Avoiding Internal Affairs
It’s not that hard. If you think there’ll be trouble write everything down and get your sergeant on the scene. Submitted by Chris Collins, Executive Director: Las Vegas Police Protective Association.
It’s no secret that leaders of police unions and associations spend lots of time down at IAB representing our members. In most cases, what was thought to be a very simple event, turns into several interviews. This can be a waste of time for IAB, the association and most importantly, the officer and his or her squad mates.
When a citizen makes a complaint against an officer, there will be an investigation unless IAB can prove the complaint is totally false.
So the question becomes how can you help IAB prove the complaint is false? Detectives and supervisors at the Internal Affairs Bureau here in Las Vegas have told me on several occasions they would have been able to close a case out or could have handled it with just one or two short interviews if the officer at had submitted a little more information at the time they received the complaint.
I now advise our officers here in Las Vegas that if they believe a citizen is going to make a complaint against them, they should consider asking the sergeant to come by the call and speak to the citizen. If the sergeant is too busy, at least let him or her know what happened and perhaps they can contact the person later.
Often a little attention on the front end can alleviate a big headache on the back end. Many times the public just doesn’t understand why an officer took the action he did. It’s surprising how just a brief explanation makes the citizen happy, and ultimately no complaint is filed.
If this tactic does not work and the complaint does end up at Internal Affairs, there are two ways to provide IA the information they need to make the process simpler and shorter.
First, you can update CAD. Most of us working patrol work with the MDT every day. If you have handled a call that you think might generate a complaint, often some detailed notes in CAD that explain what happened and why you did what you did can assist IA or anyone looking at the allegation to understand what occurred and why, and may even help them avoid some unnecessary interviews.
The second, and perhaps the best, way to document any event, is with an officer’s report. Probably many of you are wondering, “A what?”
The officer’s report, as best I can tell, has become a lost art. Now I know I am going back almost 30 years to when I was in field training, but back then, every training officer I had told me that anytime you think your side of the story could be important put it in writing in your report at the end of the shift.
I worked patrol for six years and do not believe I ever ended a shift without dictating at least one officer’s report. I know this helps resolve an allegation on the front end because once or twice in my career I did get a phone call from IA asking me if my officer’s report contained all the information about a certain event. When I advised them that it did, I was usually told that this took care of the matter or that only a short interview was needed to answer a couple of additional questions. My experience in those situations way always that the IA interview was always short, and most of the time, my squad mates did not have to be interviewed at all.
When a complaint comes into IA the detective assigned to the case will check CAD for any information and look to see if an officer’s report was done. If either or bother were done, it may provide enough information to close the case out altogether, which will make your busy life a little easier and certainly less stressful.