Police Reform

The Joint Delegation from the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Tajikistan and the OSCE Office is in Washington, DC

From 1 to 9 April 2013 a joint delegation from the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) of the Republic of Tajikistan (RT) and the OSCE Office in Tajikistan was on a study trip to the United States of America (USA) on Community Policing organized by the International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) of the Embassy of the United States of America in Tajikistan and The Emergence Group (TEG).

A delegation was led by the Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Tajikistan, Major General Saidkhon Jurakhonov from the MIA RT and by the Police Reform National Liaison Officer, Khaydar Mahmadiev from the OSCE Office in Tajikistan (OiT). The delegation was composed of the Heads of public safety services from different regions of Tajikistan, and from the Executive Office of the MIA. This study tour is a part of the Community Policing project of the INL, US Embassy, which is being implemented by TEG.

During the trip, the delegation visited the Department of State, where the OSCE representative made a presentation to its employees about the Police Reform Strategy of Tajikistan, and also briefed about the projects, developed by the OSCE Office to implement the Strategy. The presentation aroused interest among the various units of the Department of State of the USA, and comprehensive and detailed answers were given to the asked questions.

During the stay in Washington, DC (District of Columbia), the delegation has visited the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia (MPDC), which is the primary law enforcement agency that provides public order in the metropolitan district and in the capital itself. Cathy L. Lanier is the Chief of the MPDC since 2007, whose priority in her activities is, first of all, community policing.

The fact is that in the early 1970s, the American Police had experienced the same problems as the police in the post-Soviet space - public distrust, corruption, superfluous ill-treatment and incompetence. In 1972, the government and society tackled the police reform, putting it (police) under the rigid control. The Knapp Commission (to investigate alleged police corruption, known informally as the Knapp Commission, after its chairperson Whitman Knapp) was established, which has analyzed the situation in the New York City Police, and has presented the results in an ad-hoc report. Numerous cases of corruption and interpenetration of police and organized crime, cases of positions purchase, etc. were revealed in the report. The Commission has sent to the US Department of Justice and the Office of the Attorney General 6 recommendations, which served as a background for the nationwide police reform.

The most important component of the reform is community policing. One of the recommendations of the Knapp Commission is to change the style of police work. It implied the establishment of cooperation with the community - the connection had been lost by 1970. The authorities developed and funded a number of programs aimed at public engagement into the police activities. Many programs became mandatory for implementation. For instance, according to law each police station had to engage into a work certain quantity of volunteers among the ordinary citizens. They were the core of the "Voluntary Police": patrolling the streets and assisting to maintain order at public events. This voluntary work is not paid at all, but is considered to be honorable. Prior to the start of work, the "volunteers" pass a brief training course. They are supposed to get a uniform and patrol vehicle. Thus the psychological barrier between the police and community overcomes, and the system becomes more open as people from outside get into it.

The second component – public monitoring. Police in the USA had been forming as a closed caste system. To change such situation only by the state control was not successful. The community has achieved the right to oversight the police work, particularly, to create civil oversight agencies - Public councils. The States adopted relevant laws independently, and if the authorities would oppose, then the issue was brought up in the referendum. The activities of such structures are often funded from the state budget. There are such kinds of Councils practically in every big and small cities of the USA.

And most importantly, the Americans switched from “performance appraisal based only on quantity number” to the evaluation of the police work, based on the opinions of citizens (one of the most effective mechanisms - regular public surveys on the effectiveness of the police work, which is conducted by the Gallup Institution). The strategy has justified itself: if in 1970 only 15% of US citizens trusted to police, in 2008 already 73% of US citizens trusted the police.

Police in Washington, DC is divided into seven police districts, each of which, in its turn, is divided into 7-8 Police Stations. During a visit to the sixth Police Station, the delegation members have seen the offices, where police communicates with the community, and the Boys & Girls Clubhouse. During the conversation, the Police Station Commander Robert Contee briefed on the Public Council’s work, as well as on “Miranda rights,” a typical formulation is as follows:

You have the right to remain silent.

Anything you say or do will be used against you in court.

You have the right to have an attorney.

If you can not afford it (attorney), an attorney will be provided for you at the government expense.

Do you understand the rights read to you?

According to the US legislation, any detainee should be taken to the court "without any delay", but no more than three hours, which after considering the materials, either will authorize to arrest the suspect or will issue a subpoena, or will make a decision to release a detainee from custody in the absence of "reasonable grounds".

Thereupon, the delegation also visited the United States Capitol Police (USCP), which is an independent law enforcement service and does not subordinate to city authorities. The USCP is responsible for the area around the Congress building, neighboring streets and parks.

The Deputy Chief of the USCP Daniel Malloy shared a practice of the USCP in dealing with the participants of mass rallies, demonstrations and pickets, which occur near the US Congress almost every day. It is necessary to apply for permission prior to not less than 15 days to the Metropolitan National Park Services or Metropolitan Police Department, or to the USCP in order to hold a demonstration in Washington, DC. If a permission that was applied to the Metropolitan National Park is granted, a further notification of urban services about conducting the event, including the police (which, if necessary, can escort the protesters), is ensured by this service. Otherwise, the demonstration members will be arrested immediately without application for a permit and organizing an unauthorized demonstration. According to some assessments, taking into account the participants of even authorized demonstrations, annually at the average around one thousand people is subject to arrest. However, according to Malloy, over the last 15 years, police have never refused to hold such events to those persons, who in due time appealed to the police for permission.

During the trip, the delegation has also visited the United States Park Police - the oldest US law enforcement agency, which controls parks and public gardens in the districts of Washington, New York and San Francisco. The Park Police is one of the subdivisions of the US National Park Service and is a federal service. The Chief of Park Police is Teresa Chambers. Actually, there are a lot of female managers amongst the US Police, who properly manage their duties. According to the Commander of the Park Police Philip J. Beck, more than 12% females do work in the Park Police, but there are some subdivisions, where the number of females reaches up to 30%.

The delegation has also visited headquarter of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, where they met with representatives of the Law Enforcement Administration. There is an Equal Job Opportunities Unit in the structure of the Administration, which oversees the compliance with law within the organization, prohibiting any discrimination, based on race, religion, sex, nationality and age. The Unit assists in the field of police management at all levels to eliminate any trends that violate equal opportunities for any individual or group.

The visit to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which has an authority to investigate the violations of the US federal legislation and to provide the security of the state, country, nation and the president, was very informative for the members of the delegation. The FBI is known to the U.S. citizens as the structure that conducts a general clearance of those who applied for a job in the state service. Not less than 200 categories of federal crime fall under the FBI general jurisdiction. The FBI received more than 36,000 requests annually to investigate serious crimes, including murder and suspicious death.

As of 1 January 2013, there were 36,074 employees, working in the FBI, where 13,913 of them - special agents (i.e., human resources operational staff) and more than 22,161 people of non-operative staff: analysts, linguists, scientists, IT specialists and others. Approximately 9,800 employees work at the FBI headquarters (FBI HQ) and approximately 18,000 employees - in the field. Hence, the USA does not hide the data on the number of personnel, believing legitimately that the taxpayers should be aware of what they pay their taxes for.

Currently, resources are distributed equally among the FBI's national security and the implementation of the "old" tasks - the fight against crime. At the same time, for the last 6 years, the FBI has doubled the number of intelligence analysts up to 2,100 people, and the number of translators has tripled. There are units in each of 56 regional directorates, engaged in the collection and analysis of intelligence information. In addition, the Bureau has opened its offices in more than 70 cities around the world, including in the Central Asia.

During the visit to the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), the delegation members were introduced to the researches of the Forum staff. It was founded in 1976 to: organize the scientific researches and to generate recommendations on management and support of law enforcement, to prepare universal regulations and guidelines in the field of criminal policy, etc. More than 370 managers of big police departments are the members of the Forum. Overall, there are 18,760 police departments and stations, staffed by more than 1,131,000 police officers.

The 10^th Amendment to the US Constitution reserves the right to form the police by the states administrations. Police is divided into municipal and the district one. Special units, for example, Special Forces or highway patrolling service might subordinate to the state administration. The county administrations supervise the railway police or special services to patrol the Indian reservations. Municipalities may have a dozen police services - for ports, railway stations, residential areas and schools. Majority of big universities and colleges have their own police stations, which composes 90% of the whole US police staff. It is the responsibility of the local police to investigate crimes and to prevent other offenses, to regulate the traffic, to perform the administrative and police control, etc.

To "get" a job with the police, a citizen should be from 21 to 35 years old, be a US citizen, should not have a criminal record and other offenses, graduate from the Police Academy (the training lasts less than a year). The first line staff with a rank of officer is separated from the Chief of Police by 5-6 levels and should demonstrate a good performance at every step to get a promotion. Any recruit starts from the most difficult and thankless work: he/she is obliged to patrol the streets (thanks to patrolling every police officer is familiar with the specifics of the main job) as a minimum three years. Only then, having proved oneself, he/she has the right to apply for the next position of detective. In 5 more years, the detective can be promoted to the next level, having passed a difficult professional exam. And so for any promotion: excellent results, not less than 3 years in the current position and more complicated qualification test are required.

Modern studies have questioned the effectiveness of preventive patrolling service towards to prevention of various forms of crime, so an issue of improving legal and law enforcement culture among the population became an urgent issue. In addition to patrolling, the crime prevention envisages the security escalation of private houses and organizations, as well as teaching people on self-defense means. The departments of metropolises in their structures have special units that conduct such type of inspections and work with the community. Such movement as a “Neighborhood watch” - self-organization of citizens to fight against the offenders has become very widespread in the USA. It does not provide any lynching, but envisages that the detained offenders will be transferred to the police for legal proceedings. But, first of all, the police receive the information from neighbors, who "brief" on any offenses, committed by the neighbors. Members of the "Neighborhood patrols" in the USA do not only patrol the streets, but also participate in the traffic security campaigns, in elimination of domestic violence, etc.

The delegation members also visited the Memorial to the fallen police officers in the line of duty, which was built in 1991. There were about 12,000 names of police officers were carved on the walls by the time of the monument opening ceremony. Today, according to Richard Niebusch, a former police officer working now as a Program Manager at TEG, 200 police officers were killed while on duty only in the USA in 2012.

The members of delegation also met with the staff of the Embassy of the Republic of Tajikistan to the USA, where they were welcomed by the Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of the Republic of Tajikistan to the USA Mr. Nuriddin Shamsov.

In general, the Tajik delegation noted high effectiveness, practical orientation and significance of the activities that undertaken by American police in the field of "Community Policing," gained a positive experience of organizing Community Policing, which will be applied in the process of Police Reform and Development in Tajikistan.