Preliminary investigations are essential in community policing. The preliminary investigations' primary objective is to ascertain whether a crime or an offense was committed, find the individuals responsible, and collect evidence to facilitate legal proceedings and further investigations. There are five steps involved in preliminary investigations. The first step is verification of crime occurrence (Crowl, 2017). The police start by verifying that the reported crime or offense happened. After confirmation of the occurrence of a crime, the second step involves identifying the scene of a crime, the time the crime occurred, and the crime victims. These details are essential in preparing for legal proceedings. The third step is identifying solvability factors. In this step, the police agents aim to access information from crime witnesses and seek knowledge of the suspect's details, such as the name, their location, and other information that can be used to identify the victim. The fourth step is the communication of crime circumstances. Communication is essential in investigation processes. The final step is the identification of the completed and uncompleted tasks in the investigation of the crime. Community policing has had a significant impact on the nature of investigations in the United States. One way community policing has changed the nature of the investigation is by increasing people's engagements. The members of the community are more conversant with the nature of community policing and community policing activities. In community policing, investigations are more people-centered (Crowl, 2017). Community policing uses agency resources to improve relations with the community. This creates a good relationship between the police and community members. During investigations, community members volunteer to act as witnesses in criminal investigations. Community policing has made investigation processes more sustainable. Effective leadership in community policing offers an opportunity for increased transparency, accountability, and compliance. Before community policing was adopted, procedural justice faced many inconsistencies and limitations of transparency in investigations. The evolution of community poling helped to increase transparency and accountability in investigations. The other critical aspect is compliance. Community policing enhanced compliance during criminal investigations. Undercover policing in the United States has played a significant role in combating crime. There are several social problems created by undercover police work. The increase hinders efforts of increasing the coverage of undercover policing across national borders in the internationalization of crime (Murphy, 2020). Any efforts to expand coverage of undercover policing require intensive collaboration with law enforcers in other countries. Countries across the world vary in attitudes and beliefs towards undercover policing. Some countries do not recognize the legitimacy of undercover police (Murphy, 2020). The other social problem is deception versus coercion. Many people perceive the police's conventional methods as deploying coercive power and thus a necessary evil. The use of coercion resulted in the infringement of people's liberties. The undercover police work deploys deception rather than the coercive approach. Crime prevention versus detection is another issue of concern. Both the undercover police and the traditional police face a choice of crime detection and crime prevention. The traditional supply reduction strategies have not been effective in reducing crime in drugs. The supply reduction strategies aimed to reduce the supply of drugs among potential drug users. The supply reduction strategy aims to disrupt the supply of illicit drugs through activities such as crop destruction, encouraging crop substitution, interruption of shipping routes, and removing chemicals used in the manufacture of plant-based drugs (Lancaster et al., 2019). There are several failures associated with supply reduction strategies. Significantly high costs are associated with supply reduction, which makes it unsustainable. The outcomes of the supply approach are shorter. After disruption of transport channels, dealers explore alternative options. Different countries have different regulations on illicit drugs. Some illicit drugs are legal in one country and illegal in another country. This makes it challenging to disrupt transport and intercept such illicit drugs. On the other hand, the demand reduction approach cuts demand for illicit drugs by discouraging people from consuming them.
References
Crowl, J. N. (2017). The effect of community policing on fear and crime reduction, police legitimacy and job satisfaction: an empirical review of the evidence. Police Practice and Research , 18 (5), 449-462.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Murphy, B. (2020). Regulating undercover policing: Subjects, rights and governmentality. Critical Criminology , 28 (1), 65-84.
Lancaster, K., Ritter, A., & Rhodes, T. (2019). “A more accurate understanding of drug use”: A critical analysis of wastewater analysis technology for drug policy. International Journal of Drug Policy , 63 , 47-55.
