Researchers universally agree that interactions between police and community members have the propensity to be emotionally charged. However, to date, there is limited research investigating situational and dynamic factors that make an interaction between a police officer and citizen more or less emotionally charged. Analyzing unedited police body-worn camera footage, associated with 287 criminal code violations, this research explores the individual, behavioral, and environmental factors that affect police officers’ and citizens’ emotional states during a police–citizen interaction. Results show clear variations at the situational, organizational, and environmental levels influencing the observed emotional state of the suspect and police officer.

The legalization of recreational cannabis in Washington state (I-502) and Colorado (A-64) created a natural experiment with ancillary unknowns. Of these unknowns, one of the more heavily debated is that of the potential effects on public health and safety. Specific to public safety, advocates of legalization expected improvements in police effectiveness through the reduction in police time and attention to cannabis offenses, thus allowing them to reallocate resources to more serious offenses. Using 2010 to 2015 Uniform Crime Reports data, the research undertakes interrupted time-series analysis on the offenses known to be cleared by arrest to create

A number of police militarization scholars have explored the paradox of the simultaneous emergence of community policing and militarism in the United States. Several researchers have suggested that police militarization and community policing may be cohesive strategies of state control, with community policing being the “velvet glove” that wraps the “iron fist” of militarization in palatable rhetoric. Alternatively, it has been suggested that these two policing strategies are incoherent, having emerged as a result of the state’s disorganized attempts to maintain control in the face of significant societal changes. To date, little research has examined the link between community policing and police militarization specifically. This study uses community policing data from the 2013 LEMAS survey to examine variation in military equipment acquisition data from the Department of Defense’s 1033 Program between the years 2012 and 2014. Results show that departments engaging in certain community policing activities are significantly less likely to acquire general military equipment, firearms, and military vehicles. These findings suggest that these policing strategies are not necessarily coherent and potentially support the argument that community policing efforts can buffer militarization. However, these results also highlight the need for more empirical research on existing theories of militarization, as well as the causes and effects of police militarism and community policing activities.

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