Police Functions Essay

I think police officers are a good help for the communities they serve. Police is necessary in each city to prevent crimes and bring peace to citizens, so they can live in a safe place and knowing that they are protected of the criminals. . The reality of policing is that the police play an extremely complex role in today’s society. This role involves many different tasks. People think that they are always fighting criminals and risking their life in bad situations but as Walker described in his article â€Å"Police and Society† (2001) â€Å"Many studies of police work document the complexity of the police role. The Police Services Study (PSS), for example, examined 26,418 calls for service to the police in three metropolitan areas. As the data in Table 1-1 indicate, only 19 percent of the calls involve crime, and only 2 percent of the total involves violent crime† they spent most of their time in patrolling the city and watching for over speed cars. Every city h as a police department for a purpose and the most important role of the police is to help maintain peace, enforce the laws of the land, protect the people from criminals, and to help ensure the safety of the citizens. Also police officers are important to the government to be protected it against society. They contribute to social control through both law enforcement and order maintenance responsibilities. There are a lot of functions that police should continue to do like prevent and control conduct widely recognized as threatening to life and property, identify problems that have the potential for becoming more serious problems, create and maintain a feeling of security in the community, promote and preserve public order, and help people who are in danger of physical harm, such as the victims of violent attack. These functions are very important to the communities because crimes are increasing day by day  and without the help of police officers there will be chaos in the society and people would not be safe. Although police officers have many different kind of functions and they need to do it, not all functions are that important. They should spend less time in answer calls that are not for criminal purposes like people calling 911 because their neighbor has loud music or bothers them, watching all day for over speed cars, with no lights or plates, and they do not have to abuse the ir power when searching for a guy that is suspicious. They should devote most of their time patrolling the city searching for suspicious people, helping people in need, and maintaining the public order. There are factors that influence the functions of some police officers like their inexperience in the field work, their fear to confront dangerous criminals and get injured, the budget of their police department, or their low salary that make them think they do not have to risk their lives and work harder. There is no doubt that we need the police because they play an important role in our society and without them we could not have freedom. Reference Walker, S. (2001). Police in America. Chapter one: Police and Society. Retrieved from http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/dl/free/007241497x/39793/samplech01.pdf