Discretion is the quality of speaking or behaving in a certain manner such that an individual can avoid revealing confidential information or causing an offence. Discretion guides the personnel working in various departments on the criminal justice system and other departments dealing with law enforcement. Considering the case of a police officer destroying drugs from a homeless person and warning him never to see him with drugs again was a good use of discretion. Discretion is about the impacts of the decisions made by an individual on the lives of other people 1 . The police officer decided to warn the homeless person never to have drugs again and leave him without punishing him. The homeless person was already having a problem, and it would be worse of the police officer decided to punish him. The punishment would put the homeless person in prison to serve a jail term for a given period or pay a fine. The police officer made an individual assessment of the impacts of the punishment on the person with the problem of being homeless and applied the act of discretion.
Warning the homeless person never to be found with drugs was a chance for the person to redeem himself and struggle with the problem of being homeless. The homeless person will be focused on avoiding drugs knowing that if the officer finds him in future, he would serve a jail term or pay fine. Despite the person being homeless, he would struggle to have a place to live, which will be easier as compared with serving a jail term or paying a fine as well as looking for a place to live 2 . Additionally, the police officer found a few drugs, which would be fair to warn and the person instead of punishing him and affecting his entire life, as he could not afford to pay the fine considering his status of being homeless. The application of discretion by the police officer was good.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Reference List
Schulenberg, J. L., Chenier, A., Buffone, S., and Wojciechowski, C. An application of procedural justice to stakeholder perspectives: examining police legitimacy and public trust in police complaints systems. Policing and society , 27 (7), 2017, pp. 779-796.
