Undoubtedly one of the most controversial areas touching on police professionalism and integrity, and accounting majorly for the existing gulf in the police-public relations is to do with police utility of deadly force.
Police are authorised by law to use deadly force and sanctioned violence against ‘citizens’ in certain circumstances when public security, peace and tranquility are threatened. This is to say it is as a last option for police to resort to such extreme measure in the larger utility of common good. Therefore for this necessity of inherent rights option to be called in, certain irreducible minimums must have been considered and balanced beforehand judiciously.
Yet this is where the rub of policing lies. Police operate in a very fluid, dynamic and complex environment. This is the field colloquially referred to as policing “wicked” problems. Just imagine any mortal armed with a gun and empowered by law (which has been donated expressly by the public) being confronted by a desperate situation of marauding and dangerously armed criminals who equally put such a person’s own life in danger? These are minimalist scenarios police confront daily in discharge of their duty for the public’s good. And such are the split-second moments when firearms are either utilised responsibly or unfortunate deadly fire deployed against such offending citizens.
Power to use deadly force is regulated by law. Further, it is balanced by the moral virtue to do good to humanity. This is so since loss of life is safeguarded not only by the criminal law but equally by both the divine and natural laws. It’s against divinity in whichever form and also the order of nature to take one’s life in unjustifiable and savage manner. Life is sacred and must be safeguarded at all costs. That is why it is the primary irreducible duty of every officer to defend and safeguard life before any other duty imposed or imagined.
Once upon a time, Cain – Adam’s son – killed Abel, his brother out of jealousy. God was infuriated that he banished him with a curse. In many cultures, murder is abominable. In murder investigations, it’s popularly said that the “dead never tell tales” – but it’s the duty of the living to avenge such death through prudent and diligent investigations. That is why murder investigation cannot be simply wished away. In fact the rules regulating homicide investigation are well-thought out to defeat any shenanigans. Given such a backdrop, it gets worse when it’s an officer meant to defend life to be the one to abuse such a basic responsibility.
Once I tutored at the police academy as a criminal law instructor. My mainstay was the law of evidence. One of my beloved lesson was simply on arrest. I used to put more deliberate thought in this discussion with the trainees than any other discourse due to the import I attached to it. I felt then, and still do hold that it is through arrest of criminals that the challenge of use of force including deadly force arise. Of course use of force is a substantive topic discussed under the police practical theory, but unfortunately it’s not well-developed and covered from the legal perspective. This thus limits the overall understanding of legal implications attached to use of force, however legal it might sound. Police theory unfortunately tends only to justify the ‘justifiable’ instances where use of force is applicable.
True, there are instances when utility of force is not only necessary but even exigent. Life includes that of the officer. So he has a duty to defend himself first and foremost.
So there is need for a balance over when to use and when not to use deadly violence against citizens. The test of “reasonableness” apply in this instance. This test is not well ingrained in the law, but well articulated by the developed jurisprudence. Further, various international instruments and protocols guide on this delicate issue. Above all, the emotional intelligence of officers which informs their moral cultural character arise. Officers with a high moral intelligence will always think twice before pulling the trigger. And this judgement should take place in nanoseconds.
This is what’s meant by police discretion. Discretion rooted in morality more than legality. Morality that respects human life and dignity. Morality that appreciates ripple-effects to victims of murder: dependents. This therefore acts as a reminder to officers the due-process dictum: better ten guilty to go scot-free than one innocent to be imprisoned (including execution for a murder rap amongst other serious crimes) unlawfully. If that is bad, what of an innocent life taken in the name of law enforcement?
But this is not to say that officers should trade their lives and those of law-abiding citizens with those of criminals hellbent to alter good living. Officers must apply the principle of utility – being that of more good to the majority. Therefore if threatened, they have to respond with deadly fire, and at all cost. That’s the only way society can be safeguarded against impurities of a few. But when discretion dictates otherwise, then Peel’s principal number seven apply: police never to enter the juridical thicket!
Let the honorable justices pick the baton and run their lap. After all it is the criminal justice system – the conveyor belt, just as with the relay.
SMARTPolicing 