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Cannabis legalisation was viewed with great concern by law enforcement personnel. Here we show that police perceptions of the societal effects of legalisation are shaped to a considerable degree by officers' geographic context. Urban communities tend to be relatively prosperous and hold political and social views characterised as progressive. In contrast, rural areas tend to be much less affluent, and their residents tend to share relatively conservative political and social views. Often lacking in resources, rural police agencies experience greater difficulty with the implementation of a broad new social policy such as cannabis legalisation. We investigate how the rural or urban and east/west geographic locus of a police officer tends to shape their perceptions on cannabis-related issues. Our qualitative study involved interviews conducted in 2018 and 2019 of 67 officers from 24 agencies across Washington. Officers were drawn from 11 urban, 1 rural, and 2 tribal police departments in western Washington, and 5 urban and 3 rural police departments in eastern Washington. Both common concerns and some differing perceptions were articulated by these officers from urban and rural agencies. The common circumstance of rural decline is present in Washington as elsewhere in the US; the findings reported here suggest that marijuana legalisation outcomes will likely entail greater challenges of adaptive implementation in rural areas experiencing decline than in urban centres in those states currently reforming their marijuana laws. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past years the world has witnessed a myriad of 'viral' policing videos, some showing police officers in a positive light and many others showing officers in a negative light. Whichever direction these viral videos go, civility/incivility can be recognized in all of them. We believe that the proliferation of body-worn cameras (BWCs) offers a unique opportunity to study general (non-viral) police-suspect interactions at an interactional level. The present study documents incivility, as experienced by police officers and as experienced by suspects, using a sample of 152 police-suspect interactions involving one officer and one suspect. Key measures of incivility include interruptions, directed profanity, directed slurs, and proven deception. Results demonstrate that officers experience incivility in about one-third of one-on-one interactions. Interestingly, suspects experienced incivility at a similar rate. For the research site, interactions between officers and suspects of color were more likely to be civilized. Results reveal that officers in this study were significantly more likely to direct profanity and do so at a higher rate when interacting with male suspects. Although this study is inherently exploratory, the research offers practical implications for baselining interactions on key measures of incivility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors examine the frequency of civil commitment petitions and rates of congruence within those initial requests. Using data provided by the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare Division of Behavioral Health, the authors analyzed 32,749 petitions for civil commitment, between 2010 and 2016, as submitted by police officers, inpatient physicians, hospital administrators, and others. Results demonstrate a persistent decrease in the level of congruence with police officers displaying the lowest level of concurrence. Factors contributing to these lower rates are discussed with emphasis given to future research and broader policy consideration and discussion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]