Brad W. Smith

Exploring the Basis of Citizens’ Attitudes Toward the Police

During the past 20 years, there has been an expanding body of research examining citizens’ attitudes toward the police. Most of this research has been directed at assessing the determinants of these attitudes. In contrast, less attention has been focused on the reasons why citizens hold certain attitudes. The present study uses the survey responses of 613 residents of a midwestern city to examine the information accessed by citizens when responding to questions regarding their general and specific attitudes toward the police. The findings suggest that citizens focus on attributes of agencies and encounters, some focus on the behavior of officers during interactions, and others base their attitudes on general perceptions of the occupation of policing. Furthermore, the referent employed by citizens is not always consistent with the attitude object (i.e., general questions elicit specific responses). The likelihood that police agencies can influence citizens’ attitudes is also assessed.

Structural and organizational predictors of homicide by police

The present study examined homicides by police officers, testing threat, community violence, and organizational hypotheses. Using UCR, SHR, Census, and LEMAS data the study extends previous research by examining the relative impact of community violence, inequality and race, and organizational characteristics on the number of killings of felons by police officers in large US cities. The findings show that measures of racial threat and community violence were related to police killings. Measures of organizational policies were largely unrelated to the number of police killings. Overall the study extends research in the area, yet it also points to a more general need for research on the effects of organizational factors on police violence.

Race, Immigration, and Policing: Chinese Immigrants’ Satisfaction with Police

A considerable body of research focuses on racial and ethnic minorities’ perceptions of police, yet non-Black, non-Hispanic minority groups, Asians in particular, are largely overlooked. Meanwhile, despite a fast growing immigrant population and the increasing demand on local police to enforce immigration law, research on police–immigrant relations remains limited. Using data from over 400 Chinese immigrants, this study examines the issues of race/ethnicity, immigration, and policing with a focal concern on Chinese immigrants’ attitudes toward police. Results indicate that the majority of Chinese immigrants rate police positively in overall performance and specific areas of effectiveness, integrity, and demeanor. Both universal and immigrant-specific factors are important predictors of immigrants’ attitudes. Chinese immigrants’ evaluations of police are not only affected by exposure to media coverage of police misconduct, neighborhood conditions, and city context, but also are intertwined with their opinions of their home country police and perceptions of US immigration authorities.

Community Policing and the Work Routines of Street-Level Officers

Most of the literature on community policing suggests, either implicitly or explicitly, that the daily activities of community police officers will differ from the activities traditionally engaged in by police officers. The majority of studies examining officer work routines were conducted prior to the rapid proliferation of community policing throughout police departments in the United States. Any attempt to determine the nature and extent of community policing needs to include an examination of the daily activities of line-level personnel charged with its implementation. The current study, using systematic social observation data, provides a description and comparison of the work routines of both community-oriented and traditional police officers in a city implementing community-oriented policing. Many of the findings are similar to those of previous workload studies. However, the findings also indicate that community officers devoted significantly more time to nontraditional policing activities than beat officers. Further, 911 beat officers spent significantly more time engaged in traditional policing activities than community officers.

Officials' Estimates of the Incidence of “Actual Innocence” Convictions

Evidence indicates that the conviction and imprisonment of factually innocent persons occur with some regularity. Most research focuses on causes, but the incidence of wrongful convictions is an important scientific and policy issue, especially as no official body gathers data on miscarriages of justice. Two methods are available for discovering the incidence of wrongful conviction: (1) enumerating specific cases and (2) having criminal justice experts estimate its incidence. Counts or catalogues of wrongful conviction necessarily undercount its incidence and are subject to accuracy challenges. We surveyed Michigan criminal justice officials, replicating a recent Ohio survey, to obtain an expert estimate of the incidence of wrongful conviction. All groups combined estimated that wrongful convictions occurred at a rate of less than ½ percent in their own jurisdiction and at a rate of 1–3 percent in the United States. Defense lawyers estimate higher rates of wrongful conviction than judges, who estimate higher rates than police officials and prosecutors. These differences may be explained by professional socialization. An overall wrongful conviction estimate of ½ percent extrapolates to about 5,000 wrongful felony convictions and the imprisonment of more than 2,000 innocent persons in the United States every year.

Multijurisdictional drug task forces An analysis of impacts

Abstract In the past decade, municipal police organizations have devoted significant resources toward drug enforcement. One popular strategy in addressing the American drug problem is the formulation of multijurisdictional drug task forces. Despite their popularity, the impact of these cooperative ventures on law enforcement agencies has not been adequately evaluated. The research reported here examined the effect of membership in a drug enforcement task force on levels of drug enforcement outputs and perceptions of effectiveness by comparing law enforcement agencies participating in drug task forces to agencies which do not participate. Results suggest that task force membership impacts perceptions, but does not appear to influence objective measures of drug enforcement outputs.

An Examination of the Productivity and Perceived Effectiveness of Drug Task Forces

Multijurisdictional drug task forces formalize cooperative ventures and dedi cate attention to drug crime with the assumption that such will lead to more effective drug law enforcement. This improvement in drug enforcement is hypothesized to benefit the task forces not only in the number of drug arrests achieved, but also in enhanced communication and cooperation among in dividual members. Using data collected from a survey of task force leaders, grant applications and quarterly arrest reports, this study compares effective ness across task forces and organizational contexts. Findings indicate that differences in task force organizational structure, context and managerial fac tors may not affect the number of drug-related arrests, though they may influence the level of perceived effectiveness.

JUVENILE ATTITUDES TOWARD POLICE: A NATIONAL STUDY

ABSTRACT The importance of public attitudes toward the police is illustrated by its growing coverage in the academic literature. While a fair amount is known about how adults perceive the police, much less is known about how juveniles perceive them. Using data from the 1999 Monitoring the Future: A Continuing Study of American Youth (12th-Grade Survey), we investigate factors that influence the formation of juvenile attitudes toward police. Using OLS, we examine the relative influence of five sets of variables—drug use and acceptance, social environment, encounters with police, victimization, and race—on juveniles’ global satisfaction with police. Our findings indicate that acceptance of drug use has the most powerful influence on juveniles’ level of satisfaction with police, followed by personal victimization, race, presence of parents, and negative encounters with police, respectively.

Citizens' Attitudes Toward Wrongful Convictions

Perhaps no problem challenges the legitimacy of the criminal justice system more than the conviction of factually innocent individuals. Numerous highly publicized exonerations that occurred since 1989 have raised the visibility of wrongful conviction, eliciting the attention of both scholars and policy makers. Much of the research in this area focuses on the causes and incidence of the phenomenon. Despite the growing body of research, however, there has been no examination of how citizens view this problem. Using data from a statewide survey of Michigan residents, the present study aims to fill that gap in the literature by reporting on citizens’ attitudes regarding the issue of wrongful conviction. Overall, the results of this exploratory study suggest that respondents not only recognize the incidence of wrongful conviction but also believe that such errors occur with some regularity. Further results show that respondents believe wrongful convictions occur frequently enough to justify major criminal justice system reform. Attitudes varied significantly across demographic groups as well. Additional findings and policy implications are discussed.

Strange bedfellows: Civil liability and aggressive policing

Shaping and monitoring the behavior of street‐level officers has continued to be a difficult task for police managers, and this task may prove to be more difficult as modern departments increasingly rely on proactive law enforcement for the delivery of police services. A popular method to shape police behavior is holding officers, departments and municipalities civilly liable for street‐level behavior. While it may be assumed fear of civil litigation influences the manner in which the police interact with the public, there is little empirical evidence for this claim; in fact, the frequent use of civil liability claims is poised to have an unanticipated side effect on contemporary policing. Officers may engage in fewer proactive law enforcement activities as a way to insulate them from litigation. This study examines whether experience with and attitudes toward civil liability influence the behavior of police officers, with particular attention on officer propensity to make arrests, use force, conduct searches and initiate encounters with suspects. Multivariate results indicate attitudes toward civil liability are weak and inconsistent predictors of behavior.