how do police forces work
This is my general understanding. If anyone wants to amend, feel free.
You interview for the job, go through the recruitment process. This involves physical and academic exams. If you’re hired by a Sheriff’s Office or Police Department, they pay for you to go to the academy. Usually after academy you are sworn in as an officer, and you go through on-the-job training for several months where you may rotate between supervisory partners.
In CA the police departments are usually located in cities, whereas Sheriff’s offices are determined by county and operate in unincorporated townships. That means that small rural towns (like Beacon Hills) that don’t have budget or need for their own police forces are served by the Sheriff’s department for the county they reside in. The Sheriff is an elected position.
Sheriff’s deputies and police officers usually attend the same academy program and have the same general training (there are only a few training academies statewide). I know for Orange County if you want to be in the Sheriff’s department you must serve a mandatory 6 months as a prison guard. I’m not sure if that’s a statewide thing or only an Orange County thing. Side note: the OC Sheriff’s department is corrupted, violent, and racist as fuck. Literally do not ever get arrested in Orange County if you value your health.
Regardless of where they work, all police officers and deputies in California are employed by the state, not the city where they work. That means the state money ultimately goes to their wages (I’m fuzzy on this), and they enforce the state penal code. You can be arrested by a California deputy or police officer anywhere in California, regardless of where the cop is from. California Highway Patrol are their own separate agency entirely—don’t fuck with those guys if they pull you over, they have the most dangerous cop job there is.
Police officers and sheriff’s deputies enforce the state law according to the penal code, hence “law enforcement.” In the United States legal policies and statutes generally describe what you can’t do, not what you can do. So you don’t need legal permission to buy a tv, you can do that any time… but you can’t drop a tv on a person because that’s assault, which is specifically outlawed. This distinction isn’t always the case in other countries, so be careful if you travel.
Cops are brave people who risk their lives to protect their communities. They are also perpetually stressed out and living on a hair-trigger because they could be forced into a violent situation at any time and that makes them tense. That tension + institutional bias in the legal system and in American culture often leads to abuse of citizens and corruption of the prison system. If your skin is brown or black, you’re probably going to be screwed over.
Also, everything you thought The Patriot Act (and other spying policies passed since 9/11) was doing to stop terrorism? Is also being used by law enforcement to prosecute the War on Drugs. Literally every fucking thing. Law enforcement agencies use these sweeping national laws to investigate drug crime in addition to terrorism. Spying, search and seizure, conviction, imprisonment, etc etc etc. The stuff the NSA is collecting on you is very likely being utilized by law enforcement agencies to pursue the War on Drugs, which is why cops like policies that strip citizens of their privacy. It gives them more freedom to look at your stuff any time they feel like it.
Anyway, that’s how cops work. They ride around in cars (or walk sometimes), carry guns, interview witnesses to crimes, do hella paperwork, and almost never fire their weapon. Cops can go their whole career without firing their weapon in the field. They usually wear bullet proof vests under their uniform when on shift, and they carry a tazer, a baton, and pepper spray. They might carry knives as well, or a second gun. My ex bought a shotgun to keep in his car as a back-up.
After the national restrictions on assault rifles and heavy weapons were lessened in the last two decades, cops had to become heavily armed to compete with the heavily armed gangs that now have easy legal access to big guns with big clips. So in large cities like LA, Chicago, Miami, or New York the law enforcement have basically become a small, heavily-weaponized army.
Shred your receipts before you recycle, because you are living in a police state. Welcome to the 21st century.
