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Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

nytimes.com

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Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#291

Post by bradlys »

ct0 wrote: post #17
_fat_santa wrote: post #3

Policing has to be one of the hardest jobs in our modern society, I honestly couldn't event imagine the stress. Imagine picking up a JIRA ticket at work and not knowing if that ticket is going to a run of the mill bug fix or something that can kill you. That's just out of the realm of possibility for an SWE but for a cop it can be any one of the calls they take on a daily basis. I've always had respect for cops becau…

My opinion of cops has changed as i've gotten older. I used to think they had nothing better to do but bother me, the youth, but in hindsight they have too much to do and are expected to always be on, alert, and accountable. Something that takes a lot of courage. I respect them more, especially after the extremely divisive events of the past 2-3 years, riots, attacks, etc.

I grew up with cops. One of my parents was a cop - so we spent a lot of time with them when I was younger.

Trust me, a lot of them are not really that good of people. They’re often more broken and problematic than your random person. Substance abuse is very common and acting outside the law is also extremely common. I’ve seen many LEO’s beat their wives and drive drunk while having to go out and work on the same calls. Always a bit awkward when they have to respond to a call for one of their own - I should know, I was there.

As far as I can tell - most aren’t really that upstanding of citizens and the standards are pretty lax for what gets in. Some are genuinely nice and good people but I don’t see them last for very long because they move onto better things.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#292

Post by dfxm12 »

bairrd wrote: post #55

I always am asked when I say we should reduce policing budgets, "have you ever needed police?" In my experience, they've always been either so late that myself and neighbours have had to get involved in breaking up a rape / other violent situations, or just completely useless when I've needed them for paperwork related stuff, i.e. credit card fraud. I think the police are asked to handle too many edge case situations…

I always am asked when I say we should reduce policing budgets, "have you ever needed police?" In my experience, they've always been either so late that myself and neighbours have had to get involved in breaking up a rape / other violent situations, or just completely useless when I've needed them for paperwork related stuff, i.e. credit card fraud

Right. I don't like how the article conflates a rise of crime with cops retiring/resigning. Cops generally don't prevent crime, but respond after the fact to sort things out.

There's also no reason a cop, as understood today, needs to show up for some paperwork stuff, like credit card fraud. Any type of civilian government representative should be trusted by the credit card company to file that away.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#293

Post by bazzert »

nradov wrote: post #19
_fat_santa wrote: post #3

Policing has to be one of the hardest jobs in our modern society, I honestly couldn't event imagine the stress. Imagine picking up a JIRA ticket at work and not knowing if that ticket is going to a run of the mill bug fix or something that can kill you. That's just out of the realm of possibility for an SWE but for a cop it can be any one of the calls they take on a daily basis. I've always had respect for cops becau…

Law enforcement can be dangerous but it's only #22 in occupational death rates. Lumberjacks and roofers are far more likely to get killed. https://www.ishn.com/articles/112748-top-25-most-dangerous-j...

said by someone who probably has a #9999 most dangerous job.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#294

Post by 9wzYQbTYsAIc »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #290
9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand your point, but it is a little disingenuous to bring that up as a point without considering the relative rates of attitudes such as that with the mainstream attitudes of law enforcement trainers. Is this individual representative of the mainstream?

I mean, are the training documents that you've seen publicly available on the Internet representative of the mainstream? Why is your inclination that those are normative but this seminar is anomalous?

> Intensive specialized training is provided to offic- ers in departments using a police-based specialized police response. This strategy involves having sworn officers with specialized mental health training pro- vide crisis intervention services and act as liaisons to the formal mental health system. Deane et al.2 found that only three percent of departments use this ap- proach—among them, the Memphis Crisis Inter- vention Team (CIT). CIT officers make up about 15 to 20 percent of patrol officers and receive 40 hours of training that focuses on scenarios derived from actual incidents. Officers receive extensive training in de-escalation techniques.9 The second approach, a police-based specialized mental health response, was used by 12 percent of the departments. Mental health consultants, who were not sworn officers, were hired by the police depart- ment to provide on-site and telephone consultation to officers in the field. The third approach, a mental- health-based specialized mental health response, was used by 30 percent of the departments. This strategy involved reliance on mobile crisis teams. The teams were part of the local community mental health ser- vice system. The teams had developed a relationship with the local police departments to provide assis- tance on the scene.

http://jaapl.org/content/jaapl/33/1/50.full.pdf

Of note, the remaining 55% of the departments in that study did not have a formal policy at the time (2005).

edit: additionally, in that paper they discuss the notably high proportion of police officers expressing interest in mental health training - almost all of them

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#295

Post by jakelazaroff »

9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote: post #294
jakelazaroff wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, are the training documents that you've seen publicly available on the Internet representative of the mainstream? Why is your inclination that those are normative but this seminar is anomalous?

> Intensive specialized training is provided to offic- ers in departments using a police-based specialized police response. This strategy involves having sworn officers with specialized mental health training pro- vide crisis intervention services and act as liaisons to the formal mental health system. Deane et al.2 found that only three percent of departments use this ap- proach—among them, the Memphis Crisis Inter-…

To be clear, this is referring to a very specific subset of police: "crisis intervention team" officers within the 3% of departments that use a "police-based specialized police response" to mental health issues.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#296

Post by ethagnawl »

rootusrootus wrote: post #221
ethagnawl wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you already needed to be doing it for some reason more than just money. This just isn't true. It is a good, steady, well paying job with great benefits, _lots_ of overtime, a union that will fall over itself to protect you and (often) the ability to retire after ~20 years with ~50% pay. I personally know people who've chosen to "grin and bear it" and go down that path for these exact reasons. From a purely objectiv…

I could have gotten the same by staying in the military 20 years, without the headache that comes with being a cop. At least where I live, you need (or needed, it could have recently changed) a bachelor's degree to become a police officer, and it pays 53K per year. It doesn't seem like a great gig to me, at least financially.

> It doesn't seem like a great gig to me, at least financially.

To each their own, of course, but compared to minimum wage or slightly more in retail/pumping gas/whatever, I could see how $53K (to start; before overtime) could be pretty compelling.

Also, FWIW, it looks like Connecticut and New York (my points of reference) do not require a bachelors degree -- only a HS diploma or GED.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#297

Post by 9wzYQbTYsAIc »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #295
9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Intensive specialized training is provided to offic- ers in departments using a police-based specialized police response. This strategy involves having sworn officers with specialized mental health training pro- vide crisis intervention services and act as liaisons to the formal mental health system. Deane et al.2 found that only three percent of departments use this ap- proach—among them, the Memphis Crisis Inter-…

To be clear, this is referring to a very specific subset of police: "crisis intervention team" officers within the 3% of departments that use a "police-based specialized police response" to mental health issues.

That is not a correct reading of the quoted analysis.

In tabular form:

CIT 3%

police-based specialized mental health response 12%

mental- health-based specialized mental health response 30%

no formal policy 55%

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#298

Post by jjcon »

9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote: post #258
jjcon wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even on your source they aren’t the majority

Did you sum the numbers for all types of moving vehicle sources of hazard? If you do the math, it does appear to exceed the number of incidences of being shot on the job.

Yes and even then it doesn’t

Additionally the claim wasn’t, ‘exceed the number of incidences of being shot on the job’ it was, ‘majority of [deaths] are traffic accidents’

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#299

Post by AnimalMuppet »

slibhb wrote: post #248
ceejayoz wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Highlighting "a very very small niche" of politicians/activists isn't really debunking the "a very very small niche of the police reform community" claim. I like Ayanna Pressley and Rashida Tlaib, but they can hardly be claimed to be the mainstream portion of Congress, or even Congressional Democrats.

The entire point of the slogan is that it can reasonably be interpretted as both a call for measured reform and a demand for radical change. Activists switch between these interpretations at will. Also, within activist circles, the most radical interpretation always wins. You're on HN and so you claim you want to "divert resources" but within "ACAB circles," the winning argument is always the most radical (prison abo…

It's a slogan that's perfect for using in a motte-and-bailey way.

Re: Police have been quitting in droves in the last year

#300

Post by frankbreetz »

JohnWhigham wrote: post #153

Honestly, I don't have a lot of sympathy. Many PDs have done this to themselves with bullshit like asset seizures, buying military-grade equipment for no reason, dragging their feet on officer investigations and complaints ("paid administrative leave"...what a joke) just to name a few. Over the past ~60 years as municipal budgets for infrastructure, parks, social services and the like have shrunk, you know what part…

While I agree there is a problem, we can still have sympathy for police who joined the force to help people and now feel like they can't. The system can be broken while the majority of people in the system can be good people.
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