After a hiatus of about six years, it is now time to dust off my blogging skills and get back into things. As I'm teaching a course on policing at Dalhousie University in the College of Continuing Education, this seems like an ideal opportunity to use this log as a space to reflect upon, and react to, things that are happening out there in the Canadian policing world, and beyond.
Many things are occurring that warrant some kind of commentary and this is a perfect venue for such commentary.
Stay tuned, stand by and watch this space.
Monday 3 February 2020
Tuesday 29 July 2014
Counting Cops: Do More Police Mean Less Crime?
A significant article appears in the current issue of the academic journal, Crime & Delinquency:
Kleck, Gary and Barnes, J.C. (2014). Do more police lead to more crime deterrence? Crime & Delinquency, 60(5), 716-738.
With the beginning of the Economics of Policing initiative lead by Public Safety Canada, and the various efforts that have been inaugurated around this project, many politicians, police leaders and policy-makers have been focussed on the right number of police officers required in any given jurisdictions for the delivery of policing services.
We have seen a number of efforts aimed at making these determinations in a, more or less, scientific (or evidenced-based) manner. Research has been done on calls for service and the average time it takes to 'clear' those calls. The calculations may take into account a number of relevant factors including the seriousness of the crime occurrence, time of day, day in the week, and other elements that may provide insights into this area of human resource deployment. Complex mathematical models have been developed to guide this process, including an approach known as data envelopment analysis (DEA) which is currently being utilized within the Toronto Police Service to assist with personnel deployment.
However, beyond the complexities and adequacy of these approaches, common practice tends to equate the number of police officers with crime deterrence. It is really a simple formula: the more police you are able to put on patrol, the lower your crime rate will be in any given jurisdiction. More police equates to less crime. It's common sense that is readily accepted by the public, it is used by police executives to defend increased budgets and it is turned to by politicians (especially at election time) to convince the public (and the police) that they are tough on crime and willing to pay the price for public safety.
Unfortunately, this is one of those instances where common sense, as well as, the available research moves in an entirely different direction. Remarkably, we have had research on the actual impact of police activities upon crime rates for nearly forty years. In 1974 ground-breaking field research was conducted by George Kelling and his colleagues in Kansas City, Missouri. Well-known as the Kansas City Preventive Patrol Experiment this project examined 15 precincts (chosen at random). Several precincts would receive no routine patrols while others would receive four times the normal frequency of routine patrols. Across all measures, it was determined that there was no significant impact on crime rates as a result of any of these approaches. This was measured by police-based statistics and victim survey data. Of course, these results were remarkable and flew in the face of expectation.
Drawing upon their research results, the authors make the following observations:
People who live in places with more police perceive slightly lower risks of being arrested. The negative correlations, however, are quite weak; none of the four correlations between the police strength variable and the perceptions of arrest likelihood were more than .10 in magnitude. (pp. 725-26)
And further:
...police strength appears to have no more effect on perceived risk of arrest among offenders as approximated by self-reported arrestees, than among non-offenders. (p. 730)
These are useful findings that serve to support some of the conclusions generated from the work completed in Kansas City and Newark years ago. And, for those who proceed to argue that police strength would have an impact on crime rates through an incapacitation effect, Kleck and Barnes offer the following statement:
...it is unlikely that increases or decreases in police strength -- even a doubling or halving of manpower [sic] -- could have any measurable effect on the number of criminals incarcerated. Because nearly all prison systems are full nearly all the time, the only factor that substantially affects the number of criminals "taken off the streets," in the sense of being incarcerated, is prison capacity. Police ability to arrest criminals guilty of prison-worthy offenses is never a limiting factor on the number imprisoned, so it is implausible that variations in police manpower [sic] affect the collective incapacitative effect of the criminal justice system. (pp. 731-32)
So, neither increases nor decreases in the number of police officers deployed to operational duties will likely have any dramatic impact on crime rates or the number of individuals arrested for crimes. Again, it would be valuable to have Canadian research to validate the findings of American police academics. However, we can certainly extrapolate from this study to suggest that any results would likely be similar in a Canadian context.
Of major importance to Canadian policy-makers and police leaders is what the authors assert near the conclusion of their article:
Increasing police manpower [sic] levels may have various benefits other than crime control, such as traffic control or the delivery of various public services, or it may affect crime rates in ways that do not involve either increased general deterrent effects or increased incapacitating effects. At this point however, the evidence indicates that police manpower [sic] levels do not affect crime rates by affecting perceptions of risk of actual arrest and punishment.
In light of these findings, policy makers may want to reconsider whether increases in police manpower [sic] bring sufficient crime reduction benefits to justify their costs. Conversely, in time of fiscal crisis, it is worth considering the possibility that cuts in police strength may be implemented without causing crime increases. Even in time of fiscal plenty, it may be worth thinking about alternative investments that are more likely to reduce crime. (pp. 735-36)
These are quite clear statements that should be taken to heart by everyone interested in the adequacy and effectiveness of modern Canadian policing. We can begin to see that on the basis of this kind of research, combined with the historical record of earlier systematic study, that police may provide valuable and necessary public safety services. However, there is no axiomatic relationship between police strength (in numbers) and crime rates. Here again, we could benefit from home-grown research that tests the findings of studies like the one completed by Kleck and Barnes. In the meantime, it is essential that these kinds of insights become an important part of the dialogue regarding the future of policing in Canada.
Police executives are well-schooled in the art of pressing for increased resources; human, financial, technological, and material. This is part of what being an police leader is all about. Politicians are easily convinced of the simple equation: more cops equals safer streets. We often see that during an election that political parties will vie with one another to increase the complement of police officers to combat crime and increase public safety and security. In Nova Scotia a popular "Boots on the Street" campaign was introduced by the Conservatives and sustained by the NDP when they took hold of the reins of power. In 1994, President Clinton made a commitment to hiring 100,000 additional police officers to bring greater safety to American states. This was consolidated in the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act. A similar initiative appeared on the scene in Canada and was seen as a path to improvement for police services. No research was offered to support or substantiate these new funding initiatives. They were seen to be self-evident and by all means politically expedient.
Kleck, Gary and Barnes, J.C. (2014). Do more police lead to more crime deterrence? Crime & Delinquency, 60(5), 716-738.
With the beginning of the Economics of Policing initiative lead by Public Safety Canada, and the various efforts that have been inaugurated around this project, many politicians, police leaders and policy-makers have been focussed on the right number of police officers required in any given jurisdictions for the delivery of policing services.
We have seen a number of efforts aimed at making these determinations in a, more or less, scientific (or evidenced-based) manner. Research has been done on calls for service and the average time it takes to 'clear' those calls. The calculations may take into account a number of relevant factors including the seriousness of the crime occurrence, time of day, day in the week, and other elements that may provide insights into this area of human resource deployment. Complex mathematical models have been developed to guide this process, including an approach known as data envelopment analysis (DEA) which is currently being utilized within the Toronto Police Service to assist with personnel deployment.
However, beyond the complexities and adequacy of these approaches, common practice tends to equate the number of police officers with crime deterrence. It is really a simple formula: the more police you are able to put on patrol, the lower your crime rate will be in any given jurisdiction. More police equates to less crime. It's common sense that is readily accepted by the public, it is used by police executives to defend increased budgets and it is turned to by politicians (especially at election time) to convince the public (and the police) that they are tough on crime and willing to pay the price for public safety.
Unfortunately, this is one of those instances where common sense, as well as, the available research moves in an entirely different direction. Remarkably, we have had research on the actual impact of police activities upon crime rates for nearly forty years. In 1974 ground-breaking field research was conducted by George Kelling and his colleagues in Kansas City, Missouri. Well-known as the Kansas City Preventive Patrol Experiment this project examined 15 precincts (chosen at random). Several precincts would receive no routine patrols while others would receive four times the normal frequency of routine patrols. Across all measures, it was determined that there was no significant impact on crime rates as a result of any of these approaches. This was measured by police-based statistics and victim survey data. Of course, these results were remarkable and flew in the face of expectation.
George Kelling
Then, in 1981, research was completed through the Newark Foot Patrol Experiment which served to confirm and consolidate the findings in Kansas City. In Newark, foot patrols were stopped entirely in four areas, new patrols were started in four areas, and existing patrols were maintained in another four areas within the city. Again, there was found to be no difference in crime rates in the experimental or the control areas. Once, again, police activity (regardless of the number of officers) appeared to have no significant impact on crime rates.
It should be noted that there was some skepticism among police researchers. However, these remain fairly compelling experimental results that policy-makers need to consider. The police community needs to remind themselves about these evidence-based findings and the academic community in Canada should seriously consider the research value of replicating this kind of field study in the 21st century.
Kleck and Barnes speak directly to the common sense view that more police should equate to reduced crime rates:
Despite the intuitive theoretical linkage between police activity, individual-level perceptions of punishment risks, and crime rates, no studies have assessed these associations empircally. Purely macro-level research cannot directly assess the deterrent effects of police activity because it cannot directly measure perceptions of risk among potential offenders. (p. 720)
What this current article summarizes is the work completed by Kleck and Barnes in 54 US counties. A total of 1500 adult respondents were randomly selected and interviews were completed with participants in April and May of 1998. The dependent variable related to perceptions of arrest risk and the key independent variables included: police strength, jail ratio, and arrest ratio (i.e., actual arrest rates).Drawing upon their research results, the authors make the following observations:
People who live in places with more police perceive slightly lower risks of being arrested. The negative correlations, however, are quite weak; none of the four correlations between the police strength variable and the perceptions of arrest likelihood were more than .10 in magnitude. (pp. 725-26)
And further:
...police strength appears to have no more effect on perceived risk of arrest among offenders as approximated by self-reported arrestees, than among non-offenders. (p. 730)
These are useful findings that serve to support some of the conclusions generated from the work completed in Kansas City and Newark years ago. And, for those who proceed to argue that police strength would have an impact on crime rates through an incapacitation effect, Kleck and Barnes offer the following statement:
...it is unlikely that increases or decreases in police strength -- even a doubling or halving of manpower [sic] -- could have any measurable effect on the number of criminals incarcerated. Because nearly all prison systems are full nearly all the time, the only factor that substantially affects the number of criminals "taken off the streets," in the sense of being incarcerated, is prison capacity. Police ability to arrest criminals guilty of prison-worthy offenses is never a limiting factor on the number imprisoned, so it is implausible that variations in police manpower [sic] affect the collective incapacitative effect of the criminal justice system. (pp. 731-32)
So, neither increases nor decreases in the number of police officers deployed to operational duties will likely have any dramatic impact on crime rates or the number of individuals arrested for crimes. Again, it would be valuable to have Canadian research to validate the findings of American police academics. However, we can certainly extrapolate from this study to suggest that any results would likely be similar in a Canadian context.
Of major importance to Canadian policy-makers and police leaders is what the authors assert near the conclusion of their article:
Increasing police manpower [sic] levels may have various benefits other than crime control, such as traffic control or the delivery of various public services, or it may affect crime rates in ways that do not involve either increased general deterrent effects or increased incapacitating effects. At this point however, the evidence indicates that police manpower [sic] levels do not affect crime rates by affecting perceptions of risk of actual arrest and punishment.
In light of these findings, policy makers may want to reconsider whether increases in police manpower [sic] bring sufficient crime reduction benefits to justify their costs. Conversely, in time of fiscal crisis, it is worth considering the possibility that cuts in police strength may be implemented without causing crime increases. Even in time of fiscal plenty, it may be worth thinking about alternative investments that are more likely to reduce crime. (pp. 735-36)
These are quite clear statements that should be taken to heart by everyone interested in the adequacy and effectiveness of modern Canadian policing. We can begin to see that on the basis of this kind of research, combined with the historical record of earlier systematic study, that police may provide valuable and necessary public safety services. However, there is no axiomatic relationship between police strength (in numbers) and crime rates. Here again, we could benefit from home-grown research that tests the findings of studies like the one completed by Kleck and Barnes. In the meantime, it is essential that these kinds of insights become an important part of the dialogue regarding the future of policing in Canada.
Police executives are well-schooled in the art of pressing for increased resources; human, financial, technological, and material. This is part of what being an police leader is all about. Politicians are easily convinced of the simple equation: more cops equals safer streets. We often see that during an election that political parties will vie with one another to increase the complement of police officers to combat crime and increase public safety and security. In Nova Scotia a popular "Boots on the Street" campaign was introduced by the Conservatives and sustained by the NDP when they took hold of the reins of power. In 1994, President Clinton made a commitment to hiring 100,000 additional police officers to bring greater safety to American states. This was consolidated in the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act. A similar initiative appeared on the scene in Canada and was seen as a path to improvement for police services. No research was offered to support or substantiate these new funding initiatives. They were seen to be self-evident and by all means politically expedient.
When Organizations Die
An interesting article has appeared in the latest issue of the journal Crime & Delinquency:
King, William R. (2014). "Organizational failure and the disbanding of local police agencies." Crime & Delinquency, 60(5), 667-692.
The author applies organizational theory to a consideration of the disbanding of 31 local police agencies during the 1990s in Ohio. King looks at structural contingency theory which examines how organizational structure influences efficiency . He also takes stock of the work of institutional theorists and the tendency of organizations to secure symbolic resources (e.g., legitimacy) from external constituents. For King, it is important to clearly consider how organizations respond to their environment.
King found through various research avenues that there were 31 police organizations that disbanded between January 1990 and December 1999. He also sought out 43 comparison locations in order to make certain quantiative determinations. The paper is a summary of the research and King's findings in this instance.
When a police service is disbanded it is typically due to matters of funding or a lack of sanctioning by an appropriate authority. Budget constraints are a common cause of police department disbanding and this may also be tied to a serious decrease in population. Clearly, funding for public safety in most jurisdictions is closely tied to the tax base provided by residents or businesses. When either, or both, of these decline, there is a shortfall in funding for public safety services.
King notes that small police agencies are particularly prone to these challenges. Larger urban centres are more equipped to deal with such challenges due to their size and the capacity to be more flexible in responding to financial crises. He notes:
When faced with a crisis in its institutional environment, agencies will often attempt to symbolically cope with the demands of sovereigns. Large police agencies can employ symbolic responses such as reshuffling personnel, implementing a new training program, lauching an investigation, removing a police chief, or creating a specialized unit. Larger organizations can more readily engage in these symbolic changes because they have the slack resources to create a new unit and the dark corners in which to hide controversial personnel. Large organziations are protected by their size, for size is synonymous with success. (p. 686)
This is an immediately relevant article in a Canadian context. We have seen the dramatic impact of financial constraints appear across the country and many jurisdictions are struggling with their capacity to sustain very expensive police services. Because anywhere from 80 to 90% of the costs of a modern police service are devoted to police salaries, wages and benefits, it is sensible to consider how disbandment might be an option. Of course, public safety needs must continue to be addressed and, therefore, it is often viewed as feasible to explore other options for the delivery of police services.
There has been more than a decade of debate, discussion and deliberation over the process of municipal police costings in Ontario. With major changes to the Police Services Act in that Province in the 1990s it became necessary for smaller jurisdictions to pay for what had been termed "free" OPP policing. Accordingly, many jurisdictions had to make a determination as to the option for policing they would elect to pursue. Several smaller police services were viewed as being "dysfunctional" under these new legislative arrangements and competition ensued between an existing municipal police department and the OPP through their municipal contracting branch.
King notes that there are some emotional, deeply political and community-oriented elements mixed into these local police department disbandments. Certainly, when a different approach to police service delivery is introduced, there may be significant changes in officer behaviour, different accountability mechanisms in place, as well as, new styles and types of policing provided to the community. Several communities that have adopted an RCMP contract for the provision of policing services have seen the magnitude of such changes. This is also the case for several jurisdictions in Ontario which have opted for OPP municipal policing.
King's observation about the "slack resources" that exist in larger police agencies is one that should be of interest to policy-makers and police governing authorities. It was certainly my own experience, working in several large police organizations, that difficult personnel could be "parked" in various out-of-the-way places as their files were dealt with in some manner. Often challenging officers would be hidden in the training department where they would not have any opportunities for operational misadventure. However, it is difficult to quantify the damage the presence of such officers might do in the training realm, especially when they are exposed to new recruits. Also, I can recall having sidelined officers assigned to work in the policy and planning unit with equally questionable judgment as to their value in such a role.
Police executives have become remarkably adept at creating a kind of black box within their budget envelope to allow them to deal with some of the environmental, budgetary and other challenges which King speaks about in his article. The tactic of rolling out a new training or awareness program is common in police organizations across Canada. This is a conditioned response to many organizational crises in policing when a commission of inquiry or an inquest makes recommendations about potential improvements in a police department's delivery of service. There is often no real research as to the absolute need for this training. Nor is their really any careful design of the training to ensure that will address measurable behavioural outcomes. And the tactic of calling in another police department to conduct an investigation is a stop-gap measure that is applied again and again in many jurisdictions. This, of course, speaks to the viability or legitimacy of 'police investigating police' which has been the subject of increasing study in Canada, and elsewhere.
It would be useful to conduct some research in a Canadian context on those police services which have been disbanded for a variety of reasons to see if the causes and consequences mirror the research that King has conducted in Ohio. What has the process of organizational "death" meant in communities which have lost their local police service? What has been happened in areas like Paris (Ontario), Haldimand-Norfolk (Ontario), Nepean (Ontario), of other areas where the local police were replaced by a contract with a larger police service, or changed through amalgamation?
We have a tendency to think of public organizations as being permanent fixtures. They do, however, have a life cycle that is not entirely dissimilar to that of human beings. They come into being at certain points and may pass away when their purpose is completed, or, they no longer serve a viable public purpose.
King cites a couple of articles that are worth pointing to in this context:
King, William R. (2014). "Organizational failure and the disbanding of local police agencies." Crime & Delinquency, 60(5), 667-692.
The author applies organizational theory to a consideration of the disbanding of 31 local police agencies during the 1990s in Ohio. King looks at structural contingency theory which examines how organizational structure influences efficiency . He also takes stock of the work of institutional theorists and the tendency of organizations to secure symbolic resources (e.g., legitimacy) from external constituents. For King, it is important to clearly consider how organizations respond to their environment.
King found through various research avenues that there were 31 police organizations that disbanded between January 1990 and December 1999. He also sought out 43 comparison locations in order to make certain quantiative determinations. The paper is a summary of the research and King's findings in this instance.
When a police service is disbanded it is typically due to matters of funding or a lack of sanctioning by an appropriate authority. Budget constraints are a common cause of police department disbanding and this may also be tied to a serious decrease in population. Clearly, funding for public safety in most jurisdictions is closely tied to the tax base provided by residents or businesses. When either, or both, of these decline, there is a shortfall in funding for public safety services.
King notes that small police agencies are particularly prone to these challenges. Larger urban centres are more equipped to deal with such challenges due to their size and the capacity to be more flexible in responding to financial crises. He notes:
When faced with a crisis in its institutional environment, agencies will often attempt to symbolically cope with the demands of sovereigns. Large police agencies can employ symbolic responses such as reshuffling personnel, implementing a new training program, lauching an investigation, removing a police chief, or creating a specialized unit. Larger organizations can more readily engage in these symbolic changes because they have the slack resources to create a new unit and the dark corners in which to hide controversial personnel. Large organziations are protected by their size, for size is synonymous with success. (p. 686)
This is an immediately relevant article in a Canadian context. We have seen the dramatic impact of financial constraints appear across the country and many jurisdictions are struggling with their capacity to sustain very expensive police services. Because anywhere from 80 to 90% of the costs of a modern police service are devoted to police salaries, wages and benefits, it is sensible to consider how disbandment might be an option. Of course, public safety needs must continue to be addressed and, therefore, it is often viewed as feasible to explore other options for the delivery of police services.
There has been more than a decade of debate, discussion and deliberation over the process of municipal police costings in Ontario. With major changes to the Police Services Act in that Province in the 1990s it became necessary for smaller jurisdictions to pay for what had been termed "free" OPP policing. Accordingly, many jurisdictions had to make a determination as to the option for policing they would elect to pursue. Several smaller police services were viewed as being "dysfunctional" under these new legislative arrangements and competition ensued between an existing municipal police department and the OPP through their municipal contracting branch.
King notes that there are some emotional, deeply political and community-oriented elements mixed into these local police department disbandments. Certainly, when a different approach to police service delivery is introduced, there may be significant changes in officer behaviour, different accountability mechanisms in place, as well as, new styles and types of policing provided to the community. Several communities that have adopted an RCMP contract for the provision of policing services have seen the magnitude of such changes. This is also the case for several jurisdictions in Ontario which have opted for OPP municipal policing.
King's observation about the "slack resources" that exist in larger police agencies is one that should be of interest to policy-makers and police governing authorities. It was certainly my own experience, working in several large police organizations, that difficult personnel could be "parked" in various out-of-the-way places as their files were dealt with in some manner. Often challenging officers would be hidden in the training department where they would not have any opportunities for operational misadventure. However, it is difficult to quantify the damage the presence of such officers might do in the training realm, especially when they are exposed to new recruits. Also, I can recall having sidelined officers assigned to work in the policy and planning unit with equally questionable judgment as to their value in such a role.
Police executives have become remarkably adept at creating a kind of black box within their budget envelope to allow them to deal with some of the environmental, budgetary and other challenges which King speaks about in his article. The tactic of rolling out a new training or awareness program is common in police organizations across Canada. This is a conditioned response to many organizational crises in policing when a commission of inquiry or an inquest makes recommendations about potential improvements in a police department's delivery of service. There is often no real research as to the absolute need for this training. Nor is their really any careful design of the training to ensure that will address measurable behavioural outcomes. And the tactic of calling in another police department to conduct an investigation is a stop-gap measure that is applied again and again in many jurisdictions. This, of course, speaks to the viability or legitimacy of 'police investigating police' which has been the subject of increasing study in Canada, and elsewhere.
It would be useful to conduct some research in a Canadian context on those police services which have been disbanded for a variety of reasons to see if the causes and consequences mirror the research that King has conducted in Ohio. What has the process of organizational "death" meant in communities which have lost their local police service? What has been happened in areas like Paris (Ontario), Haldimand-Norfolk (Ontario), Nepean (Ontario), of other areas where the local police were replaced by a contract with a larger police service, or changed through amalgamation?
We have a tendency to think of public organizations as being permanent fixtures. They do, however, have a life cycle that is not entirely dissimilar to that of human beings. They come into being at certain points and may pass away when their purpose is completed, or, they no longer serve a viable public purpose.
King cites a couple of articles that are worth pointing to in this context:
- Sutton, R.I. (1987). The process of organizational death: disbanding and reconnecting. Administrative Science Quarterly, 32(4), 542-569.
- Weed, F.J. (1991). Organizational mortality in the anti-drunk-driving movement: failure among local MADD chapters. Social Forces, 69(1), 851-868.
Thursday 17 July 2014
Meeting the Challenge of Bullying in the RCMP
An interesting, and highly relevant, article has appeared in the most recent issue of Administration & Society:
McKay, Ruth B. (2014). Confronting workplace bullying: agency and structure in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Administration & Society, 46(5), 548-572. doi: 10.1177/0095399713509245
The author is a member of faculty at the Sprott School of Business, Carleton University in Ottawa, ON.
She begins with a general observation that an organization's ability to come to grips with the challenge of workplace bullying must begin with simple awareness. This, of course, is not always a simple matter as the hierarchical nature of most organizations, including police services, often serves as an impediment to real awareness of this problem. Change may not immediately flow from awareness alone since formal responses must be put in place to actually grapple with the climate that creates the conditions for bullying to take place within the organization. McKay's paper sets out to consider the impacts of agency (defined as individual influence) and structure (defined as organizational forces) in the context of workplace bullying. The author places her focus on the RCMP as an important case study in the area of bullying.
All organizations require both formal and informal means and mechanisms for resolving conflict, settling differences and advancing the goals and objectives established for their mission and mandate. Police organizations, in Canada and elsewhere, continue to be hierarchical, rank-ordered, rule-bound entities that retain militaristic elements, including command-and-control, use of deadly force, and high levels of internal discipline. Also, although this is not given consideration in McKay's treatment, there is a broad margin for individual police officer discretion that flows directly to the lowest ranks (i.e., constable) within these organizations. Therefore, bullying, as an authoritative approach to the settling of differences of opinion is something that often occurs within the context of modern policing. It is also something that international research has discerned in many other public organizations.
Bureaucracies place a high priority on hierarchy and give considerable power to managers and supervisors in order to advance whatever 'business' they are engaged in conducting. The core functions of Canadian policing typically include: crime prevention, emergency response, law enforcement, public order maintenance, and assistance to victims. Most, if not all, of these core functions require quick, decisive responses that are consistent with the laws, policies, procedures, guidelines and standards established in any given jurisdiction. However, police officers must be able to act with significant speed in circumstances that do not allow for long deliberation, speculation or contemplation. Accordingly, front-line officers exercise discretion in the widest range of operational areas and this 'gift' of discretion flows up the chain-of-command in all police organizations.
McKay, while not addressing the complicating aspects that necessarily attach to police discretion, does usefully discern three sets of factors that play a key role in the matter of workplace bullying, namely: individual; social, and organizational factors. Each of these factors may be viewed as contributing to, or offering protection from, the occurrence of bullying within police services. The author's interest in the RCMP has clearly been triggered by the prevalence and persistence of this matter over the last several years:
The seemingly systemic nature of bullying and harassment and the inability of RCMP management to easily and effectively address the problem can be linked to strong structural influences within a bureacracy. (p. 550)
McKay mentions several specfic instances of workplace bullying within the RCMP that symbolize the nature of this organizational challenge. In 2006 Constable Paul Carty raised concerns about bullying behaviour by one of his supervisors and found that his complaints were not being addressed with any degree of seriousness. Complicating matters was the fact that the bullying actually intensified following Carty's complaints and produced conditions in the workplace which became intolerable.
A former BC RCMP officer, Nancy Sulz was awarded damages in the amount of $950,000.00 for harassment by a superior officer. In 2011 the case of Corporal Catherine Galliford generated a considerable amount of public attention given this officer's extremely high profile as a spokesperson for the RCMP. In 2012, Galliford launched a lawsuit against Canada's Attorney General, the British Columbia's Justice Minister, three RCMP officers, a civilian RCMP doctor, and a Vancouver PD officer. Over the course of sixteen years, Galliford's lawsuit claimed that she was sexually assaulted, harassed and bullied.
In March 2012 another female RCMP officer began a suit against the RCMP. Janet Merlo, a 19-year veteran (again from the RCMP's "E" Division in British Columbia), argued that she was persistently harassed by her supervisor, S/Sgt. Donald Smith to the point where she developed clinical depression and was forced to resign from the organization.
Within the context of this gathering storm of concern about workplace bullying in the RCMP, the Commissioner for Public Complaints Against the RCMP commenced a review of 718 harassment complaints. The Commissioner's findings basically supported the view that internal bullying was indeed a problem for the RCMP.
McKay turns some attention to the leadership issues that pertain to the challenge of workplace bullying and harassment. Certainly, the leadership of former RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli may be viewed as a watershed moment in this organization's life. Zaccardelli, who was prompted to resign his position following revelations about his mismanagement, autocratic and insensitive behaviour, became a symbol for much that was wrong, or dysfunctional, within the RCMP. Following several waves of review, beginning with David Brown's independent examination of the pension fund scandal within the RCMP, a real window of opportunity opened up for reform and change within this police service. Along with my colleague, Christopher Murphy, I have traced some of the management and leadership challenges within the RCMP as part of the Task Force on Governance & Cultural Change in the RCMP in 2007.
However, not all windows of opportunity are opened with the clarity of enlightenment. So, when Zaccardelli left a vacuum in the leadership of the RCMP, the Harper Government made the serious error of filling that gap with a most unfortunate choice for Commissioner. William Elliot had a long career as a civil servant in areas that operated in proximity to the law enforcement mandate of the RCMP. However, as a civilian, Elliot was never fully embraced by the senior officers in command positions. This was, and continued to be, an insurmountable challenge for the new commissioner. Policing remains a bit of a closed shop when it comes to inclusion of civilians in the upper echelons and Elliot's ability to manage his managers became an increasingly difficult matter for the entire organization. Also, it became apparent that Elliot's own personal leadership style was not a winning one. He appeared to have serious difficulties with anger management and rapidly became a liability for the organization. In 2011, Elliot was replaced by Bob Paulson, a successful and upwardly mobile officer who presented himself as a confident and no-nonsense leader.
Paulson quickly acknowledged that the RCMP did contain some 'bad apples' that he would like to deal with in order to move forward on the issue of bullying and harassment. However, beyond the compromised orchards that appeared to exist, particularly in British Columbia, it remained apparent that both structural and individual (i.e., 'agency') transformations would be required to deal with the bullying crisis in the RCMP.
McKay points out that policy changes that include anti-bullying provisions are useful but they may only offer the illusion that problems in the workplace are actually being addressed. This is a valuable observation that applies in several key areas of modern Canadian policing, including: excessive use of force, racial profiling, and police corruption. Fundamentally, the existing (and perhaps unavoidable) asymmetry of power within police organizations presents a challenge for police leaders and police employees alike.
The author suggests that unionization may be a possible avenue for positive change within the RCMP. This is an area that surfaces with considerable regularity when difficulties and disasters arise in this organization. I remain unconvinced that the movement to a conventional unionized environment would benefit the RCMP or the Canadian public. Research could assist in this area if it could be demonstrated that other Canadian police services which do have active police associations (i.e., unions) are significantly more effective at pinpointing, preventing, and punishing instances of bullying and harassment. Presently, there is not a strong body of literature in this area to offer that demonstration. Also, police unions do not by nature function to transform the prevailing police culture (or, more accurately, the variety of sub-cultures that thrive in police departments). Their overriding goal is to advance the well-being of their members from a financial and workplace health and safety perspective. It remains to be seen if workplace bullying is firmly lodged in the list of bargaining concerns being pursued by police union executives. Finally, another area that McKay does not take into account in her treatment of workplace bullying, is the often unbridgeable divide between uniform officers and civilian members within Canada's police organizations. The media has been focussed upon the many cases of bullying of RCMP officers. However, the public rarely gets a glimpse into instances where civilian members of the RCMP may have suffered bullying and/or harassment from supervisors, police managers, and commissionerd officers. Clearly, if sworn officers, such as Catherine Galliford with all of their status, training and legal authority are fearful about making official complaints it stands to reason that civilian employees who lack these resources would be profoundly relunctant to raise concerns about bullying and harassment.
McKay offers the following suggestions for improving the manner in which the RCMP deals with workplace bullying:
The study of police organizations certainly benefits when academics from a wide range of disciplines turn their attention to the challenges associated with these highly important public institutions. McKay brings a perspective derived from her background in organizational theory, business, environmental sustainability and strategy to bear on the particular issue of workplace bullying. This treatment draws upon the literature associated with an interdisciplinary approach and widens the scope of conventional police studies. However, what this particular topic calls for is something that has been generally lacking, or even absent, from recent Canadian academic research on policing; serious, sustained and substantial ethnographic examination of the real-world workings of police services, including the RCMP. What is called for is more embedded research by competent academics who can gain entry into the working world of police organizations in order to study a whole host of questions that will ultimately lead to better policing, more effective policy, and improved public service in the realm of public safety.
McKay, Ruth B. (2014). Confronting workplace bullying: agency and structure in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Administration & Society, 46(5), 548-572. doi: 10.1177/0095399713509245
The author is a member of faculty at the Sprott School of Business, Carleton University in Ottawa, ON.
Ruth B. McKay
She begins with a general observation that an organization's ability to come to grips with the challenge of workplace bullying must begin with simple awareness. This, of course, is not always a simple matter as the hierarchical nature of most organizations, including police services, often serves as an impediment to real awareness of this problem. Change may not immediately flow from awareness alone since formal responses must be put in place to actually grapple with the climate that creates the conditions for bullying to take place within the organization. McKay's paper sets out to consider the impacts of agency (defined as individual influence) and structure (defined as organizational forces) in the context of workplace bullying. The author places her focus on the RCMP as an important case study in the area of bullying.
All organizations require both formal and informal means and mechanisms for resolving conflict, settling differences and advancing the goals and objectives established for their mission and mandate. Police organizations, in Canada and elsewhere, continue to be hierarchical, rank-ordered, rule-bound entities that retain militaristic elements, including command-and-control, use of deadly force, and high levels of internal discipline. Also, although this is not given consideration in McKay's treatment, there is a broad margin for individual police officer discretion that flows directly to the lowest ranks (i.e., constable) within these organizations. Therefore, bullying, as an authoritative approach to the settling of differences of opinion is something that often occurs within the context of modern policing. It is also something that international research has discerned in many other public organizations.
Bureaucracies place a high priority on hierarchy and give considerable power to managers and supervisors in order to advance whatever 'business' they are engaged in conducting. The core functions of Canadian policing typically include: crime prevention, emergency response, law enforcement, public order maintenance, and assistance to victims. Most, if not all, of these core functions require quick, decisive responses that are consistent with the laws, policies, procedures, guidelines and standards established in any given jurisdiction. However, police officers must be able to act with significant speed in circumstances that do not allow for long deliberation, speculation or contemplation. Accordingly, front-line officers exercise discretion in the widest range of operational areas and this 'gift' of discretion flows up the chain-of-command in all police organizations.
McKay, while not addressing the complicating aspects that necessarily attach to police discretion, does usefully discern three sets of factors that play a key role in the matter of workplace bullying, namely: individual; social, and organizational factors. Each of these factors may be viewed as contributing to, or offering protection from, the occurrence of bullying within police services. The author's interest in the RCMP has clearly been triggered by the prevalence and persistence of this matter over the last several years:
The seemingly systemic nature of bullying and harassment and the inability of RCMP management to easily and effectively address the problem can be linked to strong structural influences within a bureacracy. (p. 550)
McKay mentions several specfic instances of workplace bullying within the RCMP that symbolize the nature of this organizational challenge. In 2006 Constable Paul Carty raised concerns about bullying behaviour by one of his supervisors and found that his complaints were not being addressed with any degree of seriousness. Complicating matters was the fact that the bullying actually intensified following Carty's complaints and produced conditions in the workplace which became intolerable.
A former BC RCMP officer, Nancy Sulz was awarded damages in the amount of $950,000.00 for harassment by a superior officer. In 2011 the case of Corporal Catherine Galliford generated a considerable amount of public attention given this officer's extremely high profile as a spokesperson for the RCMP. In 2012, Galliford launched a lawsuit against Canada's Attorney General, the British Columbia's Justice Minister, three RCMP officers, a civilian RCMP doctor, and a Vancouver PD officer. Over the course of sixteen years, Galliford's lawsuit claimed that she was sexually assaulted, harassed and bullied.
Janet Merlo
Within the context of this gathering storm of concern about workplace bullying in the RCMP, the Commissioner for Public Complaints Against the RCMP commenced a review of 718 harassment complaints. The Commissioner's findings basically supported the view that internal bullying was indeed a problem for the RCMP.
McKay turns some attention to the leadership issues that pertain to the challenge of workplace bullying and harassment. Certainly, the leadership of former RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli may be viewed as a watershed moment in this organization's life. Zaccardelli, who was prompted to resign his position following revelations about his mismanagement, autocratic and insensitive behaviour, became a symbol for much that was wrong, or dysfunctional, within the RCMP. Following several waves of review, beginning with David Brown's independent examination of the pension fund scandal within the RCMP, a real window of opportunity opened up for reform and change within this police service. Along with my colleague, Christopher Murphy, I have traced some of the management and leadership challenges within the RCMP as part of the Task Force on Governance & Cultural Change in the RCMP in 2007.
However, not all windows of opportunity are opened with the clarity of enlightenment. So, when Zaccardelli left a vacuum in the leadership of the RCMP, the Harper Government made the serious error of filling that gap with a most unfortunate choice for Commissioner. William Elliot had a long career as a civil servant in areas that operated in proximity to the law enforcement mandate of the RCMP. However, as a civilian, Elliot was never fully embraced by the senior officers in command positions. This was, and continued to be, an insurmountable challenge for the new commissioner. Policing remains a bit of a closed shop when it comes to inclusion of civilians in the upper echelons and Elliot's ability to manage his managers became an increasingly difficult matter for the entire organization. Also, it became apparent that Elliot's own personal leadership style was not a winning one. He appeared to have serious difficulties with anger management and rapidly became a liability for the organization. In 2011, Elliot was replaced by Bob Paulson, a successful and upwardly mobile officer who presented himself as a confident and no-nonsense leader.
Paulson quickly acknowledged that the RCMP did contain some 'bad apples' that he would like to deal with in order to move forward on the issue of bullying and harassment. However, beyond the compromised orchards that appeared to exist, particularly in British Columbia, it remained apparent that both structural and individual (i.e., 'agency') transformations would be required to deal with the bullying crisis in the RCMP.
McKay points out that policy changes that include anti-bullying provisions are useful but they may only offer the illusion that problems in the workplace are actually being addressed. This is a valuable observation that applies in several key areas of modern Canadian policing, including: excessive use of force, racial profiling, and police corruption. Fundamentally, the existing (and perhaps unavoidable) asymmetry of power within police organizations presents a challenge for police leaders and police employees alike.
The author suggests that unionization may be a possible avenue for positive change within the RCMP. This is an area that surfaces with considerable regularity when difficulties and disasters arise in this organization. I remain unconvinced that the movement to a conventional unionized environment would benefit the RCMP or the Canadian public. Research could assist in this area if it could be demonstrated that other Canadian police services which do have active police associations (i.e., unions) are significantly more effective at pinpointing, preventing, and punishing instances of bullying and harassment. Presently, there is not a strong body of literature in this area to offer that demonstration. Also, police unions do not by nature function to transform the prevailing police culture (or, more accurately, the variety of sub-cultures that thrive in police departments). Their overriding goal is to advance the well-being of their members from a financial and workplace health and safety perspective. It remains to be seen if workplace bullying is firmly lodged in the list of bargaining concerns being pursued by police union executives. Finally, another area that McKay does not take into account in her treatment of workplace bullying, is the often unbridgeable divide between uniform officers and civilian members within Canada's police organizations. The media has been focussed upon the many cases of bullying of RCMP officers. However, the public rarely gets a glimpse into instances where civilian members of the RCMP may have suffered bullying and/or harassment from supervisors, police managers, and commissionerd officers. Clearly, if sworn officers, such as Catherine Galliford with all of their status, training and legal authority are fearful about making official complaints it stands to reason that civilian employees who lack these resources would be profoundly relunctant to raise concerns about bullying and harassment.
McKay offers the following suggestions for improving the manner in which the RCMP deals with workplace bullying:
- Identify causes of workplace bullying (including the personal, social and organizational elements). This may be advanced through the use of surveys which posed carefully constructed behavioural questions.
- Change the RCMP culture to improve capacity for 'agency' (i.e., personal efficacy).
- Include interpersonal behaviour, workplace bullying and harassment as key elements of organizational strategy.
- Include employee behaviour as a component of performance evaluations.
- Enhance employee-based supports that may assist those who experience bullying and/or harassment (over and above unionization).
The study of police organizations certainly benefits when academics from a wide range of disciplines turn their attention to the challenges associated with these highly important public institutions. McKay brings a perspective derived from her background in organizational theory, business, environmental sustainability and strategy to bear on the particular issue of workplace bullying. This treatment draws upon the literature associated with an interdisciplinary approach and widens the scope of conventional police studies. However, what this particular topic calls for is something that has been generally lacking, or even absent, from recent Canadian academic research on policing; serious, sustained and substantial ethnographic examination of the real-world workings of police services, including the RCMP. What is called for is more embedded research by competent academics who can gain entry into the working world of police organizations in order to study a whole host of questions that will ultimately lead to better policing, more effective policy, and improved public service in the realm of public safety.
Tuesday 1 July 2014
Police Officers Who Quit
A recent academic article explores some of the considerations that come into play when a police officer forms the intention to quit their job:
Allisey, Amanda et al. (2014). Testing a model of officer intentions to quit: the mediating effects of job stress and job satisfaction. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 41(6), 751-771. doi: 10.1177/0093854813509987
It comes as no surprise that the process of recruiting, selecting, training, orienting and coaching new police hires is an expensive proposition. This study looks at the experience in the UK where recruit training takes about twenty-four (24) months to complete. Accordingly, it is estimated that this "pre-operational" training costs about (US) $76,471 (47,997 pounds).
As a result of this front-end investment of time and money, it normally takes anywhere from five (5) to ten (10) years for there to be a return on investment for a police recruit.
The authors of this study are concerned to consider two sets of topics:
These are viewed as the 'drivers' of the staff turnover process and the authors hope to arrive at a more detailed understanding of a police officer's quit/stay decisions by testing a model that uses job stress and job satisfaction as mediating variables.
They are also focused on key psychosocial work characteristics (e.g., job demands, job autonomy and support from managers and colleagues), as well as, the social and organizational context (including interpersonal relationships, role clarity, and organizational change).
The assertion that as support, autonomy, role clarity and other [related] conditions increase, police job satisfaction increases is easily accepted and, forgive me, requires little research effort to establish as true.
What is also easily accepted is the observation that policing ranks among the top five (5) most stressful occupations. The extension of this is that there are high levels of mental illness within this occupation. This point has not been lost on contemporary police executives who have been enlisting the professional services of psychologists, psychiatrists and other mental health workers for several decades.
Method
This study is a cross-sectional sample of operational officers from a large, territorial UK police force.
A survey was distributed to eligible officers and 25% of those officers (N=2,026) completed the questionnaire during the first quarter of 2012. The authors removed 'non-operational' officer with a resulting sample size of 1,789 officers.
Study
There is a clear focus in this study on the importance of 'relational working conditions' that involve engagement between and among individuals. The authors note that...
Working conditions such as job autonomy, supervisor support, and role clarity are all amenable to change, and hence studies that can uncover the specific characteristics involved in the turnover process can provide more targeted and actionable avenues for preventing/reducing the costs associated with police turnover.
Allisey, Amanda et al. (2014). Testing a model of officer intentions to quit: the mediating effects of job stress and job satisfaction. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 41(6), 751-771. doi: 10.1177/0093854813509987
It comes as no surprise that the process of recruiting, selecting, training, orienting and coaching new police hires is an expensive proposition. This study looks at the experience in the UK where recruit training takes about twenty-four (24) months to complete. Accordingly, it is estimated that this "pre-operational" training costs about (US) $76,471 (47,997 pounds).
As a result of this front-end investment of time and money, it normally takes anywhere from five (5) to ten (10) years for there to be a return on investment for a police recruit.
The authors of this study are concerned to consider two sets of topics:
- Working conditions -- which includes supervisory support & role clarity; and
- Attitudinal variables -- which includes job satisfaction & organizational commitment
These are viewed as the 'drivers' of the staff turnover process and the authors hope to arrive at a more detailed understanding of a police officer's quit/stay decisions by testing a model that uses job stress and job satisfaction as mediating variables.
They are also focused on key psychosocial work characteristics (e.g., job demands, job autonomy and support from managers and colleagues), as well as, the social and organizational context (including interpersonal relationships, role clarity, and organizational change).
The assertion that as support, autonomy, role clarity and other [related] conditions increase, police job satisfaction increases is easily accepted and, forgive me, requires little research effort to establish as true.
What is also easily accepted is the observation that policing ranks among the top five (5) most stressful occupations. The extension of this is that there are high levels of mental illness within this occupation. This point has not been lost on contemporary police executives who have been enlisting the professional services of psychologists, psychiatrists and other mental health workers for several decades.
Method
This study is a cross-sectional sample of operational officers from a large, territorial UK police force.
A survey was distributed to eligible officers and 25% of those officers (N=2,026) completed the questionnaire during the first quarter of 2012. The authors removed 'non-operational' officer with a resulting sample size of 1,789 officers.
Study
There is a clear focus in this study on the importance of 'relational working conditions' that involve engagement between and among individuals. The authors note that...
Working conditions such as job autonomy, supervisor support, and role clarity are all amenable to change, and hence studies that can uncover the specific characteristics involved in the turnover process can provide more targeted and actionable avenues for preventing/reducing the costs associated with police turnover.
Sunday 8 June 2014
RCMP Shootings in Moncton, NB & Implications
Recent events in Moncton, NB have resulted in the deaths of three RCMP officers out of the Codiac Detachment. The accused in this case is a 24-year-old male who was armed with two rifles and apparently was also carrying a knife. He was at large for about 30 hours at which time police were able to effect an arrest with any further injury or lose of life. The accused was no longer armed at the time of his capture.
What this case represents is akin to the Active Shooter incidents which have become relatively common in the US and other jurisdictions. A recent study by Dr. Peter Blair, Director of Research for Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training and Associate Professor, Texas State University, defines an "active shooter" as:
one or more people killing or attempting to kill multiple people in an area or areas occupied by multiple unrelated individuals.
I shall return to some Dr. Blair's findings in this study shortly, however, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has also studied active shooters quite closely and offer this definition:
...an individual actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a confined and populated area...
What is clear with regard to the shooting of RCMP officers in Moncton is that we witnessed an active shooting event that began, and stayed, a mobile situation.
Many commentators have drawn a comparison between these events and the 2005 ambush and killing of four RCMP officers in Mayerthorpe, AB. Here officers were guarding a grow-op and stolen auto parts in a Quonset hut when they were gunned down by James Roszko (46 years old), who later died of self-inflicted wounds.
In 2006 there was further lose of life for two RCMP officers following their encounter with Curt Dagenais after a car chase which developed from an investigation of domestic violence complaints.
The Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) in Washington, DC had identified active shootings as a critical issue following several events in a number of US jurisdictions, including the 2012 mass shooting in a movie theatre in Aurora, CO and the December 2012 shooting in Newtown, CT at the Sandy Hook Elementary School. In September 2013 an active shooting event in the Washington Navy Yard witnessed 15 people being shot, 12 of them fatally.
Accordingly, PERF organized a Summit on Active Shootings in Washington, DC in February 2013 which included representatives from law enforcement agencies across the country, and one senior police executive from Alberta. One of the highlights of this Summit was the research completed by Dr. Peter Blair which examined 84 active shooting events between 2000 and 2010. It is useful to note that Dr. Blair will be a guest speaker at the 2014 Annual Conference of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police (CACP) being held in Victoria, BC in August.
Blair notes that there was a change in the tactical approach to shooting events following the tragedy in Columbine. It was seen as important to increase the speed of the police response when active shooters are involved in an effort to minimize lose of life. This was a departure from hostage or barricaded person events where time could be an important ally.
The Police Response to Active Shooter Incidents (2014)
Clearly, a fast response is more dangerous for the officers involved and this leads to a need for specialist officers to become engaged earlier in the process. So, contact teams should be comprised of Emergency Response Team (ERT) members or tactical personnel who have a higher level of training, as well as, enhanced weaponry skills.
It is essential to recognize that active shooter events are highly fluid and dynamic. Again, they require officers with high levels of skill in containment and clearing activities combined with special weapons proficiency.
US research indicates that 80% of active shooters stay in one location with approximately 20% of them going mobile.
Blair summarizes these active shooter events as pre-police and post-police circumstances. It is possible that events will occur and the attacker will stop because they have committed suicide or have left the scene. It is also possible that before police arrive, the victims will either shot or subdue the attacker. In the post-police context the attacker may stop, again, by committing suicide or surrendering. Finally, the police may stop the attacker by shooting the attacker or subduing that person.
Research also shows that initial entry by a solo officer is inherently dangerous. Fully one third of the cases that Blair looked at found that solo entry officers were shot by the attacker.
N.B.: It is important to emphasize in the case of active shooters that every event is UNIQUE and therefore it is not possible to have a template of "best practices" that can be applied. There are definitely lessons learned that might be applied in any given circumstance but officers need to be prepared for a host of challenges and difficulties when confronting an active shooter or shooters.
Blair has distilled the research on the 84 cases he examined to create the following list of characteristics for active shooters:
The Incident Commander has a key role to play in these events in areas such as:
Explicitly, the role of the perimeter team is to keep people OUT and to keep suspects IN...
The questions around "suppressive fire" which is really a war tactic were discussed at the Summit. Police executives were of the view that this is a war tactic that doesn't really have a place in law enforcement. However, "directed fire" may be useful in some circumstances if it is feasible.
The Summit highlighted a careful warning against officers "self-dispatching" to an active shooter event. This action may serve to complicate the response rather than assist it and if officers do come to the scene they should immediately go to a staging area where they can be properly assigned, if they are needed.
The attendees at the Summit emphasized that social media should be used extensively to communicate with the public. In the Moncton active shooting incident, the RCMP requested that people NOT use social media to share information regarding the whereabouts of its officers as a safety precaution.
University of Wisconsin police chief, Susan Riseling, has studied a number of active shooter incidents and provided five (5) phases for active shootings:
It will be useful to examine how closely the actions of Jason Bourque align with these five phases.
The New York Police Department (NYPD) Looks at Active Shooters
Beyond the work done by Professor Blair, the NYPD (during Commission Ray Kelly's recent tenure) has published an important and invaluable study of active shooters. This publication is entitled: NYPD Active Shooter Recommendations & Analysis for Risk Mitigation.
This report considers active shooter events from 1966 until December 31, 2010. This resulted in a total of 281 shooting incidents which were located by doing open source research on the Internet. This report includes a series of recommendations that are geared for security personnel in buildings and fall into the following main categories:
It is valuable to know that the age of the active shooting attackers shows a bi-modal pattern with peaks at 15 to 19 (in school settings) and 35 to 44 (in non-school settings).
The eventual resolution of active shooter events followed these lines:
Resolution Number of Incidents Percentage
Applied Force 93 46%
No Applied Force 28 14%
Suicide/Attempted 80 40%
Attacker Fled 1 Less than 1%
TOTAL 202 100%
It is disturbing when one considers the jurisdictional statistics assembled by this NYPD study. While the US is far and away the location for a vast majority of these active shooting events, Canada ranks second in overall instances of this type of occurrence. A sample of this jurisdictional listing is as follows:
Country Active Shooter Incidents
United States 237
Canada 8
Germany 6
Australia 5
Israel 3
United Kingdom 4
Finland 2
India 2
There will be much to consider as the RCMP, and other police organizations in Canada, debrief and come to terms with the events in Moncton, NB last week. There is much to learn in order to prevent, predict, and/or mitigate such active shooter events in the future.
What this case represents is akin to the Active Shooter incidents which have become relatively common in the US and other jurisdictions. A recent study by Dr. Peter Blair, Director of Research for Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training and Associate Professor, Texas State University, defines an "active shooter" as:
one or more people killing or attempting to kill multiple people in an area or areas occupied by multiple unrelated individuals.
I shall return to some Dr. Blair's findings in this study shortly, however, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has also studied active shooters quite closely and offer this definition:
...an individual actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a confined and populated area...
What is clear with regard to the shooting of RCMP officers in Moncton is that we witnessed an active shooting event that began, and stayed, a mobile situation.
Many commentators have drawn a comparison between these events and the 2005 ambush and killing of four RCMP officers in Mayerthorpe, AB. Here officers were guarding a grow-op and stolen auto parts in a Quonset hut when they were gunned down by James Roszko (46 years old), who later died of self-inflicted wounds.
In 2006 there was further lose of life for two RCMP officers following their encounter with Curt Dagenais after a car chase which developed from an investigation of domestic violence complaints.
The Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) in Washington, DC had identified active shootings as a critical issue following several events in a number of US jurisdictions, including the 2012 mass shooting in a movie theatre in Aurora, CO and the December 2012 shooting in Newtown, CT at the Sandy Hook Elementary School. In September 2013 an active shooting event in the Washington Navy Yard witnessed 15 people being shot, 12 of them fatally.
Accordingly, PERF organized a Summit on Active Shootings in Washington, DC in February 2013 which included representatives from law enforcement agencies across the country, and one senior police executive from Alberta. One of the highlights of this Summit was the research completed by Dr. Peter Blair which examined 84 active shooting events between 2000 and 2010. It is useful to note that Dr. Blair will be a guest speaker at the 2014 Annual Conference of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police (CACP) being held in Victoria, BC in August.
Blair notes that there was a change in the tactical approach to shooting events following the tragedy in Columbine. It was seen as important to increase the speed of the police response when active shooters are involved in an effort to minimize lose of life. This was a departure from hostage or barricaded person events where time could be an important ally.
The Police Response to Active Shooter Incidents (2014)
Clearly, a fast response is more dangerous for the officers involved and this leads to a need for specialist officers to become engaged earlier in the process. So, contact teams should be comprised of Emergency Response Team (ERT) members or tactical personnel who have a higher level of training, as well as, enhanced weaponry skills.
It is essential to recognize that active shooter events are highly fluid and dynamic. Again, they require officers with high levels of skill in containment and clearing activities combined with special weapons proficiency.
US research indicates that 80% of active shooters stay in one location with approximately 20% of them going mobile.
Blair summarizes these active shooter events as pre-police and post-police circumstances. It is possible that events will occur and the attacker will stop because they have committed suicide or have left the scene. It is also possible that before police arrive, the victims will either shot or subdue the attacker. In the post-police context the attacker may stop, again, by committing suicide or surrendering. Finally, the police may stop the attacker by shooting the attacker or subduing that person.
Research also shows that initial entry by a solo officer is inherently dangerous. Fully one third of the cases that Blair looked at found that solo entry officers were shot by the attacker.
N.B.: It is important to emphasize in the case of active shooters that every event is UNIQUE and therefore it is not possible to have a template of "best practices" that can be applied. There are definitely lessons learned that might be applied in any given circumstance but officers need to be prepared for a host of challenges and difficulties when confronting an active shooter or shooters.
Blair has distilled the research on the 84 cases he examined to create the following list of characteristics for active shooters:
- they engage more than one target;
- their actions are usually an expression of hatred or rage;
- they are often suicidal with no attempt to hide their identify [this may be an attempt to engage in subject-initiated homicide];
- they have often made plans for their attack; and
- they often choose a location based upon tactical advantage.
The Incident Commander has a key role to play in these events in areas such as:
- assessments;
- radio communications;
- requesting resources;
- gathering intelligence; and
- establishing perimeters.
Explicitly, the role of the perimeter team is to keep people OUT and to keep suspects IN...
The questions around "suppressive fire" which is really a war tactic were discussed at the Summit. Police executives were of the view that this is a war tactic that doesn't really have a place in law enforcement. However, "directed fire" may be useful in some circumstances if it is feasible.
The Summit highlighted a careful warning against officers "self-dispatching" to an active shooter event. This action may serve to complicate the response rather than assist it and if officers do come to the scene they should immediately go to a staging area where they can be properly assigned, if they are needed.
The attendees at the Summit emphasized that social media should be used extensively to communicate with the public. In the Moncton active shooting incident, the RCMP requested that people NOT use social media to share information regarding the whereabouts of its officers as a safety precaution.
University of Wisconsin police chief, Susan Riseling, has studied a number of active shooter incidents and provided five (5) phases for active shootings:
- Fantasy
- Planning
- Preparing
- Practicing
- Implementing (or, the Event Horizon)
It will be useful to examine how closely the actions of Jason Bourque align with these five phases.
The New York Police Department (NYPD) Looks at Active Shooters
Beyond the work done by Professor Blair, the NYPD (during Commission Ray Kelly's recent tenure) has published an important and invaluable study of active shooters. This publication is entitled: NYPD Active Shooter Recommendations & Analysis for Risk Mitigation.
This report considers active shooter events from 1966 until December 31, 2010. This resulted in a total of 281 shooting incidents which were located by doing open source research on the Internet. This report includes a series of recommendations that are geared for security personnel in buildings and fall into the following main categories:
- procedures;
- systems; and
- training
It is valuable to know that the age of the active shooting attackers shows a bi-modal pattern with peaks at 15 to 19 (in school settings) and 35 to 44 (in non-school settings).
The eventual resolution of active shooter events followed these lines:
Resolution Number of Incidents Percentage
Applied Force 93 46%
No Applied Force 28 14%
Suicide/Attempted 80 40%
Attacker Fled 1 Less than 1%
TOTAL 202 100%
It is disturbing when one considers the jurisdictional statistics assembled by this NYPD study. While the US is far and away the location for a vast majority of these active shooting events, Canada ranks second in overall instances of this type of occurrence. A sample of this jurisdictional listing is as follows:
Country Active Shooter Incidents
United States 237
Canada 8
Germany 6
Australia 5
Israel 3
United Kingdom 4
Finland 2
India 2
There will be much to consider as the RCMP, and other police organizations in Canada, debrief and come to terms with the events in Moncton, NB last week. There is much to learn in order to prevent, predict, and/or mitigate such active shooter events in the future.
Thursday 22 May 2014
Police Supervision -- Actualizing HR Policies & Practices
Spotlight on Police Supervision -- Dutch Treat
In the 1990s, when the concept of community policing was continuing to gain a considerable amount of traction in many areas of law enforcement, there was a growing recognition that police supervisors could be pivotal agents of change. These so-called "middle managers" could help ensure that this new approach to the policing enterprise was taken seriously, or, they could easily undermine the initiatives brought forward in pursuit of community policing and shrug when senior executive officers looked for explanations for why these great ideas were not getting support at the front-line.
In 1995, the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), published a useful monograph under the sponsorship of the National Institute of Justice (NIJ). Managing innovation in policing: the untapped potential of the middle manager was an important treatment of this much-neglected (and often maligned) component in the hierarchy of police organizations. Written by William A. Geller (an associate director at PERF) and Guy Swanger, a sergeant with the San Diego Police Department, this publication offers some great ideas about how to engage middle managers in the change agenda for police departments.
Recently, an article in the scholarly literature has been published in a Special Issue of the Review of Public Personnel Administration 34(2) that offers some contemporary views on the role of police supervisors. "Leadership behavior in public organizations: a study of supervisory support by police and medical center middle managers" is written by Eva Knies and Peter Leisink. Its focus is on supervisors the national police and an academic medical centre in the Netherlands. What makes it valuable is the continuing tension that exists involving the intended human resource practices formulated and promulgated at the executive (or corporate) level, the applied rules and policies actually enacted by police supervisors, and the perception (or reception) of those rules by front-line personnel. The gaps are often substantial and significant. One effective way of examining these gaps is to study the role, function, and feelings of middle managers. These individuals are the bridge between the executive and the operational and administrative front-line.
Of course, leadeship behaviour constitutes part of the human resource management (HRM) performance chain. Knies & Leisink rightly note that there are always constraints on the discretionary supports that may be offered by supervisors. Accordingly, they see personal motivation as the most important reason for managers to engage in supportive supervisory behaviour. This study looks at these two sets of middle managers to consider the things that lead them support personnel, as well as, the main antecedents to supportive activity, namely, supportive ability and discretionary 'room' for this support.
The authors begin with a consideration of something referred to in the literature as 'perceived organizational support' (POS). This is an employee's general sense, or belief, that their organization values their individual contribution and cares about their well-being. POS obviously will vary from individual to individual as it resides in a person's own assessment of their organization's valuing behaviour.
By looking at the police in the Netherlands the authors offer an insight into an organization that North American readers rarely find based largely on the language gap. So, it's useful to learn about how supervision in this jurisdiction parallels experience in other police departments.
By considering the work of real managers, Knies & Leisink reveal actual practice in a police organization. The authors remind the reader that competent employees may not make good supervisors. In order to conduct their work, they apply elements of social exchange theory, which deals with the reciprocal arrangements between the organization and employees. This often results in feelings of obligation on the part of the employee which may have significant impacts upon employee behaviour. Furthermore, Knies & Leisink were concerned about looking at a supervisor's voluntary actions rather than those which derive from external obligations (e.g., collective agreements, etc.).
Another dimension of this work that is useful to highlight relates to their AMO framework, which takes into account the following elements:
The research conducted within the Netherlands police organization revealed an imbalance between the importance placed upon supervisory support in HR policy generated by the organization and issued through senior police management and the necessary discretionary scope for providing such support through middle managers. Essentially, Knies & Leisink found that while supervisory support is lauded in policy documents (i.e., on paper) there are real constraints on managers when it comes to delivering the kind of supevisory support required in the field (i.e., in action). Of course, this is not a remarkably surprising finding. It does, however, serve to remind all senior police executives that HR rhetoric is not sufficient to produce an effective workplace.
Making it easier for police supervisors to develop and provide support to their personnel is a key management development challenge. Policing in the Netherlands, as elsewhere, must observe the layers of accountability that include ministers and a range of stakeholders. This requires significant and structured internal control mechanisms. However, there remains a pressing practical need for line managers to be able to employ the full range of their capability aimed at supporting the front-line officers they supervise. No police organization could ever generate policies, procedures, protocols, or practices to cover every contingency that may occur in the world of modern policing. Accordingly, having competent supervisors who know they have "discretionary room" to provide suitable support for their officers is an avenue for tapping into their potential for the improvement of the organization.
In the 1990s, when the concept of community policing was continuing to gain a considerable amount of traction in many areas of law enforcement, there was a growing recognition that police supervisors could be pivotal agents of change. These so-called "middle managers" could help ensure that this new approach to the policing enterprise was taken seriously, or, they could easily undermine the initiatives brought forward in pursuit of community policing and shrug when senior executive officers looked for explanations for why these great ideas were not getting support at the front-line.
In 1995, the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), published a useful monograph under the sponsorship of the National Institute of Justice (NIJ). Managing innovation in policing: the untapped potential of the middle manager was an important treatment of this much-neglected (and often maligned) component in the hierarchy of police organizations. Written by William A. Geller (an associate director at PERF) and Guy Swanger, a sergeant with the San Diego Police Department, this publication offers some great ideas about how to engage middle managers in the change agenda for police departments.
Recently, an article in the scholarly literature has been published in a Special Issue of the Review of Public Personnel Administration 34(2) that offers some contemporary views on the role of police supervisors. "Leadership behavior in public organizations: a study of supervisory support by police and medical center middle managers" is written by Eva Knies and Peter Leisink. Its focus is on supervisors the national police and an academic medical centre in the Netherlands. What makes it valuable is the continuing tension that exists involving the intended human resource practices formulated and promulgated at the executive (or corporate) level, the applied rules and policies actually enacted by police supervisors, and the perception (or reception) of those rules by front-line personnel. The gaps are often substantial and significant. One effective way of examining these gaps is to study the role, function, and feelings of middle managers. These individuals are the bridge between the executive and the operational and administrative front-line.
Of course, leadeship behaviour constitutes part of the human resource management (HRM) performance chain. Knies & Leisink rightly note that there are always constraints on the discretionary supports that may be offered by supervisors. Accordingly, they see personal motivation as the most important reason for managers to engage in supportive supervisory behaviour. This study looks at these two sets of middle managers to consider the things that lead them support personnel, as well as, the main antecedents to supportive activity, namely, supportive ability and discretionary 'room' for this support.
The authors begin with a consideration of something referred to in the literature as 'perceived organizational support' (POS). This is an employee's general sense, or belief, that their organization values their individual contribution and cares about their well-being. POS obviously will vary from individual to individual as it resides in a person's own assessment of their organization's valuing behaviour.
By looking at the police in the Netherlands the authors offer an insight into an organization that North American readers rarely find based largely on the language gap. So, it's useful to learn about how supervision in this jurisdiction parallels experience in other police departments.
By considering the work of real managers, Knies & Leisink reveal actual practice in a police organization. The authors remind the reader that competent employees may not make good supervisors. In order to conduct their work, they apply elements of social exchange theory, which deals with the reciprocal arrangements between the organization and employees. This often results in feelings of obligation on the part of the employee which may have significant impacts upon employee behaviour. Furthermore, Knies & Leisink were concerned about looking at a supervisor's voluntary actions rather than those which derive from external obligations (e.g., collective agreements, etc.).
Another dimension of this work that is useful to highlight relates to their AMO framework, which takes into account the following elements:
- A -- Ability
- M -- Motivation
- O -- Opportunity (to perform)
The research conducted within the Netherlands police organization revealed an imbalance between the importance placed upon supervisory support in HR policy generated by the organization and issued through senior police management and the necessary discretionary scope for providing such support through middle managers. Essentially, Knies & Leisink found that while supervisory support is lauded in policy documents (i.e., on paper) there are real constraints on managers when it comes to delivering the kind of supevisory support required in the field (i.e., in action). Of course, this is not a remarkably surprising finding. It does, however, serve to remind all senior police executives that HR rhetoric is not sufficient to produce an effective workplace.
Making it easier for police supervisors to develop and provide support to their personnel is a key management development challenge. Policing in the Netherlands, as elsewhere, must observe the layers of accountability that include ministers and a range of stakeholders. This requires significant and structured internal control mechanisms. However, there remains a pressing practical need for line managers to be able to employ the full range of their capability aimed at supporting the front-line officers they supervise. No police organization could ever generate policies, procedures, protocols, or practices to cover every contingency that may occur in the world of modern policing. Accordingly, having competent supervisors who know they have "discretionary room" to provide suitable support for their officers is an avenue for tapping into their potential for the improvement of the organization.
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