Police Officer

Police Officer

BlueSheepdog

10 Years Experience

Around the Way, FL

Male, 40

Cheating death and fighting communism: that is how a fellow officer once described our job. It was meant to be funny, but as time went on it seemed all too true.

I spent more than ten years in law enforcement, all of it on the street in uniform patrol. I've been a patrol officer, instructor, sergeant and lieutenant.

Do not report crimes here. Nothing here should be considered legal advice. All opinions are my own.

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Last Answer on October 29, 2014

Best Rated

How are officers assigned jobs? Is it just whoever's closest to the action or are skillsets considered?

Asked by Anonymous over 12 years ago

Patrol officers are assigned to zones or beats.  These are specific geographic areas that the officer is responsible for.  A non-emergency call in that zone will be held for the zone officer to handle.  Emergency calls will typically fall to the officer assigned to that zone, or if he/she is unavailable, the next closest unit.  

Certain calls may be held for certain officers.  For example, a department with officers who receive specialized training in dealing with the mentally ill may dispatch one of those officers outside of his or her zone to handle an incident that involves someone who is mentally ill.  

Can an Off Duty Police Officer who is out of his jurisdiction come to my place of residency with my landlord as her witness to serve an eviction without giving me his full name and Police Prescient he is offiliated with??

Asked by Melissa over 12 years ago

If the officer is acting as a police officer and provided his or her name (Officer Smith or whatever) and that the department he or she works for, that may be all of the information he or she is obligated to provide.  A specific zone, precinct, or other information may not be required.

If the officer is acting as an employee of the property owner, and not as a representative of the city/county/whatever, he or she may not even need to provide that.

So then how should I go about getting experience for police k9 training? Where do the police officers who train the dogs get their experience from?

Asked by Alessandro Ferri over 11 years ago

Working the road. Where else?

Until you've had to make decisions on when to deploy a dog in a real-life, volatile use-of-force situation, and then justify those decisions to your chain of command, an internal affairs investigation, a city attorney and (probably) a court, how exactly do you figure you will have the credibility to tell others what they need to know?

It's one thing to know the law from reading a book or attending a training class, its another to apply it appropriately in the field. It is a bit like training in the dojo vs. a street fight. Or perhaps a better analogy is the guy sitting on the couch watching a football game who has never stepped onto the field, yet thinks he knows better than the players. 

Reality is a harsh, unforgiving mistress. Until you've danced with her a while, you simply don't know what you don't know.

Is this a possible scenario, a young man gets pulled over and pot is found. He is arrested and taken in where he is persuaded to give up dealer names and then will be set free, no arrest.

Asked by ma almost 13 years ago

Its possible, but how valuable is that information to the officers?  Not terribly valuable probably.  The cops either know the names already, or have no way of knowing if the subject being arrested is giving them good info.

A more likely scenario would be the subject provides the officers with very detailed information on the dealers and is given a court date for some time in the future in exchange.  Then the officers can determine if the information is good.  If so, the officers can appear in court an explain to the judge that the subject was cooperative in an investigation and request favorable treatment of the informant.

In your experience, does offering a monetary award for info leading to finding a missing person or a wanted suspect actually work?

Asked by Pivot almost 12 years ago

Sometimes.

most ppl where im from become products of their environment when i was younger i did some bad things. i sold drugs for a week but i felt so bad i quit, then joined the military to atone. will my past destroy any chances i have as a police officer...

Asked by Young. over 12 years ago

Maybe not.  If you have been convicted of certain crimes, there isn't much you can do about that.  However, without any prior arrests or convictions, you may still be able to obtain employment as a police officer.  A solid military record with an honorable discharge (staying in the active reserves is even better) will go a long way to showing you aren't the person that you may have been in the past.  The longer the time space between criminal activity and when you apply is better.  Also, holding a secret clearance shows you have previously passed a background check, which helps.

If you're traveling in the fast lane of a 3 lane thru-way, and you're passed on the right hand side by a vehicle in the middle lane. The vehicle that passed brakes hard after noticing a trooper, And you get pulled over and ticketed, What can you do?

Asked by Hilliary M. about 13 years ago

You didn't mention if you were speeding.  I'd suggest paying the ticket if you were.  Other people were speeding worse than I was doesn't generate much sympathy from a judge. 

If the trooper was using laser, then you were definitely the person he measured going whatever speed was on the citation.  If he/she was using radar, there could be some doubt that an experienced traffic attorney could bring up in trial.

The above is not legal advice, of course.

Did you know that speed is the #1 contributing factor to traffic fatalities?