History and Structure of Law
Enforcement
•Briefly describe the jurisdictional limitations of
American law enforcement.
•Trace the origins of American law enforcement.
•Describe the structure of American law
enforcement.
Structure of American Law Enforcement
The US has almost 18,000 public law enforcement
agencies at the federal, state, and local levels of
government. The authority of each agency is
carefully limited by the law (jurisdiction).
Although, tens of thousands of law enforcement
officers at the federal, state, county, and municipal
levels protect life and property and serve the public;
they are employed by government, and/or private
enterprises and their responsibilities are specific and
sometimes unique to the kind of organization that
employees them.
Structure of Law Enforcement
Law enforcement in America is fragmented, locally
controlled, limited in authority, and structurally and
functionally different.
Virtually no two police agencies in America are
structured alike or function in the same way.
These differences lead to the following generalizations:
• The quality of police services varies greatly.
• There is no consensus on professional standards.
• Expenditures vary greatly among communities.
• Obtaining services from the appropriate agency is
confusing.
Municipal Police Departments
If a person knows a law enforcement agent at
all, its probably a local police officer.
Common Statistics of Municipal Departments:
• Most employ fewer than 50 officers.
• Most police officers are white males.
• At least 83 % of departments require only a high
school diploma.
Local Police Duties
4 categories of local police duties:
1. Law Enforcement - investigating a burglary,
arresting a car thief, serving a warrant …
2. Service – taking people to the hospital,
escorting a funeral …
3. Peacekeeping – breaking up a fight, holding
back a crowd at a sporting event …
4. Information Gathering – investigating a missing
child, reporting on dangerous road conditions
PEPPAS
Many academies teach recruits the duties
through PEPPAS:
P – protect life and property
E – enforce the law
P – prevent crime
P – preserve the police
A – arrest violators
S – serve the public
Organization of Police Forces
How a police agency is structured depends on the
size of the agency, degree of specialization, the
philosophy the leadership has chosen, the
political context of the department, & the history
and preferences of a particular community.
Police are organized militarily with regard to
accountability, discipline, rank, dress, and
decorum.
Political Context of Policing
Police department of any size is part of a larger government entity.
*Strong mayor-council: elected mayor appoints chief
*Weak mayor-council: elected council appoints chief
*City Manager: elected council appoints manager to hire chief
*Commission: voters elect board one of which becomes chief
Each form varies in the amount of control citizens have over
municipality leaders, source of the executive authority of the chief of
police, & the degree of insulation a chief has from interference by the
executive head of the city.
Chief Executives: chief of police, director of police and/or commissioner
County Law Enforcement
A substantial portion of law enforcement work in the US is carried out
by sheriffs’ departments. (18% of all law enforcement departments
in the US) Most departments are small with fewer than 25 officers
and most officers are white males (82.9%).
Sheriffs departments perform functions that range from investigation
to supervision of sentenced offenders. They also perform many
civil services for the court and provide courtroom security.
Departments frequently operate the county jail.
Most sheriffs are directly elected and depend on an elected board for
their funding.
State Law Enforcement
Filling the complement of law enforcement
agencies in a particular state are one or more
state law enforcement agencies.
In 2000, 49 primary state law enforcement agencies
had 87,028 employees.
Hawaii has no state police agency and California
Highway Patrol is the largest state law
enforcement agency.
Models of State Law Enforcement
• State police model: Agency and its officers have essentially the
same enforcement powers as local police in the state (Texas
Rangers).
• Highway Patrol Model: Officers focus almost exclusively on
highway traffic safety and other state law enforcement agencies
have more narrow service mandates, for example:
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
Bureaus of Criminal Investigation
State Criminal Identification Services
Forrest, game, and watercraft protection services
Alcoholic beverage control and enforcement
Crime laboratory and criminalist services
Driver’s License examinations
Drug Interdiction Activities
Peace officer training and certification
Problems between local and state
Some tension always seems to exist between
state police agencies and local law
enforcement over legal jurisdiction and
recognition for conducting investigations and
making arrests.
Federal Law Enforcement
Everyone has heard of a few better-known federal law
enforcement agencies.
Three major differences exist between federal law
enforcement and state/local agencies:
1. Federal agencies operate across the entire nation.
2. Federal police agencies do not have peacekeeping or
order maintenance duties.
3. Some federal law enforcement agencies have
extremely narrow jurisdictions.
Federal Law Enforcement Stats
• June 2002, federal agencies employed about 93,000
full time personnel
• 60 % were employed by the four largest agencies:
Immigration and Nationalization, Federal Bureau of
Prisons, US Customs, and FBI
• Annual Budget of $18 billion in 2000
• 85% were men and 15% were women, IRD
employed the largest number of women
• 17% were Hispanic, 12% were Black, 2.5% were
Asian, 1.2% were American Indian (Immigration and
Naturalization had the largest minority percentages)
FLETC
Federal Law Enforcement Training Center is the largest law
enforcement training establishment in the United States. It
provides some or all of the training for a majority of federal
law enforcement agencies.
First opened in DC in 1970 … now its in Glenco, Georgia;
Artesia, New Mexico; Charleston, South Carolina; and
Cheltenham, Maryland
Classroom Instruction ranges from about 8 to 22 weeks for
criminal investigators and from 4 to 26 weeks for patrol
officers. Field training requirements range from 2 weeks to
6 months for patrol and up to 2 years for investigators.