Recently my son sent an e-mail to the Virginia state police as a concerned citizen after he observed what appeared to be an unmarked state police car being operated in what appeared to be a very unsafe manner without emergency equipment being utilized and that the officer may have also failed to render aid and assistance to a motorist in distress. Obviously, he wouldve had no way of knowing whether or not the officer was responding to an emergency call and/or what type of hazard level it could have been. But I salute my son for making the report. If the officers actions were not justified, corrective action should be taken. If the officers actions were justified and/or excusable then no harm done and it reinforces to the state police administration that the citizens are watching their actions. After reading his posting on Facebook as to what he observed it gave me a good excuse to put my two cents worth into the mix with his Facebook friends. So this is my two cents worth: It is regrettable, inappropriate actions by one law enforcement officer reflect poorly on all of us. I emphatically preach to the young officers that they must always remember they operate exclusively in a fish bowl environment. After a rookie officer drives around in a police vehicle for a few weeks, the novelty wears off and it becomes like driving in the other vehicle to the officer. However the general public always sees the vehicle as a police vehicle. Thats why I referred to it as the fishbowl environment, everyone sees everything the officer does whether its exceeding the speed limit, failing to use turn signals or not using headlights and the rain. Having three decades of pushing a police vehicle up and down the highways I know that quite often I could always arrive at an emergency call quicker without using emergency equipment then using lights and siren. Lights and sirens quite often confuse motorists that suffer from zombie disease which creates a dangerous situation for both the zombie as well as the officer. But regardless the call, regardless whether or not emergency equipment is being used, the officer must exercise reason and judgment along with the duty to respond to the call. State law does exempt officers in the performance of their duties from compliance with numerous traffic codes. But state law is very clear when it comes to operating a police vehicle and does not relieve the police officer of civil and/or criminal penalties if operating a vehicle in a careless or reckless manner. Just be assured that what Jason observed is certainly the exception and not the rule when it comes to operating a police vehicle by the vast majority of the police officers. The vehicle could very well have been operated by a state trooper or for that matter any local sheriff’s office or police department. While the rules and regulations for each department may vary to some degree the training standard should be the same. The conduct of the police officers normally reflect the leadership of the agency the officers belonged to. Most of the state troopers I have known over the years have been top-notch and highly professional. The same is true of officers from numerous local jurisdictions. The interesting aspect is that local law enforcement officers have much more training and considerably more experience in the profession than the state police troopers. It boils down to resources and mission statements. On the other hand I would put most city and County law enforcement officers up against the most elite federal law enforcement officers including anyone in the FBI, Secret Service, ATF, DEA and of course anyone connected with a DHS agency and the local officers would win hands down in professionalism, expertise, effectiveness and cost effectiveness. Unfortunately the Virginia state police officers for the most part could not rate as part of the competition. Not necessarily the officers fault. The Virginia state police has a certain type of mentality from the upper management on down that render them somewhat ineffective other than very specific aspects of the law enforcement profession. They receive excellent training in accident reconstruction but little or no criminal investigative training. They do have a criminal investigative office but unfortunately my experience with them leads me to believe that thats where the troopers go if they are no longer physically fit enough to run radar on the interstate. Thank goodness that we have state police task forces in Virginia made up of mostly local officers to do the nitty-gritty work. And thank goodness that we have the federal task forces like the FBI anti-terrorism task force which is also made up mostly of local police officers to do the real police work on the federal level. Leadership and training, I cannot emphasize it enough. Unfortunately American law enforcement leadership is just so contaminated with politics and political appointees. Productivity and effectiveness diminishes if the leadership is corrupt or incompetent. The proper management of limited resources is critical. Good training and an uncompromising selection process of law enforcement applicants will ultimately determine whether or not the agency will be successful in their public safety mission. Lowering training standards to accommodate substandard trainees is not acceptable to me but it appears to be acceptable to the politically correct. Lowering hiring standards to accommodate the politically correct will ultimately doom numerous law enforcement agencies. It now takes at least five or more police officers to perform the same law enforcement task that most of us old timers did by ourselves, did better and more safely. The bottom line is that the closer law enforcement is to the people the more effective and responsive it will be. But what do I know; Im just an old pirate! (With of course more time and experience on the job than 95% of the current law enforcement population.)
Posted on: Fri, 17 Jan 2014 03:23:38 +0000
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