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Associate Editor
Former associate editor of Police Magazine and a retired patrol supervisor and investigator with the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department, Sgt. Dean Scoville has received multiple awards for government service. He was the author of Shots Fired, Police Magazine's monthly column examining officer-involved shootings as experienced by the officers themselves.
Interviewing a child is in some ways very similar to interviewing any crime victim but, in some ways, it's very different. The first hurdle is to get the child to open up.
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At 75, Joe Arpaio is serving his fourth term as sheriff of Maricopa County, Ariz. It's a job he's held for 15 years, much to the delight of the voting population in the Phoenix area and much to the dismay of politically correct, civil liberties advocates who characterize his policies as cruel and the man himself as a dangerous dinosaur.
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Friendly fire. Erratic driving. Improper medical diagnoses. These are but a few officer-involved errors that have resulted in deaths of innocents. That isn't to say that we aren't conscientious professionals. But we do make mistakes.
Read More →Here is a common scene: Cop handcuffs suspect and places him in the backseat of a waiting patrol car. In the movies, this is usually performed with a dramatic flourish punctuated by a Miranda warning. In real life, this is sometimes punctuated by tragedy.
Read More →How often do we find ourselves faced with an off-duty situation that would normally require our direct and immediate intervention if we were functioning in an on-duty capacity? Hopefully, not very often. But should we find ourselves in such a position, the extent to which we have planned for it ahead of time can optimize our chances for coming out ahead.
Read More →I NEED HELP, RIGHT AWAY!!! I’M IN A FIGHT!! GET ME ASSISTANCE, RIGHT NOW!! HELP!!” How would you react to hearing this impassioned plea over the radio? One deputy who'd been off training for only a few months felt that the tone of the broadcast was so emergent that it obligated him to respond code 3 to assist. As he did, he drove 80 mph through a red light and broadsided another vehicle.
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Sitting there, Hammond became dully aware of banging emanating from elsewhere in the mall. He thought it odd that mall construction should be taking place at such an hour. But as he neared the center of the mall, he looked down to his left from the second-floor walkway. That’s when he saw bloodied bodies lying on the ground below.
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There are many motivations for stealing cars. Some are taken by kids for so-called “joyrides.” Others are shipped to foreign countries and resold or chopped into parts. And more and more often, stolen cars are used to facilitate other crimes, including burglaries, robberies, assaults, and the transportation of narcotics and smuggled immigrants.
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Most officers are conscientious about wearing a protective vest. Many of you are similarly vigilant about having disposable gloves available. But most of you don’t give patrol gloves a second thought. It’s time that you did.
Read More →Few dates have marked the American psyche like 9/11/01. And if nothing else had transpired that day, Seth Dawson would have had more than enough reason to remember it. But before that terrible Tuesday would end, Dawson, a Santa Clara County (Calif.) Sheriff’s Deputy, would have a very personal reason to remember that date in addition to the 9/11 atrocity.
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