Decision Support for Improving Quality of Police Discretion in Manufacturing Turning Points

• In Event: Operation Turning Point: A Randomised Trial of Offender Desistance Policing

Abstract

Should police management policies focus on high officer discretion or instead focus on high top-down control of officers? Policies for managing police discretion have typically emphasized one or the other of these options. While each has benefits, each of these approaches has drawbacks that are too consequential to ignore. Instead, the current studies tested approaches to a third way in police decision-making, using decision support technology to bound discretion and provide continuing professional development. Operation Turning Point involved substantial police officer discretion at three major decision points in the progression of each case. Different approaches were utilized and effectiveness of each was tracked, finding that unlike other options, decision support produced high-quality use of officer discretion among all three types of decisions.

Author

• Molly Slothower, University of Maryland