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.
Disposable restraints tend to be lighter and more compact than metal chain or hinged handcuffs. Depending on policy, an officer may choose to use them instead of traditional handcuffs for the weight and space savings. Additionally, they can be used in a mass arrest situation since more of them can be carried by each officer.
There is a huge difference between being detained and arrested. If you have been arrested, you are being charged with a specific crime and supported by probable cause. If you are being detained, officers have established reasonable, articulable suspicion that you may have committed a crime and they are now investigating to see if a crime has been committed.
You can probably still enter an academy, but it will be difficult to get a department to hire you. Three speeding citations and an at-fault accident is a fairly significant indicator of poor driving. Few agencies would want to put an officer into a patrol car for 40+ hours a week and expose themselves to the potential liability of his or her foreseeable bad driving.
As time passes, the citations become less of a problem for getting hired. For example, two years since the last citation looks like you have improved your driving. Five years looks even better. Different departments will have different guidelines based on the agency's risk tolerance.
In general, a police officer can use that force which is reasonable to defend himself or another, to prevent a crime or to detain a subject. Refer to http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=490&invol=386 and http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=471&invol=1 as a starting point for this body of work.
It depends on the state's laws. Some states yes, others no. Additionally, red light cameras typically operate under a different set of laws in each state. The rules for mailing tickets may be substantially different from on view violaions observed by a police officer. So, you may or may not get a ticket mailed to you. I really dont know. Call the police department in question if it is really bothering you.
Bouncer
How often would you find yourself in real danger?
Couples Therapist
Does a therapist aim to "fix" the client, or just treat the client indefinitely?
Special Education Teacher
Should special-needs students be separated from other students?
When I did the job for 8-12 hours a day, I had no interest in watching more of it on the tv.
Besides, the way the editors cut the reality shows like Cops up to make them fit between commercials is not realistic. You only see a fraction of a case, say 10 minutes of something that took the officers hourse to resolve. It might be exciting, but it builds a very unrealistic expecation in the public.
Oh, and about 95% of what you see in CSI is b.s. I can't tell you how many times I had someone tell me to do something impossible that they saw in that show.
Call your local police department and ask for their assistance. They will know what to do.
There are a lot of good aspects to being a police officer. If you are interested in the job, I highly recommend doing a ride-along with a few different departments and see what the job is like.
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