the job, it is important to have a sense of humour and ensure you has some fun on the job. Sometimes these situations can get out of hand, or negatively impact someone’s career. It all comes down to respect and it is important to make sure you don’t cross lines when making jokes.

Scenario:
Kevin has been working for about three weeks on the job and has been getting along well with the platoon. It is a pretty laid back platoon that socializes a lot, but works hard when there is work that needs to be done. One afternoon he comes across a couple of officers laughing as they are walking away from a computer terminal. Kevin hears them saying to themselves that Steve will never leave the terminal logged on again after today. You are required as a police officer to log off a computer terminal when you are not using it, as the terminal has access to very secure and private information such as criminal records.

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Once you become a police officer, you will realize that there is a lot of freedom patrol officers have and their ability to use discretion can sometimes cause problems. Even officers with good intentions can routinely make morally questionable calls. It is important to determine the type of officer you wish to be and make sure that you abide by your personal sense of right and wrong.

Scenario:
Kevin Hung had been on the job for about a year and was partnered up with John MacDonnel who was a senior officer with ten years experience. Kevin was looking forward to working with John, as he had a great deal of experience, worked hard, wrote lots of tickets and consistently brought in good arrests on serious criminal charges. John was explaining to Kevin that they worked in a busy area with a great deal of street crime and there were more than enough bad guys to focus on and he preferred to protect and assist honest citizens.

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Settling disputes is one of the primary responsibilities of police officers. This can at times be difficult and sometimes situations happen so quickly, that you feel the best decision was not reached, especially as a new recruit. Slowing things down, and taking control of the situation is an extremely important skill to have as a police officer. If you get caught up in the situation, and swept away in a current bad decisions can result.

James was brand new to the job and had been working as a patrol officer for about three weeks when he was assigned to partner with Bill. James didn’t really know Bill, but did respect the fact that he was a senior officer with about ten years on the job, and would allow him to take the lead, and hopefully learn something.

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Police Officers have to be effective decision makers. They are often put in situations where there is imperfect information, where action is required. It is important to work well with partners to make sure that you resolve situations effectively. That being said there will be times when you are confused and will require support and advice from someone who is more senior such as a road sergeant or detective. When to go for this advice is often a matter for debate.

Scenario:
Trevor and Kalpesh had both been on the job for only a couple of years but found themselves being paired up to work together quite frequently. They both enjoyed this, as they were both hard working young officers on a shift that had several more senior officers who in their opinion would often let things slide. One night the received a radio call to attend an apartment building. There was a woman walking around the halls carrying two candles. Both the police and the fire department were dispatched.
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Police officers are going to find themselves in situations they do not want to be involved in. When you just think about the amount of driving that a police officer does, and what that means to your chance of becoming involved in a collision (minor or otherwise). The more you drive, the greater the chance of damaging a vehicle. Because police vehicles are driven almost 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, they experience a lot of wear and tear. The vehicles are often in pretty poor condition after a while.

Scenario
James and Mike had been working together as partners for almost a year. They were both hard workers, who had only about four years on the job each. They both enjoyed working with each and had become friends over the last year. They were assigned to patrol area 1406 quite often and as a result found themselves driving the vehicle 1406 which was quite an old vehicle, with many dents and scrapes on it.

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New police officers have to learn that there is a lot of discretion that police officers have when they are performing their duties. Because officers spend a great deal of time on their own (or with partners) they can make different decisions on how they choose to enforce laws, and serve the public. This can become a bit of an ethical question at times in many officers’ minds.

Scenario:
Linda Swan has only been on the job for a couple of weeks. She works for a regional police service that covers a very large area. So far she has loved the work, and found the advice from her coach officer Sean McDonald extremely beneficial. He has been on the job for about 10 years, seems to bring in very good arrests and seems to have a goal of going after the more serious offenders in society. Read the rest of this entry »

Domestic assault is a serious offence. As an officer I encountered it on a weekly, and unfortunately at times it seemed a daily basis. Victims and witnesses often don’t want police involved, as an arrest of a family member can cause obvious problems including financial hardship, destroyed relationships or potential escalation. Police have a duty to make an arrest if they believe an assault took place and there is evidence to support the charge. That being said, situations sometimes become confusing in the real world.

Scenario:
Amber and Paul had both been working as police officers for about three years and were partnered together one Saturday afternoon. They received a radio call to attend a domestic assault in progress. It was called in from a neighbour in an apartment complex who said a woman and man were fighting in their apartment and in the hallway. Read the rest of this entry »

Working nights as a police officer can be very difficult. In some divisions it is extremely busy, and the night will fly by, while in some divisions when it gets quiet, there is not a lot to do. During these times you can sometimes come across awkward moments involving other officers.

Scenario:
Sheldon has been working for about a year on the job and gets along very well with his shift. It is the last of seven nights in a row that the entire shift has to work. The preceding six nights had been extremely busy with a large number of calls and a couple of serious incidents that made a lot of officers work a great deal of overtime. Tonight it had been quite quiet, especially after 3:00 am when the officers had finished their lunch breaks. There had been no calls in a couple of hours, and officers had not reported any problems.

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Policing is a career that at times requires a great deal of creativity to get the job done. New recruits have to learn this quickly as once you are out on the road, you are often your own boss. This doesn’t mean that you can’t tap into a large number of available resources. There are lots of tools police have access to both within the organization and outside of it.

Scenario:
Wendy had been working as an officer for about 8 months at a busy downtown division. One late afternoon she received a call to attend to a disoriented older lady who was walking on a busy road in heavy traffic. When she arrived, she encountered an older woman who did not speak English carrying a purse with almost $4000 in it. The woman was confused, had no identification and seemed like she needed help. Wendy wasn’t certain what language she did speak, but was guessing an Eastern European one.
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