Introduction
Criminal procedures may negatively affect a person’s life or experiences. Nevertheless, someone whom the police have confronted, searched, interrogated, detained, or charged with a crime, no matter how small, has probably questioned whether their rights had been violated and whether the police behaved legally. The corpus of law that falls under the heading of the criminal process contains the solution.
The number of processes to safeguard people from unjustified detention, prosecution, arrest, or conviction is a notable aspect of the criminal justice system. Persons may be removed from the system if there is insufficient proof that they committed a crime or if a police officer, prosecutor, judge, or jury exercises their judgment and determines that there is no social justification for continuing to subject them to the criminal justice system (Fawei et al., 2018). The law enforcement officers usually undertake unreasonable investigations, thus violating the rights of people in the country.
Analysis of a Criminal Procedure in the Winnipeg Off-Duty Officer Interrogation Incident
Incident Background and Key Events
According to a police case, a Shaftesbury High School student from southwest Winnipeg claimed she missed the bus home at around 3:45 pm on Monday and had to return to her school to check for the next one. She and another girl had to walk behind the car as she crossed the street to get to the school because it was parked in the center of the crosswalk (“CBC/Radio Canada,” 2022). Soon after, a man yelled at her for hitting his car as he ran in her direction. The guy, a police officer even though he is off duty, makes the girl follow him to the girl’s school so he may talk with the principal. The girl claimed that she and the man told the headmaster and deputy headmaster their own versions of events. The man, a passenger in his wife’s car, claimed the girl struck the car as she passed it. The youngster argues that there was another person at the crosswalk and that it wasn’t just them, but the man won’t accept her denial.
The girl is upset and angry; she calls her dad at school. Her father said that upon reaching the place, he was shocked at how aggressively the man spoke to his daughter and conducted what he described as an extensive interrogation. According to the father, the man accused the teenager of lying and told her to admit she did it (“CBC/Radio Canada,” 2022). The father said he felt powerless in the situation because the man was a police officer, and he didn’t know what could happen to him or his daughter if they didn’t cooperate. The father stated that the off-duty officer’s wife had shown them a photo of the car, and he noticed no visible damage.
Investigation Practices and Procedural Violations
Reporting straight to the Chief of Police, the division in charge of resolving grievances against Winnipeg police personnel, the parent pledges for justice. The girl’s parents claimed they pleaded with him to apologize to their daughter, an honor student and hockey player, whom he had embarrassed in front of her classmates. However, they were shocked when a representative of the Occupational Standards Department claimed that an apology from the police was not an option, implying that they would not apologize.
Telling a young teenager to follow someone impersonating a police officer who isn’t wearing a uniform or displaying a badge raises safety issues. Even a minor police matter should have been investigated by a police officer who is on duty. Although it is illegal for the individual to park at the crossover, the lawsuit is more focused on what happened to the police than any potential wrongdoing on the officer’s part. Since the police officer also claims that his car was hit without any proof, the unit requesting evidence to determine whether the girl was indeed intimidated is biased. Accuracy is a process that outlines the steps for a person’s conviction. The guilty should be found guilty, and the innocent should be shielded from unfair judgments. The criminal justice system should handle matters promptly so people are not constantly afraid of prosecution. Whether innocent or guilty, they should be treated with dignity (“CBC/Radio Canada,” 2022). People should believe that the criminal justice system is impartial and that all ethnic and racial groups and the wealthy should receive justice of equal standing.
Criminal Law, Police Accountability, and Justice Implications
Basing arguments on criminal law procedures and police actions, the two disagree as the off-duty officer is seen as not following any criminal procedures. The incident was a simple misunderstanding that could have been addressed. Still, the man attempts to coerce the teenager into confessing by using his position as a police officer, despite her denials. The police officer is seen not to accept no as an answer, so full of interrogation and takes action even when off duty. When the situation reaches the mother, and they decide to report to the professional standards unit for justice, the unit sides with the police, not the victims (Grant, 2022). The unit does not accept that the officer was off duty but handled the matter. The units also refuse to accept that the police had wrongfully accused the teen and should apologize; instead, they insist that the family provide evidence.
In this situation, the police are perceived as influential figures who take the law into their own hands and apply it to their own acts rather than the law. In addition, the fact that the man frightened the girl into crying demonstrates how unfair the police are and that, rather than defending the public, they exacerbate their sense of vulnerability. If the man had followed the necessary criminal law processes, the girl and her family would not have felt intimidated. Procedures are crucial because they clarify one’s legal rights in public and court (Barker, 2020). Procedures assist with understanding the criminal justice system and its numerous features, provide insight into the decisions made by the authorities, and provide a forum for the discussion and resolution of significant issues. When considering legal procedures and their significance, two viewpoints on what should have happened and why they are indicated to be the preferable alternative, the off-duty officer would have followed in assessing who had hit his car.
The police’s initial action was to determine who had hit his car. The girl points out that as they walked up the crosswalk, there was another person, and it could have been that person who touched the car. The police officer was to investigate keenly and ensure that the accusation was not just a hypothesis. In addition, the officer was to interrogate the girl based on valid evidence that the car had actually been hit. The possibility of the man lying is evident since the car showed no damage (Bent-Goodley et al., 2022). The father said the off-duty officer’s wife showed them a picture of the car, but he could not spot any damage.
Additionally, it demonstrates the girl’s innocence because there is no proof that she ever touched the car. The man would have heard the girl’s side of the story rather than being authoritative and demanding that she admit to doing it. Similarly, the police should not have used aggressive interrogation on a minor and forced her to admit what she did not do.
Conversely, the man should not have acted on the case since he was off duty. There are safety concerns about a young person being told to follow someone who says they are a police officer but isn’t in uniform and doesn’t show a badge. The best option for the man was to call the on-duty police to investigate the matter. The man should not have felt superior to the girl and family (Grant, 2022). Also, the police would have apologized to the girl for having embarrassed and degraded her honor. According to the girl’s parents, an officer from the professional standards unit said an apology by the police was off the table, indicating how laws are one-sided. When rules are followed not only by subjects but also by law enforcers, insecurity reduces, and alternatively, trust is earned. The two points of view discuss the best strategies to make sure that the rules that have been made are followed. They also lessen the likelihood of criminal records or unfair treatment by the police.
The belief that just processes will provide accurate conclusions is reflected in criminal law and procedure. A criminal procedure system that erects too many legal obstacles in the way of the police and prosecutors will hinder the capture and conviction of the guilty (Barker, 2020). However, a system that erects too few obstacles in the way of the police may result in coerced confessions, erroneous convictions, and illegal searches. The procedure balances the community’s interests in preventing crime (Grant, 2022). Also, prosecuting criminals is essential in identifying when the crime occurs, and the interest in defending people’s rights to privacy and liberty is essential. Public respect, fairness, accuracy, efficiency, equality, and a host of other goals are also sought by criminal procedure, all of which support the overarching objective of ensuring justice.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the story raises concerns about the numerous instances of police officers’ failure to uphold the law. Firstly, the man is off duty but takes action as an on-duty officer; and secondly, the man interrogates a minor aggressively so that she becomes frightened. The case demonstrates the authority provided to the police to guarantee their protection even when they commit wrongdoings. For an individual to be accused, factual components of criminal offenses must be defined. The accusation must prove beyond a reasonable doubt both the criminal act’s injury and its criminal purpose to successfully convict a person. For instance, to obtain a conviction for robbery, the prosecution must prove that the suspect intentionally and forcibly removed property from the person or presence of the victim to deprive the victim of the item permanently.
References
Barker, T. (2020). Type 3: Sexual extortion aka sexual shakedowns. In T. Barker (Ed.), Aggressors in Blue (pp. 159-179). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.
Bent-Goodley, T., St Vil, C., Cuevas, C. A., & Abbey, A. (2022). Police, violence, and social justice: A call for research and introduction to the special issue. Psychology of Violence, 12(4), 195.
CBC/Radio Canada. (2022). Parents angry after teen says she was aggressively interrogated by off-duty winnipeg police officer | CBC news. CBCnews.
Fawei, B., Pan, J. Z., Kollingbaum, M., & Wyner, A. Z. (2018). A methodology for criminal law and procedure ontology for legal question answering. In X. Wang et al. (Eds.), Joint International Semantic Technology Conference (pp. 198-214). Springer, Cham.
Grant, L. E. (2022). The prevalence of guns and gun-related homicides in the Caribbean. In W. C. Wallace (Ed.), Guns, Gun Violence and Gun Homicides (pp. 111-136). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.