Klahm, C & Tillyer, R. (2010). Understanding Police Use of Force: A Review of the Evidence. Southwest Journal of Criminal Justice, 7(2), 214-231.
As it would be observed, police use of force remains one of the most unique characteristics in their day-to-day duty of enforcing the law. In most cases, people tend to think that the police are uniquely authorized to use various ways of force to deal with specific reactions from citizens. This article offers a broad explanation in understanding the use of force by police on suspects. To effectively bring out the correlates of police use of force and the varied reaction this is likely to amass from the general public, the writers of this article have borrowed from a number of forced studies which had been published in peer-reviewed articles from 1995 to 2008. The authors had provided justifiable reasons as to why this study period (1995-2008) was considered convenient for their research. One of the reasons that had been highlighted was that a comprehensive explanation of the application of force in the wider academic community had widely been presented in the year 1995. Another reason here was that the use of force continuum had become a prominent assessment of force among many scholars who studied the use of force by the police in the mid-1990s.
Klahm & Tillyer have applied a number of explanatory factors with clear explanations of how they are likely to influence the decision of police officers to apply force in their encounters with citizens or suspects. The authors have applied a comprehensive and scientific approach in identifying all the relevant studies within the selected study period. Key search terms such as ‘use of force’, ‘police’, ‘forceful encounter’, and ‘use of violence’ were used to assemble relevant literature in periodical indexes of Criminal Justice. In total, around forty-one relevant studies were identified, but only twenty-six had proved fit for this study, based on their multivariate analyses. However, a total of 212 independent variables were also employed across the twenty-three studies, to explain different dimensions of force as it is used by police in the course of their duties. In this regard, key aspects of the study were grouped based on various factors such as encounter, officer, and suspect characteristics. The findings of this intensive study on the different factors reflected varying outcomes, thus helping to justify the overall findings of the study.
In this study, a table is used as the best method to highlight their comprehensive research findings as it was associated with the application of force by the variables. All the relevant variables on the three factors; suspect, officer, and encounter characteristics were well-presented on the graph to indicate the results attained on various studies. According to the writers, most of these contributors had observed some characteristics, such as officers’ ethnicity or race to have had nothing to do with their likelihood to use physical restraint, verbal command, or any other level of force. In other words, there was no consistent link between the use of force by police officers and their race or ethnicity. However, some recent studies had shown divergent results which had suggested that; White and Black police officers differed greatly when it comes to using force practices. Quite a good number of the studied researchers had observed that blacks were more likely to respond in a coercive way compared to whites when trying to resolve interpersonal conflicts between persons.
Talking of gender, many studies were observed to have indicated a permanent lack of inconsistency between the gender of an officer and the force they would use on citizens. Other factors such as age, education, and experience were also studied and would all indicate mixed results on the variables. However, even though the general trend for all these factors would suggest force to be likely to take place where the observed characteristics were present, an overwhelming number of the variables studied had appeared to give mixed relationships. According to the writers, even those studies that tried to provide force definitions, the degree of specificity would tend to vary considerably. For that reason, they seem to be poor predictors of what is likely to influence the use of force by law enforcers. Through this study, the writers have succeeded in offering a number of plausible reasons that are able to raise concern on the overall findings observed in this study, thus encouraging further future studies regarding the influence behind police behavior on certain segments of the society, which is characterized by the use of force.
In this article, the authors have used a clear style to express their central argument that, despite the intensive studies that have been conducted so far, justifiable findings are yet to be established regarding the forceful approach used by police. The central argument of this study is well presented where adequate evidence is widely applied to support it. Apart from offering some clear facts and conclusions on the biased topic of what drives police officers into using force when dealing with certain segments of society, the writers of this article have also succeeded in laying down suggestions for further research in the area. Considering the significant mission that police have to play in our societies, it is imperative that we get to understand the nature of their force on civilians and also the diverse factors that are likely to be associated with the execution of this force. Regardless of the many fruitless efforts to establish the facts behind this behavior, necessary policies should be formulated instructing the law enforcers on the right moments to use force when dealing with citizens or suspects.