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What is Police Accountability?

Laura M. Sands
Laura M. Sands

Police accountability is a term used to describe the high expectation placed upon law enforcement agencies and individual officers to act in a responsible and legal manner while upholding the law and controlling crime. This expectation placed on law enforcement agencies by public communities is further accompanied by the expectation that all citizens will be treated equally under the law. Systems that help assure police accountability include democratic elections, public reviews, internal reviews and processes for citizen reviews.

In various parts of the world and particularly in democratic societies, law enforcement officers are expected to serve and protect individual citizens. Police accountability assures that these actions take place in a uniform manner without discrimination or abuse. Policies, procedures, laws and various review processes exist to ensure that things such as arrests and trials are carried out with due process, and that police investigations are both thoroughly and objectively performed.

Police accountability helps to assure that things such as arrests are carried out with due process.
Police accountability helps to assure that things such as arrests are carried out with due process.

While police accountability largely refers to interactions between law enforcement officials and the public, an expectation of internal accountability exists, as well. Sexual harassment, racial discrimination, bullying and other forms of workplace discrimination are considered intolerable within public law enforcement agencies in many countries throughout the world. Failure to abide by the law of the land, as well as the ethics of individual departments, generally results in lawsuits, individual reprimands, temporary suspensions or dismissals.

Police accountability is important when officers question suspects about a crime.
Police accountability is important when officers question suspects about a crime.

Under democratic governments when police accountability is lacking, not only are individual law enforcement agents punished, but democratically elected officials also face possible dismissal and a loss of public trust. A community’s citizens are least likely to vote for public officials who do not demand the highest levels of accountability from law enforcement agencies as abuses of power and negligence puts the safety of entire communities at risk. In addition to a system to accept individual complaints from the community, as well as internal review processes, independent watchdog groups often exist for the sole purpose of monitoring police accountability, particularly in areas where incidents of civil rights violations have raised concerns about accountability.

Patrol officers need accountability when testifying about crimes that took place.
Patrol officers need accountability when testifying about crimes that took place.

Without high levels of police accountability, the likelihood of rogue officers, illegal search and seizure incidents, violations of civil rights and various other abuses of power are high. Historically, lawsuits against various law enforcement agencies stemming from allegations of police abuse have shaped the level of accountability in certain jurisdictions. Police accountability and confidence is necessary for public trust, as well as for public safety.

Discussion Comments

Sporkasia

@Laotionne - You make a good point about law enforcement officers needing to spend more quality time interacting with community members. In some large cities, there has been a movement by police forces to return to having policemen walk beats like was once so common.

The thinking behind this is basically what you said. When people in the community can put a name and personality with the policeman, and they see he is a real person then they are more likely to trust and respect him. And of course this works in the other direction, so hopefully police officers will feel the need to be accountable to the people they are hired to protect and serve and not just the people they work with.

Laotionne

Police officers are more likely to be accountable to the people in the community when they interact with them at times other than when they are arresting them. I think some policemen feel no connection to the citizens in the neighborhoods where they patrol. They feel the need to be accountable to the other police officers they work with, but not to the people in the communities.

This is why you have things like the code of silence in police departments. Police officers will turn the other way and keep silent in order to protect other police officers even when they see their fellow officers abusing civilians or stealing from people.

mobilian33

The problem with police accountability is that the police officers are often policing one another and this is a recipe for corruption. I have no complaints about the county officers who patrol the community where I live, but I think corruption is a considerable problem in police departments as a whole.

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    • Police accountability helps to assure that things such as arrests are carried out with due process.
      By: ia_64
      Police accountability helps to assure that things such as arrests are carried out with due process.
    • Police accountability is important when officers question suspects about a crime.
      By: ivanfff
      Police accountability is important when officers question suspects about a crime.
    • Patrol officers need accountability when testifying about crimes that took place.
      By: Susan Stevenson
      Patrol officers need accountability when testifying about crimes that took place.
    • Police need to conduct operations in a civil manner while in uniform.
      By: aijohn784
      Police need to conduct operations in a civil manner while in uniform.
    • Without high levels of police accountability, the likelihood of rogue officers is high.
      By: aijohn784
      Without high levels of police accountability, the likelihood of rogue officers is high.
    • Police accountability includes responding to the scene of an accident in a timely manner.
      By: 00Ffilip
      Police accountability includes responding to the scene of an accident in a timely manner.