jcow79 wrote:Of course the law should be blind and treat everyone equally but there's an understanding that the human element of the justice system is its biggest flaw. This is exactly why a judge would not be expected to preside over a case of one of his own friends or relatives or anyone he may have any sort of relationship business or otherwise. It's expected that a judge would act in a biased manner towards someone close to him. Why would we expect any different from police officers? The fact is we don't. We know perfectly well that police officers will act favorably to people close to them as would most people. So when it comes to minor traffic violations, why would we not essentially allow an officer to recuse himself from the situation? On a more serious violation an officer might very well have to be "taken off the case" and another officer put in his place. However for minor violations it's better to let the person go rather than waste the resources to get another officer on the scene and waste everyone’s time.
I am sorry but you do realise that the opposite could be argued to be equally true right? Which is why some systems have the reverse take on this.
We know that human beings will favor their kin. So just like you remove the judge from making a judgement call on kin you make it the rule that an officer can not make such judgement calls either. This to enforce the equal treatment before the law. But there is a secondary effect as well, if the enforcement of the law is never wavered by the officer regardless of how minute, then the citicens will learn that breaking the law will result in a punishment.
So over here when it has been argued to increase the power of discretion for police for the sake of efficience, then that has been argued against as leading to an increase in those crimes where discretion is given. For instance if I could talk my way out of a speeding ticket then I'm more likely to speed again (especially so if I'm family and start seeing it as an entitlement), while if I get a ticket I am more likely to restrain myself from speeding again. With the added argument that I would have a reduced respect for the law and thus be more likely to commit other petty crimes.
Another argument is that its a slippery slope for officers where to draw the line. If officers are given discretion over X, then its likely that officers will also ignore X+1 and then over time X+2 etc. So removing the option of discretion is helping the officers not to ge caught in false moral dilemmas and just enforce the law as given.
Please note that I'm not saying that these arguments are factual, just that that is how the debate goes around here.
jcow79 wrote:This discretion is both a net benefit for the officer because he isn’t forced into a situation that could have an adverse affect on him personally, and for society because people that know full well they have violated the law get to experience the human side of police officers and understand they are not impassionate ticket writing machines. I’d be willing to bet society by and large would NOT appreciate this discretion be removed.
I would say that over here the opposite is true because of our cultural difference. We would think less of a cop not giving us a ticket for a clear violation (unless there are mitigating circumstances like trying to save someones life). Its also not expected from an officer to be lenient vs his colleagues kin, so he would not be in an adverse situation by giving the ticket, but rather if he didn't, thus solving any such false dilemma. We would not like officers to have the power of discretion, we would want them to be impassionate ticket writing machines. Because a machine can be trusted to treat all equal.
jcow79 wrote:As to the European posters: It makes me wonder how differently police may be viewed across our cultures. ... Do your own countries share any of these same problems and to the same degree?
Because it is completely different cultures all european countries have different relations to their police. Germany and Sweden just happen to be culturally similar regarding this but that would be an exception.
In some countries police are less trusted than in others. In some its a general warning that police will fleece tourists for bribes. In other countries its a general wanring not to try to bribe the police regardless because that will be worse.
But mostly the level of anti-authority that you have in the US is the lunitac fringe over here. I'd say that in some countries its more of a healthy distrust and not outright anti-authority. (Unless you are talking about the "black block"=anarchists et al.
jcow79 wrote:I would have guessed someone that received the benefit of discretion under the U.S. system would prefer the leniency they received and develop a preference for that system. I can appreciate your respect and preference for a more stringent application of the law though.
I work a lot abroad and the company briefing for handling different branches of US law enforcement was roughly 5 times as complex/long as the one I got when going to China or even the balkans. This because so much is arbitrary. (Juries are scary for instance).
So I would take consistency (even corrupted) over the american system any day.
jcow79 wrote:I would point out where it appears this system has been developed for sometime in Germany, a change to a system like this in the U.S. would likely add additional burden to our courts that would be difficult to compensate for. I would think that the same people that oppose the existing policy would be in even further opposition to the additional taxes required to fix a policy that as of now, really isn’t a big problem.
Completely agreed. Changing policies on this level would cost big bucks regardless if it where us changing to your system or you changing to ours. So both cultures have a prudence in keeping it as it is.
