Coltsmith

I agree, he is making a fool out of himself for not knowing laws and regulations and calling the police officers racist. But it was more a hint to the bad english spoken by the officer ;) I mean who can control a personality? haha

I meant to ask, whether the departemnts sent their officers to annual field trainings to freshen up their skills on dealing with suspects and certain situations in a roleplaying manner. In Berlin, the department requires officers working in the patrol divison to go to annual training 3 times a year, other division which work mainly on the streets two times a year and any other officer to train 1 time a year, that's what I meant with Field Training. Of course you can take specializations aswell. And regarding the one-man-patrol I meant you can't do stuff [typo in my last post, I meant "can't do jack shit"], because in most situations you require a second officer to be your backup, e.g. when searching a person, arresting a perp or stopping a car. So for me at least, having an one-man-patrol doesn't really make sense because you have to call in backup anyways...

haha I got another good one: www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMB8TSpSf0M&index=49

Am I getting that right, you recieve no field training and self defense classes after you gratuated from the academy??? That cant be right, otherwise officers are underperforming after a few years... And the part with the one-man-patrol what you guys are doing I don't really understand either, you can do jack shit if you out alone and dont have a partner...

Well in Germany it is common for most of the jobs to have an educational period of 1-3 years, so maybe the educational standards are different. Although the school system isnt the best in Germany so that might compensate that, who knows?

I understand that you prefer having a street level experience with that FTO phase and I guess we have little to no Field Training in actual units (like the precint or riot police) in most cases those periods are about two months of the total college (although we have the opportunity to do internships in foreign agencies, even in the US!). But to comment on the opposite perspective, you could argue that only LEOs with little to no education are confronted with real situations and real dangers and I dont know if thats a good way to train officers, because they already have to make the decisions and perform the actions of full fledged officers and I dont know if every recruit really considers the burden and the reponsibility that lies upon him.

Yeah that's true! If you dont speak German, they leave you be most of the time, because most officers, at least in Berlin, speak really bad English!

If you take battery as an example, there are certain elements you have to learn. Frist of all you have to know the definitions in the section about battery, in this case bodily harm and / or damage to health as the objective criterion. Furthermore you have to analyse the intent of the subject regarding the bodily harm and health damage (e.g. does the suspect had strict intentions on hurting the victim). After that you have to analyse whether a suspect is eligible to be prosecuted, or whether the suspect has justifications or a mental illness or is considered too young to be prosecuted. Last of all you have to check if the victim wants to press charges. But we are not done yet, as the battery can also have qualifications, those are dangerous assault, aggravated assault, mistreatment of protegees, battery with a deadly outcome and finally battery conducted by an offical. All those have new criterias, which are also analysed and if you get something wrong, the perpetrator might get out of jail. So yeah, I dunno about your criminal law, but thats the basic analysis you have to know as a police officer in Germany. That might be true, but hearing about the recent cases of police misconduct (whether its justified to call it that or not, I wasn't in the situation so I dont know) and the rejection I have seen from officers regarding the introduction of behavioural training (my infos are from a sequence at the Seattle PD, so that is only one department), I think a little bit more training wouldn't hurt, would it? I mean other job postings with the same amount of salary do have a longer educational period as well, or am I mistaking?

I find it interesting to hear, that you guys think 20 or more weeks is plenty of time. In our case here in Germany, the law is kinda complex and as a police officer you have to know most sections of the law like homicide, battery or theft in a way, that you can learn about the possible incriminations and the legal basis to use your equipment and the sidearm. Furthermore you have to know the laws concerning assemblies and demonstrations. The biggest part although is the laws dealing with averting of danger, which is the biggest topics as a uniformed police officer in Germany. With my background I would never think, that 20 weeks or so can be sufficent enough to deal with situations on the job from the first day on professionaly and with the legal knowledge required to not incriminate oneself. But I do not want to "downgrade" your academies because as I mentioned I do not know the common law and especially not the American laws, so they might be easy to pick up, who knows? I mean I almost felt like a lawyer when we had tests in the specific law subjects. And then furthermore my practical topics like shooting, Field Training, Behavioural Training, Driving and Training for demonstrations took more than 20 weeks.

Hello y'all!! I am right now in the process of becoming a LEO in the State of Berlin in Germany and I am attending the police college to graduate on a bachelor degree for policing. I have heard numerous times that the police academies in the States are only about 6-8 Months long and I was suprised by it, knowing that colleges and academies in all over Europe require at least two years of studying and training to become LEOs in the respective departements. So I would like to know of you guys whether you think 6 months academy was enough to prepare you for your future occupation or if you thought a little bit more would have been better.

Well I as an soon to be police officer in Berlin have a different perspective on things. First of all you have to understand that federalization enables different security politics to take place in different parts of Germany and the south is very much different than the north. In my part of Germany it is commonplace to blame the police on every false move made by officers and to critize every policy adopted by the departments. The penal courts are also considered mostly far too relaxed on crminial behaviour, most of the first time offenders only get parole and no jailtime whatsoever. Furthermore attacks on police officers have increased over the last years and the judical systems seems to not have caught up with this trend. That can be observed with the use of bodycams. While I assume in the US this device is used by the departments to ensure correct use of powers by police officers, bodycams in germany are mostly seen as a protective measure for police officers so that criminals who resist police officers can be identified and brought back to justice.

I can totally agree with your point. Every action performed by police officers will be measured harshly. Although as mentioned above the hypocrisy is that most people expect police officers to be role models although they themselves behave in no way like a role model. Problematic, at least in Germany, is also the political and judical side of things: although the law might permit you the use of force, the politcial situation or a judge might rule against your case in certain situations. That makes policing a the modern age really difficult, because you can never be really sure whether your use of force was justified or if you get penalised for it...

To give my two cents to this conversation and to give another european perspective, the use of force is always something you have to consider. Using punches and kicks are mostly percieved as a brutal attack and are often considered unnessecary in the perspective of the bystander. Although there are situations in which officers are in the legal position to use that kind of force my police college teaches us to prefer armlocks and defensive techniques while arresting perps rather than using our fists. Using punches can also have an effect on the bystanders to sympathize with the perp which lets them justify themselves in resisting police actions. In germany, especially Berlin that effect is a major problem, as seen in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuOJm7tmpMc that's why I, and I guess most german police officers would agree, prefer locking techniques over raw force.

To give my two cents to this conversation is, that it strikes me, how little LEOs in the United States recieve basic training. You can't expect recruits to go through a 6 month training to make them ready for police duty! In other countries, especially in Europe you get at least 2 years of studing and training to be fit as a police officers. With this little basic training, it is understandable, that LEOs in the U.S. do not master the communication skills or self defense techniques as opposed to other countries. That also increases the chances of police officers misbehaving, just because they lack knowledge and or are just not professional enough to handle the situation! Of course this can't be applicated to every departement in the States, but the difference for me as a foreigner is visual nontheless!

http://www.standby.eu/emergency/sos9000-lightbar/ this one maybe? It doesn't really look like a typical whelen