5 Things To Know Before Becoming A Police Officer
The purpose of this article is to educate not only people who are considering a career in Law Enforcement, but also those who need a better understanding of a police structure and its operation, especially in these trying times. As a former Police Officer for nearly a decade, I finally left voluntarily in 2022, having worked at three different departments ranging from a rural community to a suburb and ending at a large city. All of my experience was in patrol, with an additional assignment of training new officers, known as a Field Training Officer. At this point, you’re probably thinking I’m just an old, salty, burnt out cop who is venting his frustrations. But that is not the case, well maybe a little. In all seriousness, I am not trying to discourage you from a career in Law Enforcement, but I do want to prepare you for the challenge ahead. Also to remind you that other options exist like becoming a City Council Member/Administrator, Mayor, Governor, District Attorney, Lawyer, etc. With all the politics involved, you’ll soon understand later why I mentioned those other career options. If you really want to make a change in the world or within your community, this article will make you think long and hard about what path to choose for yourself. Here are the five things that are unavoidable when entering a career in Law Enforcement:
1. No Camaraderie / Zero Work Ethic
One of the first questions you’ll be asked in the Academy is “why do you want to be a police officer?”. Most people reply by stating, “I want to help people”. Got to love that response, but more on that later. When I was asked that question my response was “I want to be a part of a family” and to “Experience something new everyday”. I can tell you this, the brotherhood, camaraderie, family or whatever you call it, does not exist and the new experience everyday becomes routine and dreadful. Now with that being said, you will feel some camaraderie during your time in the Police Academy, as you meet new people with the same goals in mind, or someone that will be there by your side as you struggle on that two mile run. However that brotherhood will soon fade away as you graduate and everyone moves to different shifts, beats, or divisions. Even after completing your field training, you’ll still be oblivious to the toxic work environment because all you can think about is getting your first arrest and/or foot pursuit. Which is great, but you can only avoid the bad behavior for so long before it starts to affect you.
I’ll provide you with an example. To keep it simple, let’s say you work in District 1 and you have a co-worker named Joe, who borders you and is in District 2. You’ve been handling calls in your district all evening and are up to your neck in paperwork. But Joe on the other hand has had a quiet evening in his district. It’s less than an hour until you both get off and you are returning to the station to finish up paperwork. But before you can do that, dispatch sends you to an emergency call in Joe’s district and the dispatcher is looking for another unit in a different division to back you up. But where is ole Joe! You glance down at your MTD (Mobile Data Terminal) to see what units are available to assist you and notice that Joe has placed himself on a business check at the gas station. As you drive toward the call in his district, you pass the gas station that Joe is at and see him hanging out inside, drinking his big gulp, chatting with the clerk. You continue on as Joe soon returns to his vehicle, hears over the radio that you’ve gone on scene to that call in his district and instead of clearing himself and going to that call to handle it, he remains on his business check, returns to the station and goes home on time. Meanwhile, you’re stuck on that call, which becomes an arrest, followed by any summonses and/or citations you are required to write, written statements you have to obtain from the victim and/or witnesses, photographs of any injuries or evidence. Followed by the booking process, then all the reports, on top of any previous paperwork that you had to do, prior to getting stuck with Joe’s call. This is what we call district integrity, which is almost non existent in Law Enforcement today. To make matters worse, let’s say you happened to be off that day and another dud like Joe was covering your district with that same scenario in play. That dud, we will name Bob, would go over the radio and inform dispatch that he is on a “special assignment” currently and forgot to inform dispatch. Therefore he too is unable to respond to that call. Now dispatch is looking for two officers in other divisions to take the priority call. So why do Police Departments really have response time issues, well there’s your answer. Now with that scenario, which is an everyday occurrence at your local police department, not only were you inconvenienced by Joe’s unethical behavior, but now other officers from other divisions are being abused. It’s a vicious style that never ends and as a result you’re left doing twice the work. Here is a better one. Let’s say you have two shifts at your division, mornings (7am to 7pm) and nights (7pm to 7am) and each shift has to have at least 10 officers. But since you’re at such low staffing and the senior officers already requested the holidays off along with people’s regular days off, you are down at minimal staffing or below 10 officers consistently. And then Thanksgiving rolls around, the schedule shows ten of you, but as you’re sitting in roll call waiting for your shift to start, there is only you and five other cops. Your Sergeant comes into roll call and announces that Joe and four other dead beats, called in sick. Wow what a coincidence, sick on Thanksgiving Day. And to make matters worse, your supervisor announces that the next shift is short as well. Therefore, we will have to cover part of the next shift too. Your 12 hour shift now became a 16 hour one, so much for your Thanksgiving. Expect that to happen for every holiday, or any special event for that matter. Still seeing a brotherhood here?
2. Mandatory Overtime
If you think overtime is a choice, you’re wrong. You will work it whether you like it or not. What most people fail to understand is that Police Officers are exempt from certain Labor Laws that protect citizens in non emergency, regular jobs. An example is number the of hours worked in a day, or within a twenty-four hour period. On many occasions I’ve been forced to work from six in the morning to six in the evening and instructed to return four hours early for my next shift. Therefore I would need to return at two in the morning, less than an eight hour break between shifts. And if you think other officers have sympathy for you, think again. They are more than likely working overtime too. And since you’re at minimal staffing, you can bet your hind quarters you’ll be answering calls outside of your district and doing twice the amount of work. Nevermind the fact that you are sleep deprived and a constant target for someone looking to end your life. I worked with a quality patrolman, who transferred from Atlanta PD. I asked how things were done there at the patrol level. He informed him that officers did not get breaks and were call to call. Even if you were on a call, like documenting and entering evidence into the property room, dispatch would start sending you to the next call for service, regardless of what you were currently doing. And when it came to the end of your shift and you still had tasks to complete, you were not paid overtime. Instead, you were given comp time. If you were to max out your comp time, usually 300 hours, the department would start forcing you to take days off, instead of paying you more money.
3. Too Many Chiefs, Not Enough Indians
And then there are your super cops. The guys and gals that think they’re being followed by a camera crew and trying to constantly impress someone. So much that they wont even go to calls for service. For example, they’ll be dispatched to a domestic and on their way to the call, they’ll see a car leaving a known drug house. So instead of helping a person involved in that domestic that may be getting their face punched in, this super cop decides to stop that vehicle leaving the dope house, in hopes of getting that big drug bust of the year. As a result, an outside district car is dispatched to the domestic, who is much further away. While that outside unit responds to that domestic, you watch your partner attempt to scrape up tiny particles of potential Methamphetamine off of the driver’s floorboard, hoping it’ll weigh a gram.
Before you ask, yes these are real scenarios, I am not kidding. You’re probably thinking to yourself, well shouldn’t a supervisor see and do something about this behavior? And no, he or she couldn’t care less. Not to mention, your Sergeant isn’t listening to every radio transmission, although they should be, and they have things to do as well. Like review reports, make changes to the schedule, take complaints, issue discipline and so on. But while you deal with shift mates that think they’re part of a task force and don’t need to answer calls, there is something much bigger going on above your pay grade. The popular belief in society is that the Chief of that particular Police Department is in charge and can make the necessary changes, WRONG!
Most Police Chiefs have almost no authority or decision making abilities anymore. This structure can be hard to teach, but understand this, everything is a business, even policing. With a Police Department, you have City Council Members, the City Administrator, Mayor, the District Attorney and even Police Unions now. Talk about too many Chiefs. It is a political nightmare that involves making sure money is being made and allocated properly, to how cops police the streets, which is mainly decided by City Council and the administrator, people who have more than likely never faced real adversity in their lives. Meanwhile, the District Attorney is throwing out felony cases due to poor police work and lack of evidence in investigative reports. To the union, making you “pay dues” every paycheck for nothing and promising protection that you don’t need as long as you do your job correctly. Then representing guys like Joe, who got fired for sleeping in his patrol car and dodging calls in his district. Great, we got Joe back on the shift, wonder where he’ll be caught sleeping on the job this time. Remember its a business and you’ll often find yourself in horrible situations, like being on a call with a mother and her three children. The mother has outstanding warrants for unpaid traffic tickets that exceed thousands of dollars. You would prefer to advise and release her on said warrants so she can care for her children, but the City needs that money and per policy, you are to contact and get approval from your supervisor on releasing her. But your Sergeant says no, arrest her. Now you have to make arrangements for her children and hope they do not have to go into police protective custody. A babysitter or a Debt Collector? Well guess what, you’re both. Having fun yet?
4. Everything is a Liability
Now we make our way to the liability of the job. From being sued for placing handcuffs on someone incorrectly, to a Sergeant being fired for reprimanding a patrolman, like Joe. Remember when I said that Sergeants couldn’t care less about poor patrol methods, well this is part of the reason as well. Your supervisor is afraid that if he or she were to discipline an officer for something reasonable, like a scenario discussed earlier, they’ll be targeted as harassing that officer based on their gender, race, sexual orientation, etc. Yes, even cops are quick to play the harassment card. You should not be surprised, it’s built into our society now, a common mentality that is ultimately destroying our country. Therefore, Sergeants have backed off from correcting and fixing bad police habits. As a cop, you are looked at as the person with all of the answers, who cannot make a mistake. Moreover, there are people out there looking to capitalize on you making a mistake, it is an easy payday. As soon as you place handcuffs on someone, to them now having a panic attack and demanding to go to the hospital, you better believe that you’ll be making a trip with your arrestee to that warm hospital cot where you’ll sit bed side a watch your arrestee kick back, eat a nice meal and get everything just shy of a massage before you take him or her to jail. All to avoid liability. No, the jail nurse will not be enough. This is just a fraction of potential liabilities officers face day to day, not to mention the number of unfounded complaints that come in from Internal Affairs or the lawsuit settlements that citizens get for mistakes that officers make on calls. And if you think you cannot personally be sued, well you’re wrong again. Many times I have seen officers have liens placed on their property from a complainant. That is a nightmare by itself.
5. No Promotion in Sight
So you took the bait. You attended a police recruitment session where they displayed all of the awesome opportunities like becoming a helicopter pilot, K9 handler, SWAT operator, Task Force Officer and so on. As I am typing this I can’t help but laugh. I mean, I shouldn’t knock the hustle and pitch strategy, after all it worked on me. I was shown cool videos of guys in high speed pursuits, chasing people on foot, repelling from a rope and more. Sadly the truth is, you’ll more than likely never do any of those things, or will you get into any of those positions. I say that because the people that are currently in those positions are riding that spot out to retirement, trust me they will not be coming back to patrol. And even if they leave and that spot opens up, there is already someone prepped for that position and it isn’t you. It’s a buddy-buddy system where favoritism is red hot. Meaning the most unqualified person will more than likely get the position. Remember the liability section, it plays a huge role here as well. A position like a SWAT operator, largely male dominated. A spot opens up for SWAT operator with several applicants, one of them is a female, with no military experience, very little patrol exposure, not physically fit and no experience handling high powered rifles. But because the Department could be deemed sexist, who do you think gets the spot. You think a Police Union will help, nope. Most unions base everything off of seniority, so Joe, that burnt out deadbeat patrolmen we’ve been talking about, would get that SWAT position, over a decorated four year patrolman who was a Navy Seal prior to his police career. Lastly, most agencies are so understaffed, that promotions do not even exist and promotional positions are being abolished.
This is just an entry into what you can expect in a job as a police officer. And while it can be rewarding, the ego driven environment will always over power doing the right thing regardless if you want to or not. Too many officer’s fall into feeding their ego and doing what they want to do, instead of staying in their lane and remembering how they answered that simple question “Why do you want to be a police officer?” So helping people is few and far between these days in the world of Law Enforcement.
