Law enforcement officers
The manner in which administration of justice and enforcement of order has gradually evolved has prompted for the alignment of the major players in the justice system. The most impactful changes have been undertaken at the legislation level. Constant monitoring and testing of frameworks as the field of law and administration of justice have evolved. Environmental and institutional factors have been critical in the shaping of how activities get carried out in all the significant phases of dealing with suspected criminals. Every stage from when law enforcement officers arrest a suspect to when the final verdict is made accompanies a unique set of challenges that arise. Law students have highly appraised the relationship between law enforcement officers and individuals suspected of committing crimes, researchers and general observers. Most regulations that modulate the activities of law enforcers involves the stratification of the whole apprehension process before trial. Police officers are expected to be proactive in the enforcement of the rights of suspects and not passive involvement. For instance, once a person has been apprehended and presented to the police station, the police officer has the mandate to notify the suspect of the availability of a solicitor, who becomes inadvertently obligated to advise the suspect on how to face the prosecution adequately.
Officers are also expected to regularly update the suspect on any updates on the case at least every six hours during the duration of their stay. Such measures are unlike in the past where apprehension by police officers was associated with the total disregard of a suspect’s human rights and maltreatment. The Human Rights Act 1998 incorporates the extensive database of the European Convention on Human Rights. The ECHR is central in the propagation of awareness of human rights and administration of justice in the European Union. Code C also governs the activities of the police, mostly to ensure the rights of detainees are upheld, as well as ensuring critical sectors of their roles are handled adequately.
Claims on the harassment and the overriding of suspect’s rights and essential freedom have put the police department on the spotlight, especially from human rights organizations and activists. Concerns on the maltreatment of suspects have led to the imposition of various measures which are expected to protect the basic humanity of offenders and suspects. Basically, the role of police officers is to enforce the law, investigate the circumstances surrounding the purported crime and eventually to present the lawbreakers to judges, who finally decide on the judgement. According to globally adopted laws and ethics, an individual is only guilty when the judge gives the final verdict declaring the suspect guilty of the crime they have been prosecuted for. Any deviation from the specified mandates of law enforcement officers can lead to the disregard by the court of their evidence, and in other instances, even getting charged. Police officers are encouraged to be considerate in their actions when handling suspects of crime by the ECHR.
The fact that police officers get involved in the minutest details of a crime gives them the opportunity to exercise their powers. Law enforcement officers also happen to spend a lot of time with suspected criminals, and much information is usually at the discretion of the officers. Sensitive information gets handled by the police officers, and in an attempt to restrict the officers to their role description, specific mechanisms have been established to guide their activities. Most of the regulation is made through constitutional amendments and by the imposition of laws by the European Convention of Human Rights, which act as oversight for courts, police departments and the well-being of suspects and convicts.
Numerous efforts from various human rights activists from the European Union led to the establishment of the European Convention of Human Rights. The approach that this organization utilized in the implementation of a framework that can govern the process of prosecution without undermining the fundamental rights of a suspect is highly reputable in the European Union. This reputation led to most of the European countries signed a Memorandum of Understanding in that the body would monitor and hence responsible on matters regarding the upholding of human rights for suspected offenders. The Human Rights Act 1998 of the UK had been a significant reference point in the instances where there has been contention on how human rights and freedoms of a suspect were transgressed. Many cases are recorded with Amnesty International and European Courts of Human Rights, which focus on standing for all kinds of human rights. These institutions represent individuals who feel like their rights or freedom has been negated mostly by the government institutions and courts. By clearly laying out the various kinds of human rights and freedoms, the European Convention of Human Rights also sensitizes the public on the relevance of human rights and freedoms in society. Field data collected by ECHR indicates how the rates of awareness on the law and human rights are dismally low throughout the populace. Police officers, on the other hand, ply on the mainly ignorant masses to get the most out of their encounter with them.
As it is a requirement by a court of law that police do collect as much information as possible that would aid the discourse of judgement, the law enforcers have in numerous occasions been accused of obtaining of evidence in demeaning manners. The Human Rights Act 1998 highlights the significant elements that could lead to a seamless engagement between law enforcement officers and suspected criminals. The Human Rights clause in the UK has significantly boosted the professionality of police officers. Still, their natural tendencies to forego the rule of law to collect as much information as possible to implicate a suspect. Such actions by the police departments are considered violent and highly invasive, therefore undermining the freedom a suspect has right to. Provisions such as Code C and PACE 1984 come in handy to regulate the extent to which police officers could overreach. Many judgements are appealed from the basis of PACE 1984 and Code C and E, where investigators are faced with accusations against unfair obtaining of evidence such as when voice recorders get placed in police cells with two people suspected to have collaborated to commit a crime incriminating themselves. Defendants are likely to spot some disparity in the way the detention of a suspect was carried out, and in some cases end up being lost as a result of negligence when handling a suspected offender by a police officer.
Law enforcement officers have been over time, accentuated to the lack of a procedural way of carrying out investigations. Instead, most of the investigative officers believe that they should use any means necessary to collect more evidence. This approach has been prevalent since the army was modernized, and particularly for Democratic countries. The fact that the law enforcement officers contravene the rule of law by maltreating a suspect by denying them their rights and restricting their freedom and they mostly will not give a second thought of their actions remains the main challenge in enforcing the 1998 Human Rights Act. Instead, the law enforcement officers, who also play the investigative role admittedly think that they are working for the good of the nation. Enforcing the Human Rights Act 1998, despite being flanked by a compact and intricate analysis by the European Convention of Human Rights has seen minimal changes associated with the actions of police officers. More than half of all the police officers will engage in an action that contravenes the stipulations in Human Rights Act 1998 and Code C and E. Most of these violations are concerned with forceful or unfair obtaining of evidence and failure to inform a suspect on the availability of a solicitor. However, since most offenders will not have lawyers representing them before they are charged, the police officers usually get away with such violations which to them are misdemeanours. Police officers are fond of casually engaging suspects of crime during probing and detention. Numerous resources need to be deployed to a single police station if the already existing roles by the officers need to be segmented and hence more officers needing to be raised for the extra duties. Most police stations adopt arbitrary rules in going about their extraction of useful information that could lead to a suspect getting successfully charged.