Should Police Officers Have Discretion In Handling The Homeless

While being homeless is not a crime, police officers need to know how to handle a situation properly when they are facing a homeless person. “The Seattle Police Department uses community service officers (CSOs) to handle many of the homeless-related situations.” It is basically their job to help homeless people seek shelters, or send them to a drug or alcohol rehab program. I think that having community service officers in the departments are beneficial but I also believe that every officer should have appropriate training on how to handle homeless people or mentally ill people. If I was dealing with a homeless person and I can see that they have issues with drugs or alcohol I wouldn’t want to hurt the individual. In order to be a good representation of my police department and the city, I would do the right thing and I would want to assist them with finding a shelter or an alcohol/drug treatment program. Some homeless people actually commit crimes on purpose so they can be arrested, and then get sent to jail or prison where they will be provided with a bed and food.

As stated in Chapter 8, “Police officers exercise great discretion in handling the mentally ill.” If I was an officer, I wouldn’t want to use force on a homeless or mentally ill person unless I absolutely have to and if they have a weapon or are behaving in an aggressive manner. “Mentally ill persons are also much more likely to be the victims of crime and, therefore, are more likely to come to the attention of the police.” Serial killers choose their victims before they kill them and mentally ill people can be an easy target for serial