As professional law enforcement officers, we have the ability to vastly improve the quality of cases we present to a judge or jury.
Simple things we can do at the scene make vast differences to the prosecutor, judge and jury in any criminal case.
Let's look at some simple things we can do to improve our cases.
Technology, Admissions and Professionalism - most officers only begrudgingly use technology and very seldom do they use it to their advantage.
Examples: o We have audio and video recorders which many of us are "forced" to use.
o It's easy to understand why officers resent those intrusions on our life.
o Recorders are, in a sense, a slap-in-the-face to our credibility.
o As a consequence, many officers have such a dislike for tape recorders that they just turn the recorder on and proceed to make a citizen contact as if the recorder wasn't even present.
Officers also have a bad habit of not seeking admissions/confessions when we see the crime ourselves.
We rationalize it by saying we don't need a confession, because after all, we say the crime being committed.
What we don't realize is that jurors always prefer to hear that a suspect confessed to a crime.
It's human nature to want to hear someone admit their wrongdoing before finding them guilty.
We also have a bad habit of uttering less then complimentary terms to crooks once we've placed them under arrest.
Let's look at two hypothetical (although typical) scenarios using an audio tape recorder and let's further make believe that we are jurors reviewing the tapes at trial.
Officer Grizzly is a 25 year veteran who deeply resents having to use a tape recorder.
o He fondly recalls when his word was taken at face value in court over that of a suspect.
o Counting the days toward retirement, he feels that the department's mandatory taping policy is further evidence that the country is going to hell, so he grudgingly obeys department policy and uses his tape recorder, but doesn't like it.
As Officer Grizzly stops a violator for speeding, he turns his recorder on and makes his approach (we jurors can hear his footsteps on the tape).
o When he walks up to the vehicle, he observes that the driver appears very nervous, dropping his wallet out of the window of the vehicle, where it falls to the ground.
Silently, Officer Grizzly picks up the wallet and hands it back to the violator, asking for his license, registration and proof of insurance (we hear only this).
o As Officer Grizzly looks in the interior of the vehicle, he sees what he believes is the corner of a kilo of cocaine peeking out from under the front seat (we don't hear anything about this silent observation).
o He orders the suspect out of the vehicle and arrests him.
Officer Grizzly doesn't talk to the suspect about the speeding violation, because he saw the offense occur.
o He doesn't talk to the suspect at all about the drug violation, because he saw the drugs himself in plain view and doesn't need to get a confession.
Officer Grizzly calls the suspect a "no-good, drug dealing scumbag" at some point during the arrest process (it is an unwritten rule that even if everything else is garbled, we will hear this comment clearly on tape).
At trial, the defense attorney moves for the exclusion of the drugs, stating that Officer Grizzly stopped a violator who acted normally, then ordered him out of the vehicle and placed him under arrest.
o The defense attorney alleges that the officer searched the vehicle illegally after the arrest and once he found drugs, charged his client.
o Further, the attorney alleges that the officer was prejudiced against his client, as evidenced by his derogatory comments during the arrest process.
The tape recording doesn't help to clarify the situation because Officer Grizzly didn't verbalize what he was seeing.
Officer Newby is a rookie officer.
o He never worked in law enforcement without a tape recorder, so he accepts this as a useful tool and doesn't resent it the way Officer Grizzly does.
o Officer Newby has taken the time to learn to use the technology effectively.
As Officer Newby stops the violator for speeding, he activates his tape recorder before he actually exits his vehicle.
o On the tape, Officer Newby records the violator's license plate number, description of the vehicle and anything he observes which he feels is suspicious ( we like this in the jury room, as it places us mentally at the scene of the traffic stop).
As Officer Newby approaches the car, the driver acts very nervous and drops his wallet outside of the vehicle.
o Officer Newby comments on his tape that he has seen this and then asks the driver why he dropped the wallet outside the vehicle.
o When the driver replies that he dropped it because he was nervous, Officer Newby has just received corroboration for the jury of his observations (many jurors take notes when they hear this).
Officer Newby clearly asks the driver to explain the reason he was speeding; was it done on purpose or was it just a moment's inattention? o The driver clearly replies (on tape) that he wouldn't speed on purpose, he just wasn't paying attention.
o This instantly corroborates the officer's initial observations of the illegal activity which prompted him to stop the vehicle, thereby taking this avenue of defense away from the defendant in court (more note taking from jurors).
When Officer Newby observes what he thinks is drug packaging sticking out from under the seat of the vehicle, he asks the driver to step out of the car.
o Once the driver is away from the evidence, Officer Newby shares his observations with the driver, secures him, reads him his rights and asks him to explain the presence of drugs in the vehicle.
When the driver hesitates, Officer Newby (on tape) offers the driver some rationalizations for the drugs being there, such as: "Is that cocaine just for your personal use or were you planning on selling it?" The driver denies planning to sell the drugs and says that the cocaine belongs to his brother, not him.
o This establishes the legal elements of the crime of possession of drugs, as he admits knowing the drugs were in the vehicle (many jurors quit taking notes at this point).
Officer Newby asks the driver if there are other drugs and/or weapons in the vehicle (all of this is on tape).
Throughout the encounter, Officer Newby remains professional in his demeanor toward the suspect.
As Officer Newby's tape is being played in court, the defense attorney listens with the jury and realizes that he can't attack the officer's initial observations of criminal activity (speeding), the officer's observations of suspicious/nervous activity on the part of the suspect (dropping the wallet), the officer's observations of the drugs sticking out from under the seat (suspect admits this), the officer's professionalism (no cussing or derogatory terms) and he can't even say that his client didn't know that the drugs were in the vehicle ( the suspect said the cocaine was his brother's).
IF YOU WERE ON THE JURY, WHICH OFFICER'S TESTIMONY WOULD BE MORE BELIEVABLE AND CARRY MORE WEIGHT? Let's remember something here: in both of the above scenarios, the officers did a great job.
First, they each saw the initial traffic violation and acted upon that observation, which led to the recovery of some illegal drugs and the capture of a "bad guy.
" But now, Officer Grizzly faces allegations that he made a false arrest and illegal search, letting the "ends justify the means" while Officer Newby receives kudos from the prosecutor for making an airtight case.
For those "Officer Grizzlys" out there, I can sympathize with you.
I started in this business in the 1970's and I can remember when my word alone was sufficient in court to convict.
Guess what? Those days are gone and they'll never be back.
We have technology available to us and the public (and legal system) wants us to use it.
So let's embrace it and do our jobs better.
What's important to remember is that by embracing technology, we can make our testimony vastly more effective as an evidentiary tool for prosecution.