The Internal Affairs Unit

“Behind the Badge”                The Internal  Affairs Unit

By Joseph Pangaro

 

One of the most misunderstood functions of a police department is the Internal Affairs Section, also known as the “IA” unit.

For our cops, the men and women who inhabit these units have been derided for years as “Rats” and members of the “Rat squad”. This all comes to us from television and movie portrayals of these specialized investigators. They are usually seen as pencil neck types out to destroy hard working cops who are just fighting crime. This persona has caught on in the mind of the cops and of society in general, but it is far from the truth.

The other side of an Internal Affairs Section is the public perception that they are in place only to white wash any investigation of wrongdoing by a police officer and formalize the “Cover up”. In both cases those templates are wrong, especially in this modern era of policing.

Now, I don’t like to do this but I will for arguments sake; of course we have to acknowledge that there have been instances where IA investigators have gone after an innocent officer and ruined their lives, and there have been IA investigators who have shut down investigations of police officers to protect the cops. To deny this would be inaccurate, so I hope that forestalls those who would point to the example they know of personally and want to make a case that “Every” IA Section behaves this way or that. There are bad apples everywhere.

I am talking about the modern, sunshine lit, Internal Affairs Unit that strives to ensure that our cops are doing their business in the most appropriate, fair and just way possible and that people who lie about police officers are held to account. Fair is fair.

 

For a police agency to function properly there has to be some basic truths in play. We can identify those truths as: Integrity, Honesty, and Transparency. Without these three horseman as a foundation there will be no public support for police action and a state of distrust will grow between the police and the public we have all sworn to serve. 

I know as a street cop I always believed in what I was doing, the greater good kind of thing. I was on the lookout for bad guys and girls and I didn’t care about their race, creed, religion or who they happen to love. I cared about what they did.  With that mindset I went after them everyday. I think this is what most cops do. Ours is a noble profession, we don’t have many gray areas, we don’t dwell in the shadows, we believe in right and wrong and we aim for justice.

Unfortunately, the public doesn’t always see us that way. They paint us with a very broad brush. If a law enforcement person anywhere does something illegal or inappropriate we all get smeared.

The vast majority of law enforcement personnel will never do anything purposefully wrong or illegal, but as any cop anywhere can tell you that isn’t always the first thing people think about.

This is the point that a well trained and experienced group of investigators in an IA unit can make a difference to the cops and the community.

To make this type of a unit serve the needs of the agency, the members of the agency and the public it has to have a few things:

1-    Support of the administration and the freedom to act independently of political considerations.

2-    Trust in the investigators by the rank and file that they are there to get to the truth ad not serve as a demolition squad for the chief, the mayor or any other supervisor.

3-    The officers themselves have to be dedicated to the principals found in the oath they took when they pinned on the badge and they must demand their brother and sister officers adhere to those principals as well.

4-    Training on ethics as a way of life, not only as a required block of in-service noise, and vivid examples of respected officers that do things properly. This starts at the top. The person in charge must lead by example and cannot be a vindictive or unscrupulous leader who demands perfection from everyone below them but does not live it themselves. This is poison and we all have seen examples of it.

5-    Openness to the concept that we are public servants and the people we police have a right to demand we act properly at all times, even if the public at large does not. We are expected to function at a higher standard.

6-    Demand that justice is a two way street.  If an officer is investigated for alleged wrong doing and is found to have acted improperly they should receive the appropriate penalty. BUT… if the citizen that made the complaint is found to have lied about the officer then that citizen should be held to account for their actions. We do this by ensuring that a citizen who has knowingly and purposefully lied about a police officer get arrested and charged with making a false police report and that arrest is published in the weekly police blotter. If we do not do this then the police officers have every reason to resist the efforts of an IA unit investigation for fear of not being treated fairly. What’s right is right.

7-    We must also acknowledge the difference between an honest mistake and a purposeful act.  If an officer had their head and heart in the right place, but things went wrong the administration must recognize this and not seek to “Criminalize” these actions. If our officers have to do their jobs always worrying that a mistake can cost them professionally or financially they will not be able to perform at the level we want.   

 

If we employ these basic steps in the process, and keep personal motivations out of the IA unit it will go a long way to creating a successful and appropriate process that everyone can believe in.

This leads me to the next point: Why is the internal affairs function so important?

If we accept my premise that a properly conceived and run IA unit should see each incident based on facts and the officers on the job understand and accept their roles as public servants and conduct themselves as professionals, then the work of the IA unit is be the arbiter of fairness, plain and simple.

A citizen makes a complaint and that complaint is taken seriously. If there is merit to the complaint, that fact is documented and the appropriate response takes place; be that training, or more serious punishment. If the act did not constitute improper police action and the citizen reported it accurately and not maliciously, then the officer should be publicly cleared and the citizen advised why that determination was made.

This type of a clear process sets limits and adds guidance to our interactions with people. Many times police work requires our cops to take aggressive action that some people may find offensive or unnecessary, even though we know it is often necessary to our mission. This includes officer safety, public safety or addressing specific criminal actions. It is the responsibility of every police administration to have a dialogue with the people of their community so they understand why the police do what they do. The world is not an Us versus Them. We, the police, have a well defined and necessary purpose. If we are to successfully serve and protect then the public has to understand this and let us do our jobs. If they society decides that safety from crime and other negative behaviors are acceptable they will have to change the way the system works. We are simply doing what they demanded of us.

The IA Unit serves these needs when it functions as it was conceived. It should provide the good cops with back up as they do their work and for the cops that choose to take another path, they will find the IA unit at odds with them, as all good cops should be. We don’t need people in our profession that don’t respect the power and position they have been entrusted with and ensure that power is wielded in the service of justice and fairness for everyone.                                  

 

 

We all want our police officers to do their job to protect and serve our communities. We want them to take the risks we don’t want to take: chasing robbers and drug dealers and other dangerous criminals that are apt to hurt you if you confront them. We also want them to respect our rights and be polite, helpful and courteous. We don’t want them to treat us like criminals for running a red light, or not wearing a seat belt or the worst of all, asking a question. These are among the hundreds of tasks we have given our police forces and most agencies prove to be total professionals, others not so much.

This is where Internal Affairs Investigators come in.

Should you encounter a police officer on a traffic post and you commit a violation, even a little one, don’t get mad at the cop for giving you a ticket: you did the violation. The officer has a couple of options; he can give you a warning or he can give you the ticket. Either way what he / or she must do is behave like a professional.

Issuing traffic summons is not a function of police work that most officers love, contrary to what many people believe. Most officers find issuing traffic summons to be almost as irritating as we find in getting them, but it is a part of the job. A job society has demanded the officers do.  How many times have we heard someone say “This idiot cut me off I’d like to see him get a ticket for that”. While our cops do have discretion they are also responsible for maintaining safe driving conditions by conducting traffic stops and giving out tickets for violations, even little ones.

Now if during your encounter with a cop for rolling through a stop sign two blocks from your house the officer uses profanity, or acts rudely, or lectures to you, speaks down to you or uses inappropriate words that make you uncomfortable or offend you- you would be justifiably upset and the cop would be wrong.  So you call your local police and make a complaint. That complaint is taken very seriously in 2013.

Police administrators and supervisors do not want their officers behaving improperly or treating people rudely or unfairly. What happens in most agencies is that the complaint is taken by someone in the police station, and anyone in a police station can take a report like this. The complaint is forwarded to the IA unit and an investigator is assigned.

That investigator then gathers the facts, reviews the in-car video tape (If the car has it), interviews the officer and victim as well as any witnesses, and then writes a report summarizing what they found.

That report ends up with the chief at some point and he/ she will have to decide what to do about it. In most cases, if it is a single complaint about an officer’s demeanor and the officer doesn’t have a history of this type of behavior, the officer might find the incident is documented and he/ she is advised how to behave better in the future and reminded that the public is owed respect at all times.

You, as the complainant will most likely get a letter saying your complaint was investigated and was sustained, meaning it was found to be true. You may expect a letter of apology from the cop, or a phone call or some other acknowledgement. Unfortunately that is not usually what happens for many reasons. Usually your satisfaction will be in knowing your complaint was found to be meritorious and the officer was made aware of the improper behavior and advised not to repeat it.

This response may upset you, especially if you want a pound of flesh for the transgression. Understandable, but…. Let’s look at the offense in a bigger light. Maybe the officer had a bad day, maybe he/ she had a problem at home, maybe he/ she didn’t feel well, whatever. These are not excuses they are reasons. That doesn’t make the officers behavior right, but put into perspective it really is not the end of the world. We don’t fire cops or give them days off without pay for being a jerk on a given day. After all haven’t we all had a day when we were off a bit? Maybe not our best selves, yelled at a check out girl or flipped a bird in traffic? Of course we have, were all human.

The problem comes when the officer that was rude to you has also been rude to four other people and they have made complaints about the officer. Now the IA report will reflect a pattern of behavior that no one in law enforcement wants to defend nor should we. We can all understand a bad day, but if you repeatedly have “Bad Days” and people complain about you all the time, something needs to be done.

The IA investigators report may reflect that this fourth incident was just another “Rude” comment, but it’s the fourth rude comment in three months. The police administration will want to take some action to correct the problem for several reasons; first the officer should not be rude to anyone, second if the officer has a bigger problem it has to be corrected for his own good and the good of the public.

I can tell you from personal experience as an investigator that several officers’ jobs were saved due to the work of the IA unit and the administration’s efforts to help the officers change their inappropriate behavior and return to being a valued member of the agency. If it wasn’t for the IA investigation I believe some of the officer’s with minor behavior issues would have seen those minors issues grow to become huge career ending and or dangerous issues.

The other side of this coin is of course the citizen that lies about the police or police behavior in order to get an advantage on the system.

The truth be told, people, especially people who commit crimes, don’t like to get caught and locked up. Many people have found that by making an accusation against an officer or group of officers, they can mitigate their exposure to punishment. In other words they find that by lying they can get over on the cops and the system.

In many agencies there is such a concern for being politically correct, that the administrations will take the side of the criminal, just so as not to incur public ridicule. Even if the officer is proven to be innocent of the allegation, no one will ever know and in many instances the officer has to suffer that attack on their reputation. This is just as wrong as the cop doing something improper.

The police are a representative of us, the people. When someone damages a cop’s reputation wrongly, the society is damaged. Every time that cop writes a report or goes to court, that improper allegation will come up and cast doubt on the officer’s credibility. So what you say, who cares?  Well let’s take a look at that.

Say a citizen makes a false allegation against an officer, not murder, but an allegation of an improper use of force. The incident is investigated and the officer is cleared of any wrongdoing.

Then say you are victimized by a mugger. The same officer makes the arrest of the criminal and it goes to trial. The defense attorney will most likely bring up the report of the officer misusing force and in many cases allege the officer did so in arresting their client.

The jury hears this and thinks poorly of the officer and decides to acquit your offender. He/ she goes back out into society and mugs someone else, who really suffered then?  At that point the officer’s reputation would matter a lot.

Now this example may be a bit exaggerated but it makes the point. Police officers are not free-lance men and women who put on uniforms and guns and just decide to run rough-shod over society. We the people created the police force and we empowered the officers to enforce our laws and ordinances. The police represent society.  

 It is for these reasons that the modern IA section should be viewed as a friend to the public and the police. The modern IA unit is tasked with walking a fine line between the rank and file police officers and the people of our communities. Police officers that do their jobs properly have nothing to fear from an IA unit. Citizens who have honest complaints have a right to be heard and their grievances addressed, but it requires all of us to be on the same page. The police serve the community and must respect every member. The community must respect the work of our officers and accept the consequences of our own behavior.

Let me know what you think.   Email: Jpangaro194@yahoo.com