Police Pursuit Driving - (Contributions in Criminology and Penology) by Geoffrey P Alpert & Roger G Dunham (Hardcover)

About the Book

Police strategies often develop from custom and practice without guidance from empirical research. Police officers often make their decisions based upon information and tactics with which they are the most familiar and comfortable. Choosing between available strategies and other alternatives can be improved through research and evaluation. One area of policing in which this is especially true is pursuit driving, which may be the deadliest weapon in a police officer's arsenal.

Using the analogy between improper use of firearms and improper pursuit driving, Alpert and Dunham analyze the police car as a potentially dangerous weapon. The book is based upon information gathered over several years in Dade County (Miami), Florida. Included are the details of deaths, injuries, and property damage. Also reported are the arrests and apprehensions of felony suspects. The data are presented not to scare citizens, but to assist them, members of the law enforcement community, and politicians to understand more clearly the role of pursuit in policing and crime control. Pursuit needs to be discussed as a deterrent and crime-fighting strategy, and felony arrests resulting from successful pursuit must be included to compute a cost-benefit analysis. By offering a view of police pursuit that has been heretofore unavailable, the authors hope their empirical data will replace unsupported opinion and media sensationalism as information on which to create or modify pursuit policies and legal standards.

Book Synopsis

Police strategies often develop from custom and practice without guidance from empirical research. Police officers often make their decisions based upon information and tactics with which they are the most familiar and comfortable. Choosing between available strategies and other alternatives can be improved through research and evaluation. One area of policing in which this is especially true is pursuit driving, which may be the deadliest weapon in a police officer's arsenal.

Using the analogy between improper use of firearms and improper pursuit driving, Alpert and Dunham analyze the police car as a potentially dangerous weapon. The book is based upon information gathered over several years in Dade County (Miami), Florida. Included are the details of deaths, injuries, and property damage. Also reported are the arrests and apprehensions of felony suspects. The data are presented not to scare citizens, but to assist them, members of the law enforcement community, and politicians to understand more clearly the role of pursuit in policing and crime control. Pursuit needs to be discussed as a deterrent and crime-fighting strategy, and felony arrests resulting from successful pursuit must be included to compute a cost-benefit analysis. By offering a view of police pursuit that has been heretofore unavailable, the authors hope their empirical data will replace unsupported opinion and media sensationalism as information on which to create or modify pursuit policies and legal standards.

About the Author

GEOFFREY P. ALPERT is a Professor in the College of Criminal Justice and a Research Professor in the Institute of Public Affairs at the University of South Carolina. He is the co-author, with Roger Dunham, of Policing Multi-Ethnic Neighborhoods (Greenwood Press, 1988), Policing Urban America (1988), and Critical Issues in Policing (1989).

ROGER G. DUNHAM is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Miami, Florida. He has published widely in the areas of deviance and evaluation research along with his works Policing Multi-Ethnic Neighborhoods (1988), Policing Urban America (1988), and Critical Issues in Policing (1989) with Geoffrey Alpert.