FOCUS Police Discipline: Part One, the Complaint Process


CHART 1 - COMPLAINT PROCESS CITIZEN WITH COMPLAINT


REFERRED TO ON-DUTY SUPERVISOR who takes report & forwards to IA function


and investigative responsibility assigned


ALLEGATION MINOR assigned to supervisor


in an offi cer and we should not lose offi cers whose action can be corrected. Many times training, counseling, or other intervention techniques will reduce substantially the number of complaints. Study of three major cities showed that with intervention, there was a two-thirds reduction in complaints. Another important reason for having an


early intervention system is that should the department be sued over the actions of an offi cer, the record of that offi cer will be an issue. If this offi cer has had a large number of citizens’ complaints or other problems, that either the department was not aware of, or took no action, the agency will be guilty of deliberate indifference. This will result in fi nancial loss to the taxpayers. In simple terms, the depart- ment needs to know if there is a problem and have a process for taking corrective ac- tion. Even a large number of un-founded complaints may indicate there is a problem with the policies or a need for training. The tracking of citizens’ complaints is a


major element of the early intervention pro- cess. A good internal affairs program can track other things of interest to the agency. Some of the most common are: Use of force; Civil litigation; Resisting arrest incidents; Vehicle pursuits; Internally generated ad- ministrative violations; Citizen-initiated commendation or compliments; All depart- ment commendations and awards. Other things that may be of interest are sex, race or ethnic origin, age of the com-


28 LAW and ORDER I June 2016


ALLEGATION MAJOR assigned to IA & criminal investigator if crime related


plainant, officers involved, supervisors involved, training offi cer, units involved, type of force used, location of incident, and anything of special interest to the depart- ment. This kind of tracking helps man- agement identify problems before they become major issues. Medium and large agencies certainly should have computer programs that meet these needs. Very small agencies, of say less than 25


offi cers, may feel that they cannot afford a dedicated internal affairs program. A small agency could accomplish much the same results with a simple spreadsheet showing type of complaint, date, time, complainant information, offi cers involved information, results of the investigation, and any other information they wish to track. Spread- sheet would be reviewed from time to time to identify any patterns. Early intervention systems have broad


goals including: Improve performance of officers involved; Higher standards of accountability; Improve supervisory practices; Higher accountability for super- visors; Higher standards of accountability for entire department; Reduction in litiga- tion; Improve community relations. More detailed information on imple- mentation of early intervention is available from the U.S. Department of Justice, Offi ce of Community Oriented Policing Services in publications such as Early Intervention System For Law Enforcement Agencies. This and many other up-to-date publications


IA NUMBER ASSIGNED NUMBER


may be ordered, free of charge, from their website: www.cops.usdoj.gov. Closely related to the criteria we have se-


lected above, is the important decision when we need to review. The majority of depart- ments review an offi cer’s record when the offi cer has three complaints within 12 con- secutive months. A little over 10 percent use two complaints as the trigger to make a review. There is no particular standard for review that would fi t all agencies. Management usually bases the decision


on how severe problems are in the agency. Review should not be viewed as negative. It does not mean that any disciplinary action is taken; only that the fi les are ex- amined to see if there is a pattern and/or information that would indicate interven- tion would be appropriate. If there is an indication that intervention is needed, our next decision is what type of counseling or other intervention is appropriate. There are four that are in widespread


use: 1) Informal counseling by immediate supervisor; 2) Informal counseling by im- mediate supervisor and command staff; 3) Formal observation and documentation; and 4) Special training. There are advantages and disadvan-


tages in all four of the intervention tech- niques. Counseling by just the immediate supervisor will result in a less formal and threatening atmosphere, but it may not be taken seriously by either. Counseling with the supervisor and command staff will result in a more formal atmosphere, but will probably not lead to the offi cer being forthcoming or acknowledging any weaknesses. Formal observation and documentation and training all take more time and fi nancial resources. Manage- ment should select the most appropriate based on the facts. We have spent considerable time look-


ing at the complaint process and how the information should be used. None of the intervention options we have discussed should be considered negative discipline. Part 2 in this three-part series on discipline will cover the interview of the complainant and the offi cer. The third and fi nal part will be on negative discipline options.


Joseph Koziol has 25 years of law enforcement experience. He can be reached at jskoziol@att.net.


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