Running head: LESS THAN LETHAL FORCE: IS THERE A BETTER WAY? 1 LESS THAN LETHAL FORCE USED BY POLICE 7 Less than Lethal Force: Is There a Better Way? Alex Sierra AMU June 2nd, 2019 Abstract Today, debates continue to ensue regarding the adoption of less lethal policies across all police departments in the U.S. Some of the less harmful devices suggested include pepper sprays, chemical sprays, impact projectiles, and electroshock weapons. Even so, several tools are still in the pipeline, and their development would stretch the array of less lethal weapons that police and other law enforcement agencies could use to address numerous situations. Lack of knowledge in the general public regarding the effectiveness of using less lethal modalities is the foundational motivation for this study. Experimental research design with interviews as the primary data collection tool will facilitate the completion of the research. Keywords: Less lethal devices, lethal devices, law enforcement Less than Lethal Force Used by Police Introduction Police officers handle challenging situations that demand the use of different types of weapons. Regardless of the nature of the situation, police officers have the responsibility to ensure that the issue at hand does not compromise the safety of the law offenders and the general public. Police need to use the most appropriate device depending on the behavior of the law offenders. Most importantly, the concerned officer must use the method that matches the action of the offender. The law only allows the officers to use lethal weapons when law offenders have the potential to endanger their life. In recent years, the high rates of deaths caused by police officers have evoked debates aimed at exploring the possibility of using less lethal weapons. The fact that these devices are less lethal in comparison to firearms does not imply that they cannot cause physical and emotional harm. Therefore, their use must adhere to all precautionary regulations. The debates over the use of less lethal weapons in various law enforcement agencies and police departments continue to emanate. Most people lack knowledge on the effectiveness of using less lethal weapons as compared to using lethal weapons in maintaining law and order. Therefore, it is essential to conduct a study aimed at comparing the impact of using less lethal weapons and lethal weapons in ensuring adherence to the law. The findings established from the research could be instrumental in persuading police departments that are yet to adopt less lethal force policies to do so. In this light, the study will involve collecting data about the police activities in departments that have already adopted less lethal policies, including Boston, New York, Seattle, and Loss Angeles police departments. The findings will add to a large body of knowledge exploring the effectiveness of weapons by police officers along with fostering unification of policie.

1. Running head: LESS THAN LETHAL FORCE: IS THERE A
BETTER WAY? 1
LESS THAN LETHAL FORCE USED BY POLICE
7
Less than Lethal Force: Is There a Better Way?
Alex Sierra
AMU
June 2nd, 2019
Abstract
Today, debates continue to ensue regarding the adoption of less
lethal policies across all police departments in the U.S. Some of
the less harmful devices suggested include pepper sprays,
chemical sprays, impact projectiles, and electroshock weapons.
Even so, several tools are still in the pipeline, and their
development would stretch the array of less lethal weapons that
police and other law enforcement agencies could use to address
numerous situations. Lack of knowledge in the general public
regarding the effectiveness of using less lethal modalities is the
foundational motivation for this study. Experimental research
design with interviews as the primary data collection tool will
facilitate the completion of the research.
Keywords: Less lethal devices, lethal devices, law enforcement

2. Less than Lethal Force Used by Police
Introduction
Police officers handle challenging situations that demand the
use of different types of weapons. Regardless of the nature of
the situation, police officers have the responsibility to ensure
that the issue at hand does not compromise the safety of the law
offenders and the general public. Police need to use the most
appropriate device depending on the behavior of the law
offenders. Most importantly, the concerned officer must use the
method that matches the action of the offender. The law only
allows the officers to use lethal weapons when law offenders
have the potential to endanger their life. In recent years, the
high rates of deaths caused by police officers have evoked
debates aimed at exploring the possibility of using less lethal
weapons.
The fact that these devices are less lethal in comparison to
firearms does not imply that they cannot cause physical and
emotional harm. Therefore, their use must adhere to all
precautionary regulations. The debates over the use of less
lethal weapons in various law enforcement agencies and police
departments continue to emanate. Most people lack knowledge
on the effectiveness of using less lethal weapons as compared to
using lethal weapons in maintaining law and order. Therefore, it
is essential to conduct a study aimed at comparing the impact of
using less lethal weapons and lethal weapons in ensuring
adherence to the law. The findings established from the research
could be instrumental in persuading police departments that are
yet to adopt less lethal force policies to do so. In this light, the
study will involve collecting data about the police activities in
departments that have already adopted less lethal policies,
including Boston, New York, Seattle, and Loss Angeles police
departments. The findings will add to a large body of
knowledge exploring the effectiveness of weapons by police
officers along with fostering unification of policies regarding
the use of less lethal weapons among police departments across

3. the country.
Hypothesis/Problem Statement/Purpose Statement
Hypotheses are essential in providing the direction followed in
conducting the study. The research seeks to address the lack of
knowledge among the general public and some police
departments regarding the varying effectiveness of using lethal
and less lethal weapons by police officers. Conducting the study
in the required manner will result in reliable evidence
instrumental in formulating policies. The null and alternative
hypotheses adopted for the research will be as follows:
H0: Using less lethal weapons improves the effectiveness of
police officers in maintaining law and order.
H1: Using less lethal weapons improves the effectiveness of
police officers in maintaining law and order.
Literature Review and Definitions Included in Research
The law enforcement agencies ensure the safety of all people by
maintaining law and order. The socio-economic, political,
technological, and socio-cultural advancement of a society is
only possible under the prevalence of law and order. Therefore,
police and other enforcement agencies play a central role in the
development of society. Today, questions continue to exist
regarding the use of lethal weapons by police in situations that
do not necessarily require the use of firearms (Ferdik,
Kaminski, Cooney, & Sevigny, 2014; Terrill & Paoline, 2017).
The arguments have been raised challenging the concerned
policymakers and stakeholders to formulate policies that would
foster the use of less force by the police and other law
enforcement agencies.
The recent events in the U.S have painted a clear yet disturbing
picture of police brutality, especially against individuals from
the African-American community. Given the high rates of death
of Black suspects compared to White suspects at the hands of
the police officers, the general public has been led to believe
that racial bias influences officers’ behavior. However, a study
by James, James, and Vila (2016) challenges the idea conveyed
by the race-related debates. The study used a sample size of 80

4. officers and aimed to investigate their behavior in extreme
realistic environments consisting of White and Black suspects.
The study reveals that most officers are hesitant to shoot armed
Black suspects in comparison to White armed suspects.
Moreover, the findings show that the officers are less likely to
use lethal weapons on unarmed Black suspects in comparison to
unarmed White suspects.
The studies by Payne-James, Rivers, Green, and Johnston
(2014) and Jetelina, Jennings, Bishopp, Piquero, and Reingle
Gonzalez (2017) investigated the complexities of using less
lethal and lethal weapons by police officers. In particular, the
study by Jetelina et al. (2017) provides essential findings
regarding officers-civilian sub-lethal interactions. The
researchers reveal that 48% of forceful interactions occur
between the White officers and the non-white civilians.
Conversely, the study by Payne-James et al. (2014) shows that
the use of less force over the years has improved the
effectiveness of law enforcement agencies. Therefore,
conducting this research will aim to advance the findings
established from the previous studies and create the foundation
for future studies.
Research Methods/Design
Experimental research design with interviews as the primary
data collection tool will facilitate the completion of the
research. The participants in the study will be drawn from four
police departments that have implemented the less lethal
policies, including Boston, New York, Seattle, and Loss
Angeles police departments. In this light, the participants must
have served at a time before the adoption of the less lethal
policies. Having the experience of both periods would be
crucial in the successful completion of the research. The open-
ended interview questions would seek to foster flexibility in
responses provided by the participants. Moreover, participants
will be guaranteed confidentiality, and they will all sign the
consent forms before partaking in the study.

5. References
Ferdik, F. V., Kaminski, R. J., Cooney, M. D., & Sevigny, E. L.
(2014). The influence of agency policies on conducted energy
device use and police use of lethal force. Police
Quarterly, 17(4), 328-358.
James, L., James, S. M., & Vila, B. J. (2016). The reverse
racism effect: Are cops more hesitant to shoot black than white
suspects? Criminology & Public Policy, 15(2), 457-479.
Jetelina, K. K., Jennings, W. G., Bishopp, S. A., Piquero, A. R.,
& Reingle Gonzalez, J. M. (2017). Dissecting the complexities
of the relationship between police officer–civilian race/ethnicity
dyads and less-than-lethal use of force. American journal of
public health, 107(7), 1164-1170.
Payne-James, J. J., Rivers, E., Green, P., & Johnston, A. (2014).
Trends in less-lethal use of force techniques by police services
within England and Wales: 2007–2011. Forensic science,
medicine, and pathology, 10(1), 50-55.
Terrill, W., & Paoline III, E. A. (2017). Police use of less lethal
force: Does administrative policy matter?Justice
Quarterly, 34(2), 193-216.
https://doi.org/10.1080/07418825.2016.1147593
Assignment Content
1.
Top of Form
Research the following four federal agencies:
· U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)
· U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (U.S. EPA)
· Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)
· U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC)
Provide one real world example of an entity that each agency
regulates.

6. Submit your assignment.
Bottom of Form
Dissecting the Complexities of the Relationship
Between Police Officer–Civilian Race/Ethnicity
Dyads and Less-Than-Lethal Use of Force
Katelyn K. Jetelina, PhD, MPH, Wesley G. Jennings, PhD,
Stephen A. Bishopp, PhD, Alex R. Piquero, PhD, and Jennifer
M.
Reingle Gonzalez, PhD
Objectives.To examine how sublethal use-of-force patterns vary
across officer–civilian
race/ethnicity while accounting for officer-, civilian-, and
situational-level factors.
Methods. We extracted cross-sectional data from 5630 use-of-
force reports from the
Dallas Police Department in 2014 and 2015. We categorized
each officer–civilian in-
teraction into race/ethnicity dyads. We used multilevel, mixed
logistic regression models
to evaluate the relationship between race/ethnicity dyads and
the types of use of force.
Results. Forty-eight percent of use-of-force interactions
occurred between a White

7. officer and a non-White civilian (White–non-White). In
bivariate models, the odds of
hard-empty hand control and intermediate weapon use were
significantly higher among
White–Black dyads compared with White–White dyads. The
bivariate odds of in-
termediate weapon use were also significantly higher among
Black–Black, Hispanic–
White, Black–Hispanic, and Hispanic–Black dyads compared
with White–White dyads.
However, after we controlled for individual and situational
factors, the relationship
between race/ethnicity dyad and hard-empty hand control was
no longer significant.
Conclusions. Although we observed significant bivariate
relationships between race/
ethnicity dyads and use of force, these relationships largely
dissipated after we con-
trolled for other factors. (Am J Public Health. 2017;107:1164–
1170. doi:10.2105/
AJPH.2017.303807)
Because of recent high-profile events,
1
public attention has increasingly focused

8. on use-of-force interactions between police
officers and civilians. Public opinion has
attributed the degree of force used in any
given interaction to the race/ethnicity of the
civilian and police officer. This is expected
given the fact that the race/ethnicity of
a civilian is the strongest demographic factor
that predicts public opinions, whether that be
positive or negative, about the police.2–4
However, because of methodological in-
consistencies and gaps in the extant research,
the relationship among officer race/ethnicity,
civilian race/ethnicity, and use of force is
unclear.5
Police officer characteristics, and specifi-
cally race/ethnicity, have received consider-
able scientific attention and many studies
have found no relationship between officer
race/ethnicity and use of force.6–10 For
example, in a multisite study, Paoline and
Terrill observed no racial or ethnic differences
in coercive practices after they controlled
for officer-, suspect-, and encounter-level
characteristics.7 Also, Lott and Moody found
no difference in fatal shootings of Black
suspects among Black and White officers
and concluded that their “findings [were]
inconsistent with taste-based racial discrimi-
nation against blacks by white police offi-
cers.”11(p20) On the other hand, Garner et al.
found that Hispanic officers had an increased
odds of using force compared with White

9. officers, although no significant effects
were observed for force severity by officer
race/ethnicity.12 In addition, McElvain and
Kposowa found that White officers were
more likely to use deadly force than Hispanic
officers and not more likely than Black
officers.13
Literature evaluating the relationship
between civilian race/ethnicity and use of
force is also mixed.5 Many studies report no
relationship between civilian race/ethnicity
and force used by police officers.6,8,9,14–16
However, results from a recent meta-analysis
suggest that minority civilians are more likely
to be arrested, a form of force, than White
civilians.17 Furthermore, a recent, highly
publicized report found that Black civilians
are more likely to be touched, handcuffed,
and pepper-sprayed, but not more likely to
encounter lethal forms of force.18
A valid assessment of the relationship
between officer and civilian characteristics
related to use of force is important to inform
preventive efforts and to mend the tense
community relationships between the police
and the public.18,19 Although numerous
studies have examined the relationship
between officer or civilian race/ethnicity and
use of force, none of these studies to our
knowledge have explored how use-of-
force patterns vary as a function of the officer–
civilian race/ethnicity dyad, specifically
beyond Black and White dyads. In other

10. ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Katelyn K.Jetelina and Jennifer M. Reingle Gonzalez are
withthe Universityof Texas Health Science Center, School of
Public
Health–Dallas. Wesley G. Jennings is with the University of
South Florida, Department of Criminology, Tampa. Stephen A.
Bishopp is with the Caruth Police Institute/Dallas Police
Department, Dallas. Alex R. Piquero is with The University of
Texas
at Dallas, Program in Criminology, Richardson.
Correspondence should be sent to Katelyn Jetelina, 6011 Harry
Hines Blvd, Dallas, TX 75390 (e-mail: [email protected]
utsouthwestern.edu). Reprints can be ordered at
http://www.ajph.org by clicking the “Reprints” link.
This article was accepted March 16, 2017.
doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2017.303807
1164 Research Peer Reviewed Jetelina et al. AJPH July 2017,
Vol 107, No. 7
AJPH RESEARCH
mailto:[email protected]
mailto:[email protected]
http://www.ajph.org
words, officer and civilian race and ethnicity
have been considered as independent risk
factors for use of force; however, use of force
is inherently nested in an officer–civilian dyad
(e.g., force patterns may be different when
a White officer is interacting with a Black

11. civilian compared with a Black officer
interacting with a Black civilian). To address
this important problem, we examined how
sublethal use-of-force patterns vary across
officer–civilian race/ethnicity dyads, while
accounting for officer-, civilian-, and
situational-level factors.
METHODS
Dallas, Texas, is the ninth largest city in the
United States (with a 2010 population of
approximately 1.2 million) and is policed
primarily by the 3551 sworn members of the
Dallas Police Department (DPD). In February
2016, 82% (n = 2900) of DPD were male and
51% (n = 1818) identified as non-Hispanic
White.
Since January 1, 2013, officers at DPD
have been mandated to complete a use-of-
force report, called the “Blue Team report,”
every time they engage in use of force beyond
compliant arrest. These reports document
individual (e.g., complainant or civilian and
officer characteristics), situational, and envi-
ronmental factors related to each use-of-force
altercation.20 Examples of force include, but
are not limited to, deployment of physical
defensive tactics (e.g., “take downs”), use of
pressure points, oleoresin capsicum spray
deployment (i.e., pepper spray), and drawing
and discharge of weapons—batons, Tasers,
and firearms. Each Blue Team report is linked
to the completing officer’s badge number to
allow for an assessment of how use-of-force

12. patterns vary within and between police
officers.
Blue Team reports are completed im-
mediately after the incident (with the ex-
ception of firearm discharges) and forwarded
to field supervisors for approval. These re-
ports are periodically uploaded to a publicly
available database. Instances involving
firearm discharges or in-custody-death in-
cidents were excluded from these records.
Officer-involved shooting incidents (i.e.,
shots fired by officers or at officers) and
deaths occurring after an individual has
been detained or arrested are routinely
investigated by the Special Investigative
Unit. Detectives within those investigative
areas are responsible for use-of-force entries
into the Blue Team database after the initial
investigation of each event. All other in-
cidents involving a use of force greater
than compliant handcuffing are recorded
by either the officers involved or the
responding supervisor immediately after
the preliminary investigation. We used
these abstracted records in the current
study, which included data from 5630
Blue Team reports submitted by 1693
DPD officers. This represents all
reports filed from January 2014 to
December 2015.
Measures
Outcome. Force used was recorded by

13. officers immediately after each incident. In
the Blue Team database, officers were pre-
sented with a drop-down menu of 40 types of
force used to select from, including baton
display, verbal command, handcuffing take
down, leg restraint system, pressure points,
and oleoresin capsicum spray (among others).
In accordance with DPD policies and pro-
cedures, 40 force options were categorized to
represent the force continuum21: (1) verbal
direction (e.g., verbal command and combat
stance), (2) soft-empty hand control (e.g.,
held suspect down, pressure points, threatened
to use Taser, and displayed Taser), (3)
hard-empty hand control (e.g., joint locks
or weapon display at person), and (4) in-
termediate weapon use (e.g., pepperball
saturation and used Taser). Deadly force was
not included in this data set because of the rare
occurrence of these cases (n = 26 in DPD
from 2014 to 2015) and because of the fact
that they are reported through a specialized
unit within DPD. Because the force contin-
uum variables are not mutually exclusive, we
dichotomized the types of force used in each
of the 4 outcomes for analysis (e.g., 0=no
verbal direction used;1=verbal direction used).
Individual factors. We gathered officer
gender, officer race/ethnicity (non-Hispanic
White, non-Hispanic Black, Hispanic, other
[including Native American and Asian]),
and tenure (< 5 years, 5 to <10 years, ‡ 10
years), calculated from hire date, from Blue
Team reports.

14. Civilian gender and civilian race/ethnicity
(non-Hispanic White, non-Hispanic Black,
Hispanic, other [including Native American
TABLE 1—Sample Description: Dallas
Police Department, Dallas, TX, 2014–2015
Characteristics No. (%)
All use-of-force reports (n = 5630)
Race/ethnicity dyads (officer-citizen)
White–White 765 (14)
White–Non-White (Black/Hispanic/
other)
2685 (48)
White–Black 1806 (32)
White–Hispanic 764 (14)
White–Other 115 (2)
Black–Black 556 (10)
Hispanic–Hispanic 292 (5)
Black–White 160 (3)
Hispanic–White 210 (4)
Black–Hispanic 177 (3)

15. Hispanic–Black 563 (10)
Other (and missing) 222 (4)
Force continuum
Verbal 1879 (33)
Soft emptya 3070 (55)
Hard emptyb 2210 (39)
Intermediate weapon usec 391 (7)
Civilian under influence 2411 (43)
Civilian mental health symptomology 841 (15)
Unique officers involved in use-of-force
altercations (n = 1693)
Male gender 1461 (87)
Race/ethnicity
White non-Hispanic 935 (55)
Black non-Hispanic 360 (21)
Hispanic 337 (20)
Other 62 (4)
Tenure, y

16. < 5 425 (25)
5 to < 10 587 (35)
‡ 10 682 (40)
No. of use-of-force incidents
1 570 (34)
2 340 (20)
3 229 (14)
‡ 4 554 (32)
aFor example, held suspect down, pressure
points, threatened to use Taser, and displayed
Taser.
bFor example, joint locks or weapon display at
person.
cForexample,pepperballsaturationandusedTaser.
AJPH RESEARCH
July 2017, Vol 107, No. 7 AJPH Jetelina et al. Peer Reviewed
Research 1165
and Asian]) were self-reported by the officer
as a part of the Blue Team report.
Race/ethnicity dyads. We matched the
main exposure, the dyad of officer race/
ethnicity and civilian race/ethnicity per Blue

17. Team report, and categorized them into 10
groupings with officer race/ethnicity first and
civilian race/ethnicity second (White–White
[referent], White–Black, White–Hispanic,
Black–White, Black–Black, Black–Hispanic,
Hispanic–White, Hispanic–Black, Hispanic–
Hispanic, other).
Situational factors. Calls for service were
categorized by the responding police officer
into 8 mutually exclusive groups:
1. arrest,
2. call for assistance,
3. crime in progress,
4. service call,
5. suspicious activity,
6. traffic stop,
7. warrant execution, and
8. other.
These data provide requisite context about
the motivation for the officer–civilian
interaction.
Other risk factors. Officers reported
whether they perceived that the complainant
was under the influence of alcohol or drugs
(dichotomized) or appeared to be suffering
from severe mental health symptomology
(dichotomized) during the incident. We in-
cluded these variables in the model as con-
founders because civilian impairment by
substances and mental health symptoms has
been associated with elevated use of force by

18. police officers.14,22–24
Statistical Analysis
To describe the prevalence of racial/ethnic
dyads in use-of-force incidents, we matched
officer race/ethnicity and civilian race/
ethnicity and categorized them into 10
groupings. We used tabulations to describe
the distribution of race/ethnicity dyads,
use-of-force typologies within the force
continuum, civilian and police officer de-
mographics, and officer tenure. Because
multiple officers could complete Blue Team
Reports for the same incident, multivariate
analyses accounted for the 2-stage clustering
design (e.g., officers’ Blue Team reports were
nested within each call).
We used SAS command glimmix (version
9.4; SAS Institute Inc, Cary, NC) to model
2-level, logistic mixed effects (random
intercept) regression to evaluate the re-
lationship between race/ethnicity dyads
(White–non-White vs White–White; in-
dependent variable) and types of sublethal
force used (dependent variable). Model
building commenced by fitting bivariate
TABLE 2—Prevalence and Adjusted Odds Ratios of Hard-
Empty Hand Control and
Intermediate Weapon Use Among White–Non-White Compared
With White–White
Officer–Citizen Dyads: Dallas Police Department, Dallas, TX,
2014–2015

19. Hard Empty
(n = 2210)
Intermediate Weapon Use
(n = 391)
Variable No.a AOR (95% CI) No.b AOR (95% CI)
Race/ethnicity dyads (officer–citizen)
White–White 284/481 1 (Ref) 35/730 1 (Ref)
White–Non-White 1146/1539 1.15 (0.94, 1.42) 183/2502 1.73
(0.98, 3.04)
Other 780/1399 0.89 (0.73, 1.10) 173/2006 1.94 (1.11, 3.42)
Officer level
Gender
Female 210/469 1 (Ref) 56/623 1 (Ref)
Male 2000/2950 1.53 (1.25, 1.89) 335/4615 0.89 (0.55, 1.44)
Tenure, y
< 5 609/1148 1 (Ref) 92/1665 1 (Ref)
5 to < 10 1103/1381 1.51 (1.29, 1.76) 179/2305 1.89 (1.26,
2.83)
‡ 10 498/891 1.07 (0.90, 1.28) 120/1269 1.97 (1.27, 3.06)
Civilian level
Gender

20. Female 360/730 1 (Ref) 46/1044 1 (Ref)
Male 1844/2680 1.33 (1.12, 1.59) 344/4180 2.26 (1.34, 1.82)
Situational level
Civilian under influence
No 1317/1902 1 (Ref) 205/3014 1 (Ref)
Yes 893/1518 0.74 (0.64, 0.85) 186/2225 1.35 (0.93, 1.96)
Civilian mental health symptomology
No 1960/2829 1 (Ref) 335/4454 1 (Ref)
Yes 250/591 0.53 (0.43, 0.66) 56/785 1.08 (0.63, 0.84)
Service type
Arrest 968/1464 1 (Ref) 168/2264 1 (Ref)
Call for cover 95/177 0.76 (0.55, 1.04) 25/247 1.76 (0.86, 3.61)
Crime in progress 151/120 1.72 (1.25, 2.38) c/262 0.45 (0.16,
1.26)
Service call 624/1015 0.88 (0.75, 1.04) 112/1527 0.93 (0.62,
1.41)
Suspicious activity 46/85 0.65 (0.41, 1.03) c/126 0.24 (0.06,
1.01)
Traffic stop 115/121 1.16 (0.82, 1.62) 10/226 0.49 (0.17, 1.40)
Warrant execution 17/21 1.13 (0.51, 2.48) c/36 1.33 (0.18, 9.80)

21. Other 194/416 0.62 (0.49, 0.78) 60/550 1.84 (1.09, 3.12)
Note. AOR = adjusted odds ratio; CI = confidence interval. To
calculate crude odds ratios, divide the
no. fraction for the predictor category by the no. fraction of the
referent category. The crude odds
ratios may not match Tables A and B (available as a supplement
to the online version of this article at
http://www.ajph.org) because they do not take into account the
clustered study design.
aNo. among reports with hard-empty hand control/no. among
reports without hard-empty hand control.
bNo. among reports with intermediate weapon use/no. among
reports without intermediate weapon
use.
cn < 10.
AJPH RESEARCH
1166 Research Peer Reviewed Jetelina et al. AJPH July 2017,
Vol 107, No. 7
http://www.ajph.org
regression models for each independent
variable. Because significant relationships
emerged in these bivariate models, we ex-
panded models incrementally to include
individual and situational covariates
(officer demographics, tenure, civilian
gender, civilian impairment by substances
or mental health symptomology, and
service type).

22. RESULTS
A description of the sample is provided in
Table 1. From January 1, 2014, through
December 31, 2015, 5630 unique Blue Team
use-of-force reports were filed by 1693
unique DPD officers. White officers’ in-
teractions with non-White civilians repre-
sented 48% of the total interactions; of these,
67% were White–Black (White officer–Black
civilian; n = 1806). Black–Black and His-
panic–Black dyads each represented 10% of
the sample. Officers reported use of
soft-empty hand control in 55% of reports,
hard-empty hand control in 39% of reports,
verbal force in 33% of reports, and in-
termediate weapon deployment in 7% of
reports. Of the officers, 43% reported that the
civilian was under the influence of alcohol or
drugs and 15% reported the civilian to be
exhibiting symptoms of a mental health
condition.
Of the 1693 unique police officers in
our sample, 87% were male and the ma-
jority (55%) were non-Hispanic White.
Twenty-five percent of officers were
employed by DPD for less than 5 years and
32% of officers had more than 4 use-of-
force incidents recorded over the 2-year
study period.
There was no significant bivariate re-
lationship between White–non-White dyad
and White–White dyad encounters in re-

23. lation to verbal or soft-empty hand control
(data not shown). Because significant bivariate
models emerged betweenrace/ethnicity dyad
and hard-empty hand control and interme-
diate weapon use (Tables A and B, available as
a supplement to the online version of this
article at http://www.ajph.org), models
were expanded to include officer-, civilian-,
and situational-level confounders (Table 2).
After we controlled for covariates, differ-
ences in the odds of hard-empty hand
control between White–non-White dyad
and White–White dyad encounters were
not significant (odds ratio [OR] = 1.15; 95%
confidence interval [CI] = 0.94, 1.42).
Similarly, variations in the odds of
intermediate weapon use between White–
non-White dyad and White–White dyad
encounters were not significant after we
controlled for officer-, civilian-, and
situational-level factors (OR = 1.73; 95%
CI = 0.98, 3.04).
Table 3 expands the race/ethnicity dyads
to examine how these use-of-force patterns
vary according to specific combinations of
officer and civilian race/ethnicity. Results
from bivariate models suggest that use of
verbal commands and soft-empty hand
control techniques were significantly less
frequently reported in Black–Black dyad
encounters and Hispanic–Hispanic dyad en-
counters compared with White–White dyad
encounters. The odds of hard-empty hand
control were significantly higher among

24. White–Black dyad encounters compared
with White–White dyad encounters.
Furthermore, Black–Black, White–Black,
Hispanic–White, Black–Hispanic, and
Hispanic–Black dyad encounters had higher
odds of intermediate weapon use than
White–White dyad encounters.
Table 4 displays results from the multilevel,
multivariate regression analyses examining
the persistence in variation between race/
ethnicity dyads and use of force. After we
controlled for officer-, civilian-, and
situational-level covariates, the odds of
hard-empty hand control were significantly
lower among Black–Black dyad encounters
compared with White–White dyad en-
counters (OR = 0.74; 95% CI = 0.56, 0.98).
The odds of intermediate weapon use were
significantly higher among White–Black
(OR = 2.34; 95% CI = 1.22, 4.53), Hispanic–
White (OR = 4.14; 95% CI = 1.62, 10.60),
Black–Hispanic (OR = 3.09; 95% CI = 1.08,
8.85), and Hispanic–Black (OR = 3.18;
95% CI = 1.47, 6.89) dyad encounters
compared with White–White dyad
encounters.
DISCUSSION
The use of force by police, when
inappropriate, is a significant concern—
especially when such instances are dispro-
portionately experienced by certain races/
ethnicities. The detrimental effect of such
circumstances has the power to strain confi-

25. dence and trust in the police, which is essential
to building effective crime-control partner-
ships between civilians and the police.25–27 In
accordance, empirical analysis of this issue is
critical for theory and especially for police
policy and practice.
In this study, we used the population of
use-of-force incidents from the DPD in 2014
and 2015 to examine how the race/ethnicity
of both the officer and the civilian were in-
terrelated across a range of use-of-force in-
cidents. Not only does our work present an
important contribution to a salient national
TABLE 3—Crude Odds Ratios of Types of Sublethal Use of
Force Across Officer–Civilian
Race/Ethnicity Dyad: Dallas Police Department, Dallas, TX,
2014–2015
Variable
Verbal, OR
(95% CI)
Soft Empty, OR
(95% CI)
Hard Empty, OR
(95% CI)
Intermediate Weapon Use,
OR (95% CI)
Race/ethnicity dyads
(officer–citizen)

26. White–White (Ref) 1 1 1 1
Black–Black 0.74 (0.56, 0.99) 0.74 (0.56, 0.97) 0.76 (0.58,
1.01) 2.22 (1.04, 4.77)
Hispanic–Hispanic 0.43 (0.29, 0.62) 0.64 (0.45, 0.90) 1.07
(0.76, 1.49) 0.58 (0.19, 1.75)
White–Black 0.93 (0.75, 1.16) 0.86 (0.69, 1.07) 1.31 (1.06,
1.62) 2.25 (1.19, 4.27)
Black–White 0.57 (0.36, 0.90) 0.87 (0.57, 1.34) 0.65 (0.42,
1.01) 2.06 (0.63, 6.69)
White–Hispanic 0.93 (0.71, 1.20) 0.82 (0.63, 1.06) 1.18 (0.92,
1.52) 1.57 (0.75, 3.29)
Hispanic–White 0.89 (0.60, 1.32) 0.84 (0.58, 1.23) 0.88 (0.60,
1.28) 3.94 (1.58, 9.83)
Black–Hispanic 0.76 (0.50, 1.17) 0.92 (0.61, 1.40) 0.84 (0.56,
1.27) 3.07 (1.09, 8.69)
Hispanic–Black 1.00 (0.76, 1.32) 0.79 (0.60, 1.04) 1.02 (0.78,
1.34) 2.60 (1.22, 5.51)
Note. CI = confidence interval; OR = odds ratio.
AJPH RESEARCH
July 2017, Vol 107, No. 7 AJPH Jetelina et al. Peer Reviewed
Research 1167
http://www.ajph.org

27. issue, but its use of a broad conception of race
and ethnicity in general and in examining
various race dyads also specifically represents
a key extension over much of the previous
work in this area because of its concentrated
focus on Whites and Blacks. Research more
generally on criminological and criminal
justice topics has, unfortunately, not con-
sidered Hispanics in large part because of
data sources not containing the relevant
information.28,29
The overarching finding from our analysis
of these data showed that, although there
were significant bivariate relationships
between race/ethnicity dyads and use of
force, control for other factors related to
both officers and civilians rendered most
early relationships insignificant. Among
hard-empty hand control, relationships
interestingly dissipated once situational fac-
tors, such as the citizen being under the in-
fluence of alcohol or drugs, were introduced
into the model. These results notwithstand-
ing, the odds of intermediate weapon use
among Hispanic–White, Black–Hispanic,
White–Black, and Hispanic–Black dyads
remained significant in complex multivariate
models, and this is certainly not an in-
consequential finding.
Limitations
Findings from this study should be con-

28. sidered in light of 3 limitations. First, all data
were obtained from police officer self-
reports for which no information about
validity or reliability of reporting practices is
available. A number of safeguards are in place
to prevent widespread falsification of doc-
uments. Use-of-force reports are routinely
reviewed and approved by police supervi-
sors, a process likely to identify and flag
details not consistent with the associated
narrative. Falsified records are subject to
internal affairs investigation and disciplinary
action for all involved officers, a ramification
that may deter officers from providing
false information. That said, it is very difficult
to obtain objective data on the entire range
of use-of-force incidents in a single, large
city over an extensive time period. The
widespread use of body cameras may play
a role in validating the reporting practices
of police officers in future research.
Second, use of data from a single police
department limits the external validity of
these findings. In the absence of national
(or state) surveillance systems tracking police
use of force, this limitation will continue to
limit our knowledge about officer–civilian
interactions. Finally, the use-of-force in-
cident reports did not contain all possible
factors that play a role in police–citizen
interactions. For example, community-level
factors, such as crime rates; individual-level
factors, such as civilian or officer body
height or weight, physical fitness, and

29. visible tattoos; or situational-level factors,
such as day or night shift, may all
TABLE 4—Adjusted Odds Ratios of Hard-Empty Hand Control
and Intermediate Weapon Use
Across Officer–Civilian Race/Ethnicity Dyad: Dallas Police
Department, Dallas, TX, 2014–
2015
Variable Hard Empty, AOR (95% CI) Intermediate Weapon Use,
AOR (95% CI)
Race dyads (officer–citizen)
White–White (Ref) 1 1
Black–Black 0.74 (0.56, 0.98) 2.00 (0.90, 4.42)
Hispanic–Hispanic 1.01 (0.71, 1.42) 0.69 (0.23, 2.09)
White–Black 1.18 (0.95, 1.47) 2.34 (1.22, 4.53)
Black–White 0.70 (0.45, 1.09) 2.11 (0.64, 7.00)
White–Hispanic 1.05 (0.80, 1.36) 1.58 (0.75, 3.36)
Hispanic–White 0.93 (0.63, 1.36) 4.14 (1.62, 10.6)
Black–Hispanic 0.85 (0.56, 1.28) 3.09 (1.08, 8.85)
Hispanic–Black 0.95 (0.72, 1.25) 3.18 (1.47, 6.89)
Officer level
Gender

30. Female (Ref) 1 1
Male 1.52 (1.23, 1.89) 1.00 (0.59, 1.70)
Tenure, y
< 5 (Ref) 1 1
5 to < 10 1.51 (1.29, 1.77) 2.00 (1.28, 3.13)
‡ 10 1.08 (0.90, 1.30) 2.45 (1.49, 4.01)
Civilian level
Gender
Female (Ref) 1 1
Male 1.34 (1.12, 1.61) 2.28 (1.26, 4.12)
Situational level
Civilian under influence
No (Ref) 1 1
Yes 0.76 (0.65, 0.88) 1.31 (0.86, 1.97)
Civilian mental health symptomology
No (Ref) 1 1
Yes 0.53 (0.43, 0.66) 1.01 (0.55, 1.84)
Service type
Arrest (Ref) 1 1

31. Call for cover 1.79 (0.57, 1.09) 1.93 (0.87, 4.23)
Crime in progress 1.74 (1.24, 2.44) 0.31 (0.09, 1.03)
Service call 0.88 (0.74, 1.03) 1.03 (0.65, 1.65)
Suspicious activity 0.63 (0.39, 1.01) 0.21 (0.05, 0.97)
Traffic stop 1.27 (0.89, 1.82) 0.78 (0.25, 2.39)
Warrant execution 1.02 (0.45, 2.29) 1.43 (0.18, 11.6)
Other 0.62 (0.49, 0.79) 1.96 (1.09, 3.53)
Note. AOR = adjusted odds ratio; CI = confidence interval.
AJPH RESEARCH
1168 Research Peer Reviewed Jetelina et al. AJPH July 2017,
Vol 107, No. 7
influence how use-of-force situations play
out on the streets during police–citizen
encounters. Because officer behavior
could vary according to these circumstances,
future research should strive to collect those
data and append them to force incident
reports.30
Public Health Implications
Ultimately, these findings have important
implications for policy within the DPD. For
example, although the majority of use-of-

32. force variability dissipated across race/
ethnicity dyad once a host of covariates was
introduced into the models, it is important for
the DPD to continue to improve trust and
legitimacy within the police–citizen in-
teraction, especially with respect to use of
force. This has been, and should continue
to be, accomplished through public in-
formational transparency via open data from
most operational units within DPD. Yet, to
the general civilian, deciphering police ter-
minology is often difficult. The provision of
codebooks that operationalize variables
consistent with requirements for most
grant-funded social research would increase
DPD’s data transparency and utility. Un-
fortunately, DPD and most other policing
agencies do not have sufficient resources to
gather, manipulate, analyze, and present data
in a publicly accessible, user-friendly manner.
The results of this study also have policy
implications for DPD training. Looking to
improving police–citizen interaction dy-
namics with an eye toward reducing excessive
use of force, new implicit bias training has
begun to incorporate officers’ thought pro-
cesses and decision-making through high-
quality, scenario-based judgment training.31
Training programs for DPD should be tied
with findings from the neuropsychological
literature. For example, meta-cognitive ap-
proaches, such as coaching DPD officers with
the constructive and deliberate practice of
recognizing the way they think and why, may

33. allow officers to act and reflect more objec-
tively in high-intensity situations. Officers
will gain increased self-awareness, which, in
turn, may significantly improve officer–
citizen interactions, specifically surrounding
race/ethnicity and intermediate weapon use
variability, as seen in this current study. This
method has improved performance around
other high-stress occupations, such as trauma
care teams.32
In sum, although in this study we used data
from 1 large, urban police department, the
issues raised are relevant to all police agencies,
especially those serving diverse communities.
President Obama’s Task Force on 21st
Century Policing has recently made a num-
ber of recommendations surrounding
“shoot/don’t shoot” scenarios, de-escalation
tactics, and the use of less-than-lethal
alternatives to deadly force to reduce the
occurrence of police use of force.27 In
addition, the President’s Task Force recom-
mendations have led to 130 police agencies
making much of their data openly available
to the public. Encounters involving police
use of force and their relationship to citizen
race/ethnicity, real or perceived, coupled
with publicly available data, fervently calls
for research like the current study to ex-
amine the nuances of those often unstable
encounters.
In this same vein, there is a growing and
encouraging amount of evaluation research

34. highlighting the effectiveness of police officer
body-worn cameras for reducing the fre-
quency and prevalence of the use of force and
civilian-generated external complaints.33
Thus, it is likely that the implementation of
strategies and initiatives along the lines out-
lined and recommended by President Oba-
ma’s Task Force in addition to the adoption of
police officer body-worn cameras will be
a step in the right direction to prevent officer
misuse of force, reduce the likelihood of force
rising to the level at which deadly force is
necessary, and improve police–community
relations, particularly in racial/ethnic mi-
nority communities.
CONTRIBUTORS
K. K. Jetelina managed the data set, ran the analyses,
and drafted the article. S. A. Bishopp provided feed-
back on the data set and specific Dallas Police De-
partment policies and implications. W. G. Jennings
and A. R. Piquero drafted the Discussion and assisted in
editing throughout. J. M. Reingle Gonzalez provided
critical analysis, feedback, and edits throughout the
development of the article.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Funding for this study was provided by the University of
Texas School of Public Health’s Front of the Envelope
Innovation Award.
HUMAN PARTICIPANT PROTECTION
Institutional review board approval was received from the
University of Texas Health Science Center.

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Reproduced with permission of copyright owner.
Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
Supervisory influences on
officers’ perceptions of less lethal
force policy: a multilevel analysis
Jason Robert Ingram
Department of Criminal Justice Sciences, Illinois State
University,
Normal, Illinois, USA
Robert R. Weidner
University of Minnesota-Duluth, Duluth, Minnesota, USA
Eugene A. Paoline III
Department of Criminal Justice, University of Central Florida,
Orlando, Florida, USA, and
William Terrill

40. Michigan State University, Lansing, Michigan, USA
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of
sergeants’ less lethal force policy
perceptions on subordinate officers’ policy perceptions.
Sergeants are a critical level of supervision in
police departments with respect to policy administration,
particularly in regard to the use of force.
Little empirical research, however, has been conducted on
either officer policy perceptions or this
aspect of the supervisory role.
Design/methodology/approach – Surveys of 765 patrol officers
and 146 patrol sergeants
served as the data source. Multilevel modeling procedures were
used to test for supervisory influences
on officer force policy perceptions while controlling for
relevant officer-level variables. Additional
analyses were conducted to examine potential moderating
effects for this sergeant-officer attitudinal
relationship.
Findings – Findings revealed that sergeant policy perceptions,
views of top management, and their
level of support had a significant impact on officers’ force
policy perceptions. Furthermore, post hoc
analyses revealed that sergeant support moderated the sergeant-
officer force policy perception
relationship.
Research limitations/implications – The results indicate that
officers’ force policy perceptions are
associated with the attitudinal dispositions of sergeants. Future
work could expand the focus on
administrative attitudinal outcomes beyond less lethal force
policies as well as other perceptions of the
work environment.

41. Practical implications – For police leaders, the findings
illustrate the need to pay attention
to mid-management levels and the organizational climate, as
negative orientations can impact
additional domains (i.e. policies and procedures) and other
organizational members (i.e. subordinates).
Originality/value – The study adds to the limited body of
research on two accountability
mechanisms of departments: administrative rulemaking and
frontline supervision.
Keywords Policy, Frontline supervision, Less lethal force,
Officer attitudes, Sergeants
Paper type Research paper
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is
available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/1363-951X.htm
Received 26 May 2013
Revised 4 September 2013
Accepted 4 September 2013
Policing: An International Journal of
Police Strategies & Management
Vol. 37 No. 2, 2014
pp. 355-372
r Emerald Group Publishing Limited
1363-951X
DOI 10.1108/PIJPSM-05-2013-0051

42. This research is based on data from the National Institute of
Justice Grant No. 2005-IJ-CX-
0055NIJ. Points of view expressed in this paper are those of the
author and do not necessarily
reflect the views of NIJ or the US Department of Justice. The
authors would like to thank
the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and
guidance in the preparation of
this paper.
355
Perceptions
of less lethal
force policy
Introduction
Less lethal force policies serve as accountability mechanisms
within police
departments as ways to control officers’ use of force behaviors.
It has been
recommended that force policies be clearly written and have the
capacity to guide
officers’ decision making in situations that call for force to be
used (McEwen, 1997;
Walker, 2007). As a result, officers’ perceptions of their
departments’ less lethal
force policies have emerged as an outcome for assessing the
effectiveness of this
administrative process as it provides insight into the potential
benefits of policy
approaches (Terrill and Paoline, 2013b). Departmental policies,
however, are not
implemented in a vacuum. Frontline supervisors, particularly

43. sergeants are tasked
with administering and monitoring officer adherence to policies.
Sergeants represent
the first administrative layer that reviews, checks, and, in some
cases, reports force
usage by their patrol officers. In essence, frontline supervision
plays a critical role
in communicating policies to subordinate officers (Manning,
1997; Skogan, 2008;
Walker, 2007).
Despite the importance of less lethal force policies and the role
that supervision
plays in administering these policies, research has not examined
the impact that
frontline supervisors have on officers’ policy perceptions.
Using survey data from
five municipal police departments, the purpose of the current
study is to empirically
examine the extent to which sergeants influence subordinate
officer perceptions of
their less lethal force policy. We begin with a review of the role
of administrative
rulemaking in the area of less lethal force followed by extant
research on the impact of
frontline supervisors in the administration of policy as well as
officers’ attitudes.
Next, study data and methodology are presented. We then
discuss the results of
multilevel analyses modeling the influence of sergeants on
officer policy perceptions.
Finally, research and policy implications are discussed.
Less lethal force policy
A central concern of criminal justice administrators is
effectively controlling the

44. discretion of criminal justice agents. One primary method used
to control discretionary
decisions is the use of administrative rulemaking, or written
policies (Walker, 2010).
Within policing, one area that has received considerable
attention is the use of force.
In theory, written policies are designed to provide explicit
directions on when
officers can use force, the types of force that are allowed, and
review and reporting
requirements. Furthermore, administrative policies are often
based on a continuum
that outlines the types of force officers are permitted to use in
relation to the varying
types of citizen resistance encountered (McEwen, 1997; Terrill
and Paoline, 2013a;
Walker, 2007).
The importance of such policies is based on the rationale for
administrative
rulemaking in general. In relation to criminal justice decision
making, the use of
administrative rules was first popularized by Kenneth Culp
Davis (1969) who outlined
the process of confining, structuring, and checking discretionary
decision making
through the use of policy. At the time, such an approach fit
nicely within the evolving
professional model of policing that began some 50 years earlier
(Goldstein, 1990).
By the early 1990s, Walker (1993, p. 23) noted that the
importance of administrative
policy was so well entrenched that it served as the primary
instrument in “[y] which
law enforcement agencies attempt to control officer discretion.”

45. With respect to force, the beneficial effect of administrative
policy is best illustrated
when looking at the case of lethal force. Led by James Fyfe’s
(1978, 1980, 1982)
356
PIJPSM
37,2
pioneering research, this body of work ultimately proved to be
influential in
establishing the legal framework for lethal force where the USA
Supreme Court
(Tennessee v. Garner, 1985) set a defense of life standard. The
role of policy in terms of
less lethal force, however, is not as straightforward as it must
take into account a wide
range of physical and weapon based tactics as they play out
over the course of
encounters with suspects (Walker, 2007, 2010). Moreover,
while lethal force policies
incorporate a defense of life standard, the only legal guidance
for less lethal force must
be interpreted through what the Supreme Court (Graham v.
Connor, 1989) deems
“objective reasonableness.”
Researchers have pursued various avenues to better understand
less lethal force
policy. An early line of research centered on the structural
composition and
procedures associated with various administrative policies
including force definitions,

46. the purpose of using force, when various forms of force are and
are not permitted,
and various report and review requirements (McEwen, 1997;
Pate and Fridell, 1993,
1995). More recent research has expanded this area of inquiry to
explore the
tremendous variation in the manner in which agencies across the
country specify less
lethal force policy, particularly those policies drawing on the
use of a force continuum
(Terrill and Paoline, 2013a). In addition, researchers have
examined where the use of
less lethal weapons, such as chemical sprays and conducted
energy devices, may
fit into policies (Alpert and Dunham, 2010; Adang and
Mensink, 2004; Kaminski et al.,
1999; Smith et al., 2007; Taylor and Woods, 2010; Thomas et
al., 2010, 2012; White and
Ready, 2007).
A less developed, but important area of research focusses on
police officer
perceptions of less lethal force. Officers are the ones tasked
with applying force
policies as street-level bureaucrats (Lipsky, 2010), and so
examining their perceptions
of these policies is beneficial. In this regard, there are key
dimensions where assessing
officers’ perceptions would be useful. Beyond the
aforementioned ability to provide
guidance and assist decision making, another important policy
aspect is clarity.
McEwen (1997, p. 40) has noted that “without clear policies,
officers may develop
their own rules on force.” If officers perceive their policies to
be unclear, the policies

47. will be less likely to effectively guide discretionary force
decisions. Force policies also
serve as accountability mechanisms with reporting and review
procedures, and so
incorporating these policy components is also important.
A number of researchers have surveyed line-level officers
regarding varying
viewpoints toward force, mostly in the form of officer beliefs
toward what constitutes
appropriate or inappropriate (e.g. excessive) force (Brodsky and
Williamson, 1985;
Carter, 1976; Corbett et al., 1979; Micucci and Gomme, 2005;
Paoline and Terrill,
2011; Weisburd et al., 2000). Yet, despite the importance of
such studies, they do not
directly investigate officer views of their department’s
administrative force policy.
To date, only a few studies have focussed on how these policy
aspects were
perceived by front line personnel. Terrill et al. (2008) surveyed
patrol officers on their
attitudes toward policy assistance and guidance. The majority of
officers agreed
that their agency’s policy properly assisted and guided them in
their decision
making which was attributed to the flexibility that the agency
policy provided.
Attention has also been given to officers’ perceptions of policy
guidance
(Terrill and Paoline, 2013b). Here, it was found that officers
operating under linear-
type continuum designs were more likely to believe that their
policies offered
adequate guidance on the use of force relative to officers
operating under non-linear

48. type designs.
357
Perceptions
of less lethal
force policy
Frontline supervision and less lethal force policy
Frontline supervisors, especially sergeants, are inherently tied
to the administrative
rulemaking process in police organizations. Sergeants are
tasked with ensuring that
subordinate officers follow policy directives and complete use
of force reports. In
addition, sergeants may review officers’ force behaviors and, in
some cases, respond
to the scene of force incidents to serve as oversight
mechanisms. Research has found
that departments with such mechanisms in place have lower
rates of force usage by
officers (Alpert and MacDonald, 2001; Walker, 2007). More
generally, sergeants also
communicate policy directives implemented by top
administrators to subordinate
officers (Skogan and Hartnett, 1997; Skogan, 2008).
As such, sergeants play an active role in the implementation of
less lethal force
policies. To a certain degree then, sergeants’ perceptions of
departmental policies
may be expected to have an influence on their subordinate
officers’ policy perceptions.
Sergeants have been found to generally hold positive less lethal

49. policy perceptions
in the areas of clarity, assistance, and guidance. However, these
perceptions varied
across different policy types. Furthermore, sergeants’ views on
the appropriateness
of various less lethal tactics (e.g. OC spray and CEDs) were not
always aligned with
what was allowed by their policy (Ingram and Weidner, 2011).
Despite this potentially important aspect of frontline
supervision, there has been
limited research examining supervisory influences on officers in
general (Walker,
2007). Furthermore, there are competing perspectives regarding
the level of influence
that sergeants might plausibly have on the officers under their
command. Muir (1977,
2008) has argued that sergeants have the potential to exert a
substantial influence
on subordinate officers. Sharp (1982, p. 169) also noted that
sergeants have the ability
to “mold their squad of officers to their own image of good
policing.” On the other hand,
Brown (1988) submits that it is difficult for sergeants to have
much control over
officers, especially their beliefs, due to the autonomous nature
of police work.
Although research has compared supervisor attitudes to officer
attitudes on use of
force issues (Micucci and Gomme, 2005; Weisburd et al., 2000)
or has examined
supervisor attitudes and officer behavior (Engel, 2000; Johnson,
2011), few studies
have examined the extent to which supervisor attitudes
influence officer attitudes.

50. Engel and Worden (2003) examined the relationship between
supervisor and officer
occupational attitudes in the context of problem solving but
found the relationships
to be consistently weak. Ingram (2013) found that sergeants had
the capacity to
attenuate or amplify officers’ understanding of the police role.
Specifically, role
ambiguity was lowest among officers supervised by sergeants
with a broader
acceptance of order maintenance type activities. In sum, prior
studies have produced
mixed results and offer limited insight into the extent and
nature of supervisory
influences on officers’ attitudes, especially in the area of use of
force.
Current study
The aim of the current study is to empirically examine the
extent to which sergeants
influence subordinate officer perceptions of their less lethal
force policy. Because
sergeants are the ones who monitor, administer, and
communicate force policy
directives, they should represent key departmental mechanisms
for this aspect of
administrative rulemaking, making their policy perceptions
particularly relevant for
officers under their command. Sergeants who believe their force
policy to be clear, to
provide assistance and guidance, and to have fair review
requirements should
communicate these sentiments to officers. On the other hand,
any negative perceptions
358

51. PIJPSM
37,2
of force policies by sergeants could lead subordinate officers to
perceive their policies
negatively. As such, the study adds to the limited body of
literature on supervisory
influences on officers’ attitudes. While some research has found
evidence of
supervisory influences on officer attitudes (Ingram, 2013;
Johnson, 2011), others have
concluded that “supervisory influence is negligible” (Engel and
Worden, 2003, p. 158).
Furthermore, the study adds insight to the growing area of
research on officers’
attitudes toward use of force issues.
Methodology
Data and study departments
Data for the study comes from the National Institute of Justice
funded project,
“Assessing police use of force policy and outcomes.” This
project was designed to
examine use of force issues within municipal departments
across the USA. Surveys
were administered to both patrol officers and patrol sergeants in
five of the
participating departments: Albuquerque, New Mexico (APD);
Portland, Oregon (PPB);
Colorado Springs, Colorado (CSPD); Fort Wayne, Indiana
(FWPD); and Knoxville,
Tennessee (KPD)[1]. The departments were chosen, in part,
based on their force

52. policies and reporting practices. At the time of the study, each
department had
a written policy and reporting requirements in place for at least
a two-year
period without change. All of the departments employed some
type of use of force
continuum, but the tactical placement of force options and
weapon authorization
varied across policies.
With respect to supervisory review, frontline supervisors were
also required to
review and approve all use of force reports filed by subordinate
officers. Frontline
supervisors in Albuquerque were also charged with filling out
force reports in
instances where a subordinate officer did not complete one.
Finally, two department
policies required supervisors to go on-scene when officers used
force. In Portland,
supervisors needed to respond when an impact weapon was used
or unintentionally
discharged. In Colorado Springs, supervisors had to respond to
all encounters where
reportable force was used to serve as an oversight mechanism.
In addition to force
policies and reporting requirements, the study departments were
also selected
because they were comparable with respect to jurisdictional
size, workloads,
socioeconomic characteristics, and structure (see Table I).
Survey design
The survey instrument contained 116 questions measuring a
variety of attitudes
toward departmental force policy, work environments, and

53. background characteristics.
It was group-administered to patrol officers and sergeants
during roll calls or in-service
training sessions after being pre-tested. Overall, the survey was
administered to
approximately 70 percent of patrol officers (1,022 of 1,460) and
68 percent of sergeants
(146 of 217) with a response rate of approximately 95 percent
(1,022 of 1,051 officers
and 146 of 154 sergeants in attendance). These administration
results suggest
representativeness of the patrol population for each
department[2].
Officers were matched with their respective sergeant. For
officers in Albuquerque,
Fort Wayne, and Knoxville, officers were matched with the
sergeant who was assigned
to the same squad or team. Officers in Colorado Springs and
Portland were matched
with the sergeant with the same work schedule (i.e. the same
days on duty, work
times, shift, and precinct). For these two sites, this matching
approach is similar to
prior studies that have matched officers’ attitudes and behaviors
with their direct
359
Perceptions
of less lethal
force policy
supervisors (Engel and Worden, 2003). On average, each

54. sergeant supervised
approximately seven subordinate officers. In all, there were 765
officer/sergeant
matches across the five study departments (i.e. cases in which
both officer surveys and
sergeant surveys were available).
Officer force policy perceptions
Officers’ views toward their respective department’s less lethal
force policy serve as the
outcome of interest. Drawing on prior work, seven survey items
based on four-point
Likert scales were used to tap into important characteristics of
use of force policies;
clarity, assistance in decision making, guidance in how and
when to use force, guidance
for reporting requirements, and supervisory review (McEwen,
1997; Walker, 2007).
Officers were asked the extent to which they agreed that their
policy represented each
of these characteristics (see Table II for the exact questions
used). An additive index,
officer force policy perceptions, was created with higher values
reflecting more positive
policy perceptions. Exploratory factor analysis and reliability
analysis indicated that
the seven items used to form the index represented a single,
reliable construct
(eigenvalue¼3.43; loadings40.55; a¼0.82). Descriptive
statistics for this variable as
well as all variables used in the study are reported in Table II.
Officer-level variables
Additional patrol officer measures were also included in the
study. The following
four officer demographic characteristics commonly used in use

55. of force research were
included; gender (1¼male), race (1¼white), highest educational
level attained
(1¼ less than high school to 8¼graduate degree), and years of
experience. From
Table II, the majority of officers were male (89 percent) and
white (78 percent). On
average, officers had approximately eight years of experience in
their respective
departments and had some level of college education
(median¼more than two years,
no degree).
Prior research has suggested incorporating officers’ attitudinal
dispositions into the
study of police use of force (Community Oriented Policing
Services, 2012).
Characteristics
Albuquerque
(APD)
Portland
(PPB)
Colorado Springs
(CSPD)
Fort Wayne
(FWPD)
Knoxville
(KPD)
City

56. Population 513,124 538,133 374,112 248,423 182,337
% non-white 28.4 22.1 19.3 24.5 20.3
% female headed
households 8.0 6.3 7.1 9.8 8.0
% below poverty 10.0 8.5 6.1 9.6 14.4
% unemployed 3.8 4.5 3.1 4.3 3.9
UCR Part I crimes/
1,000 pop. 66.98 65.57 49.55 43.65 81.38
Department
No. officers/1,000
residents 1.92 1.84 1.78 1.84 2.09
UCR Part I/officer 34.86 35.67 27.71 23.73 39.05
Calls for service/officer 339.89 222.28 428.30 400.25 589.17
Part I arrests per/
officer 3.48 7.16 6.88 5.46 7.75
Table I.
Description of study
departments
360
PIJPSM
37,2
V
a
ri
ab
le
s

57. n
M
ea
n
S
D
M
in
.
M
a
x
.
D
es
cr
ip
ti
o
n
D
ep
en
d
en

58. t
O
ff
ic
er
fo
rc
e
p
o
li
cy
p
er
ce
p
ti
o
n
s
7
5
6
2
1

59. .3
9
3
.4
6
8
.0
0
2
8
.0
0
A
d
d
it
iv
e
in
d
ex
o
f
7
q

60. u
es
ti
o
n
s:
o
v
er
a
ll
,
m
y
d
ep
a
rt
m
en
t’
s
fo
rc
e
p

61. o
li
cy
:
(1
)
Is
cl
ea
r?
(2
)
A
ss
is
ts
d
ec
is
io
n
-m
a
k

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g
?
(3
)
H
in
d
er
s
d
ec
is
io
n
-m
a
k
in
g
?
(4
)
S

63. u
p
er
v
is
o
ry
re
v
ie
w
is
fa
ir
?
(5
)
P
ro
v
id
es
g
u

64. id
a
n
ce
o
n
h
o
w
to
u
se
fo
rc
e?
(6
)
P
ro
v
id
es
g
u
id

65. a
n
ce
o
n
w
h
en
to
u
se
fo
rc
e?
a
n
d
(7
)
P
ro
v
id
es

66. g
u
id
a
n
ce
o
n
w
h
en
to
fi
le
a
fo
rc
e
re
p
o
rt
?
(a
¼

67. 0
.8
2
).
E
a
ch
it
em
w
a
s
co
d
ed
so
th
a
t
h
ig
h
er
v
a
lu

68. es
in
d
ic
a
te
m
o
re
p
o
si
ti
v
e
v
ie
w
s
to
w
a
rd
p
o

69. li
cy
O
ff
ic
er
-l
ev
el
G
en
d
er
7
6
2
0
.8
9
0
.3
1
0
.0
0
1

70. .0
0
M
a
le
¼
1
;
fe
m
a
le
¼
0
R
a
ce
7
5
8
0
.7
8
0
.4

71. 1
0
.0
0
1
.0
0
W
h
it
e
¼
1
;
n
o
n
-w
h
it
e
¼
0
E
d
u

72. ca
ti
o
n
le
v
el
7
5
6
4
.6
8
1
.6
3
1
.0
0
8
.0
0
O
ff
ic

73. er
’s
h
ig
h
es
t
le
v
el
o
f
ed
u
ca
ti
o
n
ra
n
g
in
g
fr

74. o
m
1
(l
es
s
th
a
n
H
S
)
to
8
(g
ra
d
u
a
te
d
eg
re
e)
E

75. x
p
er
ie
n
ce
7
6
2
7
.7
1
6
.4
6
0
.1
7
3
4
.5
8
O
ff
ic
er

76. ’s
y
ea
rs
o
f
ex
p
er
ie
n
ce
D
ir
ec
t
su
p
er
v
is
o
r
7
5

77. 8
3
.5
9
1
.4
6
2
.0
0
8
.0
0
A
d
d
it
iv
e
In
d
ex
o
f
2

78. it
em
s:
(1
)
M
y
su
p
er
v
is
o
r
lo
o
k
s
o
u
t
fo
r
th
e

79. p
er
so
n
a
l
w
el
fa
re
o
f
su
b
o
rd
in
a
te
s,
a
n
d
(2
)

80. M
y
su
p
er
v
is
o
r’
s
a
p
p
ro
a
ch
d
is
co
u
ra
g
es
ex

81. tr
a
ef
fo
rt
(a
¼
0
.6
8
).
E
a
ch
it
em
w
a
s
co
d
ed
so
th
a
t

82. h
ig
h
er
v
a
lu
es
in
d
ic
a
te
m
o
re
n
eg
a
ti
v
e
v
ie

83. w
s
to
w
a
rd
d
ir
ec
t
su
p
er
v
is
o
rs
T
o
p
m
a
n
a
g

84. em
en
t
7
4
5
8
.5
9
2
.1
1
3
.0
0
1
2
.0
0
A
d
d
it
iv
e
In

85. d
ex
o
f
3
it
em
s:
(1
)
W
h
en
a
n
o
ff
ic
er
d
o
es
a
p

86. a
rt
ic
u
la
rl
y
g
o
o
d
jo
b
,t
o
p
m
a
n
a
g
em
en
t
w

87. il
l
p
u
b
li
cl
y
re
co
g
n
iz
e
h
is
/h
er
p
er
fo
rm
a
n

88. ce
,
(2
)
W
h
en
a
n
o
ff
ic
er
g
et
s
w
ri
tt
en
u
p
fo
r
m

89. in
o
r
v
io
la
ti
o
n
s
o
f
th
e
ru
le
s,
h
e/
sh
e
w
il
l

90. b
e
tr
ea
te
d
fa
ir
ly
b
y
to
p
m
a
n
a
g
em
en
t,
a
n
d
(3

91. )
W
h
en
a
n
o
ff
ic
er
co
n
tr
ib
u
te
s
to
a
te
a
m
ef
fo

92. rt
ra
th
er
th
a
n
lo
o
k
g
o
o
d
in
d
iv
id
u
a
ll
y
,
to
p

93. m
a
n
a
g
em
en
t
w
il
l
re
co
g
n
iz
e
it
(a
¼
0
.7
8
).
E

94. a
ch
it
em
w
a
s
co
d
ed
so
th
a
t
h
ig
h
er
v
a
lu
es
in
d
ic

95. a
te
m
o
re
n
eg
a
ti
v
e
v
ie
w
s.
C
it
iz
en
d
is
tr
u
st
7

96. 5
2
4
.9
2
1
.5
2
2
.0
0
8
.0
0
A
d
d
it
iv
e
In
d
ex
o
f

97. 2
it
em
s:
(1
)
O
ff
ic
er
s
h
av
e
a
re
a
so
n
to
b
e
d
is

98. tr
u
st
fu
l
o
f
ci
ti
ze
n
s,
a
n
d
(2
)
O
ff
ic
er
s
h
a
v

99. e
re
a
so
n
to
b
e
su
sp
ic
io
u
s
o
f
ci
ti
ze
n
s
(a
¼
0
.8

100. 0
).
E
a
ch
it
em
w
a
s
co
d
ed
so
th
a
t
h
ig
h
er
v
a
lu
es

101. eq
u
a
l
g
re
a
te
r
d
is
tr
u
st
o
f
ci
ti
ze
n
s
E
x
p

102. er
ie
n
ce
D
if
fe
re
n
ce
7
6
2
9
.2
2
6
.5
4
0
.0
0
4
2
.7
5

103. A
b
so
lu
te
v
a
lu
e
o
f
th
e
d
if
fe
re
n
ce
b
et
w
ee
n
th

104. e
o
ff
ic
er
’s
y
ea
rs
o
f
ex
p
er
ie
n
ce
a
n
d
h
is
/h
er

105. re
sp
ec
ti
v
e
se
rg
ea
n
t’
s
y
ea
rs
o
f
ex
p
er
ie
n
ce
(c
o

106. n
ti
n
u
ed
)
Table II.
Description of
study variables
361
Perceptions
of less lethal
force policy
V
a
ri
ab
le
s
n
M
ea
n
S

107. D
M
in
.
M
a
x
.
D
es
cr
ip
ti
o
n
P
o
li
cy
ty
p
e
C
S
P
D

108. 7
6
5
0
.1
8
0
.3
8
0
.0
0
1
.0
0
C
o
lo
ra
d
o
S
p
ri
n

109. g
s
o
ff
ic
er
¼
1
;
a
ll
o
th
er
s
¼
0
P
P
B
7
6
5
0
.2

110. 0
0
.4
0
0
.0
0
1
.0
0
P
o
rt
la
n
d
o
ff
ic
er
¼
1
;
a
ll
o

111. th
er
s
¼
0
A
P
D
7
6
5
0
.3
1
0
.4
6
0
.0
0
1
.0
0
A
lb
u

112. q
u
er
q
u
e
o
ff
ic
er
¼
1
;
a
ll
o
th
er
s
¼
0
F
W
P

113. D
7
6
5
0
.2
2
0
.4
1
0
.0
0
1
.0
0
R
ef
er
en
ce
d
ep
a
rt
m

114. en
t
K
P
D
7
6
5
0
.0
9
0
.2
9
0
.0
0
1
.0
0
K
n
o
x
v
il

115. le
o
ff
ic
er
¼
1
;
a
ll
o
th
er
s
¼
0
S
er
g
ea
n
t-
le
v
el

116. S
er
g
ea
n
t
fo
rc
e
p
o
li
cy
p
er
ce
p
ti
o
n
s
1
3
7
2

117. 1
.2
9
3
.7
0
1
2
.0
0
2
8
.0
0
A
d
d
it
iv
e
in
d
ex
o
f
th

118. e
sa
m
e
7
it
em
s
u
se
d
fo
r
th
e
re
sp
ec
ti
v
e
o
ff
ic

119. er
m
ea
su
re
(a
¼
0
.8
4
).
E
a
ch
it
em
w
a
s
co
d
ed
so
th
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142. ti
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143. h
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144. rt
iv
e
Table II.
362
PIJPSM
37,2
Furthermore, research has found officers’ views toward police
leadership and citizens
to be salient in understanding their perceptions of force policy
guidance (Terrill and
Paoline, 2013b). As such, indices measuring these aspects of
officers’ work
environments were also included. Direct supervisor (two-items,
a¼0.68) and top
management (three-items, a¼0.78) were included to examine
officers’ attitudes toward
police leadership. For both indices, higher values signify more
negative attitudes.
The final index, citizen distrust (a¼0.80), was included to
account for officers’ views
toward citizens. Higher index values indicate more distrust of
citizens. Descriptive
statistics and question items for these measures are included in
Table II.
Two final variables were also included in the study as controls
at the officer level.
The variable, experience difference, was calculated to represent

145. the absolute difference
in years of experience between the officer and his/her sergeant.
The amount of time
officers have been supervised by their respective sergeant might
influence officers’
policy perceptions. The cross-sectional design of the current
study prohibited an
exact measure of this; however, the absolute difference in
experience levels is included
as a proxy for time and has been used by prior research in this
area (Ingram, 2013)[3].
We also control for the type of policy the officer operated under
using a series of four
dummy variables for each study site (i.e. CSPD, PPB, APD, and
KPD with FWPD
serving as the reference department).
Sergeant-level variables
The primary sergeant-level variable of interest is sergeants’
perceptions of their force
policy. An additive index, sergeant force policy perceptions,
was created for sergeants
using the same seven questions used to comprise the officer
force policy perception
variable. Again, exploratory factor analysis revealed that the
seven items reflected a single
construct (eigenvalue¼3.58; loadings40.62; a¼0.84). In
addition, we also included
sergeant demographic characteristics: gender, race, highest
education level attained, and
years of experience. Sergeant attitudes toward their work
environments were also
included for views toward top management (three-item index,
a¼0.79) and citizen
distrust (two-item index, a¼0.88). Higher values on these
indices reflected more negative

146. perceptions of management and citizens. Additionally, the
variable, support (two-item
index, a¼0.52), was created to measure the extent to which
sergeants’ reported looking
out for subordinates’ well-being and teaching them how to
perform their duties[4]. Higher
values on this index indicated that sergeants provided more
support to their officers.
Analysis and results
Due to the nested nature of the data, a one-way, random effect
ANOVA model was
conducted first in order to assess whether officers working
under the same sergeant
held similar views toward their force policy. Results from the
model revealed
significant variation in force policy attitudes across groups of
subordinate officers. The
between-group variance component was statistically significant
( po0.001) and
the intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.128, indicating that
approximately
13 percent of the variation in officers’ force policy attitudes
may be attributed to
being supervised by the same sergeant, providing support for
further examining
multilevel supervisory influences on force policy attitudes.
Multilevel regression results
Based on the ANOVA model results, a two-level model was
estimated with officer
variables at level 1 and sergeant variables at level 2. Since the
focus of the current
363

147. Perceptions
of less lethal
force policy
study is on supervisory effects, officer variables remained fixed
in the model.
Furthermore, all officer variables were grand-mean centered
which allows for the
estimation of supervisory effects on officers’ force policy
perceptions after
controlling for the influence of officer demographics,
organizational and
occupational attitudes, individual-level sergeant-officer
experience differences, and
policy types (e.g. Raudenbush and Bryk, 2002)[5].
Model 1 in Table III presents the results of the multilevel
regression model
predicting officers’ force policy perceptions. This model was
based off of 672 officers
and 128 sergeants after listwise deletion of cases with missing
information. With
respect to the officer-level variables, two demographic
characteristics are worth
noting. More experienced officers held negative policy
perceptions, while the effect
of gender was significant at the po0.10 level with male officers
reporting more
positive policy perceptions. In addition, all three of the officer
attitudinal variables were
significantly related to force policy perceptions. Officers who
held more negative
views of their supervisors, top management, and citizens held
negative perceptions of

148. their use of force policies. Finally, when compared to FWPD
officers, PPB ( po0.05)
and CSPD ( po0.10) officers held more negative perceptions of
their department’s force
policy. Overall, the officer-level variables included in the
model explained
approximately 32 percent of the variation in force policy
perceptions.
Model 1 Model 2
Variables b (SE) b b (SE) b
Officer-level
Gender 0.63 (0.35)**** 0.06 0.66 (0.35)**** 0.06
Race 0.21 (0.26) 0.02 0.21 (0.26) 0.02
Education 0.12 (0.08) 0.06 0.12 (0.08) 0.06
Experience �0.07 (0.02)** �0.13 �0.07 (0.02)** �0.13
Direct supervisor �0.57 (0.08)*** �0.24 �0.57 (0.08)***
�0.24
Top management �0.47 (0.06)*** �0.29 �0.47 (0.06)***
�0.29
Citizen distrust �0.24 (0.08)** �0.11 �0.23 (0.08)** �0.10
Experience difference �0.04 (0.03) �0.08 �0.04 (0.03) �0.08
CSPD �0.53 (0.32)**** �0.06 �0.43 (0.31) �0.05
PPB �2.28 (0.33)*** �0.26 �2.23 (0.32)*** �0.25
APD �0.10 (0.34) �0.01 �0.07 (0.33) �0.01
KPD 0.50 (0.61) 0.04 0.68 (0.61) 0.06
Sergeant-level
Intercept 20.71 (1.55)*** – 23.22 (0.97)*** –
Force policy �0.09 (0.04)* �0.51 �0.08 (0.04)* �0.44
Gender �0.60 (0.39) �0.32 �0.59 (0.38) �0.31
Race 0.41 (0.29) 0.26 0.24 (0.28) 0.14
Education �0.08 (0.07) �0.22 �0.07 (0.07) �0.19
Experience 0.01 (0.03) 0.13 0.01 (0.03) 0.16
Top management �0.13 (0.06)* �0.48 �0.13 (0.06)* �0.45
Citizen distrust �0.03 (0.09) �0.07 �0.03 (0.09) �0.08

149. Support 0.56 (0.15)*** 0.62 0.31 (0.18)**** 0.33
Force policy � support – – �0.11 (0.04)** �0.44
Model results
R
2
officer level 0.32 0.33
R
2
sergeant level 0.78 0.83
Notes: n¼672 officers; 128 sergeants. **** po0.10; ***
po0.001; ** po.01; * po0.05
Table III.
Multilevel regression
results predicting officer
force policy perceptions
364
PIJPSM
37,2
With respect to supervisor effects, three of the sergeant-level
relationships were
statistically significant after controlling for the officer-level
variables. First, officers
with more negative perceptions of their force policies were
supervised by sergeants
who had more favorable policy perceptions. This is counter to
what was hypothesized

150. and additional attention is given to this finding in the next
section. Second, officers also
reported more negative force policy perceptions when they were
supervised by
sergeants with negative perceptions of top management. Third,
officers supervised
by more supportive sergeants had more positive perceptions of
their force policies.
Of all the sergeant-level variables, this effect was the strongest.
It should be noted
that the level 2 portion of the model accounted for
approximately 78 percent of the
between-level variance (or approximately 10 percent of the total
variation in officers’
policy perceptions).
Post hoc analysis: the moderating influence of sergeant support
The sergeant-officer policy perception ran counter to
expectations. An inverse
relationship is certainly plausible as it is consistent with
research reporting
a negative relationship between sergeant priorities and officers’
traffic enforcement
practices ( Johnson, 2011). Furthermore, a common aspect of
frontline supervision
entails punishing officers for violations of department policy,
and so supervision is
often viewed negatively by officers (Skogan and Hartnett,
1997). In this regard, officers
supervised by sergeants who held favorable attitudes toward
departmental force
policies may have viewed such policies unfavorably due to the
role that sergeants
play in the accountability process. It should be noted that a
model with five-item policy
measures, dropping the supervisory review and reporting items,

151. was estimated to see
if these two items accounted for the negative relationship.
Results from this model also
produced a significant, negative effect[6].
Another possibility, however, is that certain sergeant
characteristics, particularly
supervisory styles, may also affect the nature of the observed
sergeant-officer policy
relationship. Engel (2001) has argued that supportive
supervisors may act as buffers
between their subordinate officers and upper management and
might be more
inclined to protect officers from accountability mechanisms
perceived to be unfair.
As such, sergeant support and views toward top management
may moderate the
sergeant-officer policy relationship.
To examine this possibility, we tested for the presence of
interaction effects for
sergeant force policy perceptions and support levels as well as
views toward top
management. Each of these variables was mean-centered, cross-
product terms were
calculated, and additional models were estimated. The results
revealed a significant
interaction effect for policy perceptions and support, but not for
policy perceptions
and top management. As a result, Model 2 in Table III reports
the results with the force
policy and support interaction term. It should be noted that the
inclusion of the
interaction term explained a significant amount of variation in
the level 2 portion
of the model (DR2¼0.05, F¼50.0, po0.001). The significant

152. cross-product term
(b¼�0.11, po0.05) in the model indicates that the relationship
between sergeant and
officer policy perceptions is moderated by sergeant support.
In order to assess the nature of the interaction, the simple
regression slopes for the
sergeant-officer policy effect were plotted at three different
values of sergeant support,
the mean (i.e. medium support), one standard deviation above
the mean (i.e. high
support), and one standard deviation below the mean (i.e. low
support). Figure 1
displays the nature of these plots, and three interesting findings
emerge. First, sergeant
365
Perceptions
of less lethal
force policy
support had little impact on the sergeant-officer policy
relationship when sergeants
held overly positive perceptions of their force policy[7].
Second, when sergeant support
was low, their policy perceptions had no effect on their officers’
policy perceptions
as evidenced by the dashed line (simple slope¼�0.00, SE¼0.04,
p40.05). Third, the
simple slope for high levels of sergeant support was significant,
but negative (simple
slope¼�0.15, SE¼0.04, po0.001). Overall, officers supervised
by sergeants who

153. were highly supportive yet held unfavorable policy perceptions,
actually held the most
favorable perceptions of their force policy.
Discussion
The aim of the current study was to examine the impact of
sergeants on patrol officer
perceptions of their less lethal force policies. Based on
multilevel analyses, our results
indicated that certain sergeant attitudinal dispositions were
associated with officers’
policy assessments. For example, officers working under
supportive sergeants were
more likely to believe that their policies were clear, provided
guidance, and were fair.
On the other hand, officers tended to hold more negative
perceptions when supervised
by sergeants who held more favorable force policy perceptions
or who viewed top
management negatively. In this respect, an interactive effect
was also found whereby
officers held more positive views toward their force policy
when supervised by
supportive sergeants who viewed the policy in a less favorable
manner.
Cumulatively, the results of this study have implications for
police managers. An
important implication is that sergeants have the capacity to
influence subordinates’
views of use of force either positively or negatively. Although
this notion has been
promoted anecdotally or based on limited observational
research, empirical research
examining supervisory influences on officers’ attitudes in
general have been limited

154. and mixed (Engel and Worden, 2003; cf. Johnson, 2011). The
current study is one of the
first to examine supervisory influences in the area of less lethal
force systematically
across a large number of officers and sergeants.
In terms of positive influences, supportive sergeants matter in
the eyes of their
subordinates. Officers working for sergeants who take the time
to teach them how to
22.2
22.4
22.6
22.8
23
23.2
23.4
23.6
23.8
24
24.2
highmed
O

155. ff
ic
e
r
P
o
lic
y
P
e
rc
e
p
tio
n
s
Sergeant Policy Perceptions
Sergeant
Support
high
med
low

156. low
Figure 1.
The moderating effect of
sergeant support on the
sergeant-officer policy
perception relationship
366
PIJPSM
37,2
perform their job and who look out for their welfare have a
more clear and beneficial
assessment of their organization’s use of force direction. The
nature of the interaction
effect also lend credence to the notion that supportive sergeants
act as buffers or
protectors of their subordinate officers when they believe that
accountability
mechanisms, such as departmental force policies, are
inadequate, unclear, or perceived
to be unfair. Although this can be problematic (see Engel,
2001), in the current context
it implies that officers may benefit from such support. As such,
promoting and
encouraging this form of supervisory style by upper
administration can have favorable
organizational outcomes. On the other hand, the inverse officer-
sergeant force policy
relationship indicates that sergeants can also have a negative
impact on officers.
Since patrol officers (not sergeants) are the ones who apply

157. policies, as street level
bureaucrats (Lipsky, 2010), and serve as the face of the
department to the community,
this is concerning. To the extent that this finding is due to
sergeants’ roles as
accountability mechanisms, perhaps departments should
examine how policy aspects
are communicated to subordinates by supervising officers.
The implications of this work also suggest that the broader
organizational climate
matters in determining patrol officers’ assessments of policies.
Interestingly, the role
of the sergeant in shaping the views of their subordinates had
little, if anything, to do
with their gender, race, education, or experience. For police
leaders interested in
sergeants filtering organizational policies to the front-line, this
suggests that it is not so
much who is in the supervisory role, but how they orient
themselves toward the
department and their subordinates. Thus, decisions to promote
to this first-level
supervisory position should not be taken lightly, as officers
occupying this rank
are ultimately responsible for directly overseeing the majority
of a police agency’s
sworn personnel.
While the findings highlighted here offer one of the few
empirical investigations of
the role that sergeants play in predicting patrol officers’ force
policy perceptions,
certain limitations should be considered. First, the study was
conducted in mid to large
agencies. While, the results should generalize to police

158. departments of similar size and
structure, they may be less applicable to small or very large
agencies where relational
distance and supervisory oversight between sergeants and patrol
officers might
differ. Another limitation of the current study concerns the
nature of frontline
supervision in mid to large size departments. For a variety of
potential reasons
(e.g. overlapping shifts, covering another sergeant’s
assignment, availability) officers
may be exposed to the supervisory practices of more than one
sergeant. While
assuming a one-to-one relationship between officers and
sergeants is a common
approach for research in this area (Engel, 2000; Engel and
Worden, 2003; Johnson,
2011), it does not capture the extent to which other supervisors
might play a role in
shaping officers’ policy perceptions.
Finally, the cross-sectional nature of our data limited our ability
to tease out the
specific process by which supervisors were influencing their
officers’ views of less
lethal policies. Future work incorporating alternative data
designs (i.e. longitudinal)
and methodologies (i.e. extended qualitative interviews and
structured observations)
would work to remedy this limitation. The use of alternative
approaches would
also allow for a more precise examination of the relevance of
time served between
sergeants and police officers. Such approaches may also help to
identify additional
officer and supervisor characteristics important for

159. understanding force policies.
Beyond addressing the aforementioned limitations, future
research could extend
this work in a number of important ways. First, researchers
should expand the focus of
367
Perceptions
of less lethal
force policy
supervisory influences on attitudinal outcomes beyond less
lethal force policies to
other types of organizational policies, such as suspicion stops,
vehicle pursuits, or
arrests, as well as other perceptions of the work environment
(e.g. job satisfaction,
citizen suspicion, etc.). It could be that sergeants are exerting
influence over
subordinates’ orientations toward use of force policies because
of the fact that these
discretionary behaviors are amongst the most highly supervisory
scrutinized decisions
in the police organization. In addition, future work should
address the extent to which
the sergeants’ influence on patrol officers’ views of less lethal
policies impacts the
behavioral application of force. In answering this question,
research could examine
whether positive (or negative) patrol officer policy orientations
affect their overall
decisions to use force, the levels of force utilized, and/or the

160. appropriateness of their
force actions. These are all additional questions worthy of
empirical answers.
Notes
1. Three additional departments participated in the larger NIJ
project. However, one
department did not allow the portion of the survey measuring
the work environment to be
administered. The survey collection process for the other two
agencies did not allow for
consistent administration of sergeant surveys. As such, these
three departments were
excluded from the current study.
2. The goal was to survey every patrol officer and sergeant
within each of the study
departments. In order to accomplish this, a standardized
protocol was implemented to ensure
that the survey was administered consistently across sites.
Departmental master rosters
listing all sworn officers and their current work assignments
were obtained, and a survey
schedule was created for each site that allowed for the
opportunity to survey every assigned
patrol officer and sergeant. During administration, trained
research staff provided officers
with a brief description of the research project, gave
instructions for survey completion, and
informed officers of confidentiality protections.
3. Unfortunately, we were unable to systematically capture the
exact length of time officers and
sergeants had worked in their current assignments across all
sites. On average, 83 percent of

161. responding sergeants reported working in their current
supervisory assignment for
approximately 29 months at the time of the survey. In APD and
KPD, officers reported
working the same squad assignment an average of 18 months at
the time of the survey.
Although these descriptive results only represent a partial
overview of the total sample, they
do provide some insight into the amount of time officers and
sergeants had worked in their
current assignments.
4. Although the reliability coefficient for the sergeant support
index was below the suggested
threshold of 0.70, a coefficients are influenced by the number of
items in the scale (Schmitt,
1996). As such, two item scales may produce lower a
coefficients. We conducted a factor
analysis containing all of the work environment items for
sergeants, the results provided
support for three separate factors (i.e. top management, citizen
distrust, and support).
Furthermore, the two support items loaded on a single factor
(loadings40.65). As such,
we retained and used the two-item support measure in the
analyses (see also Terrill and
Paoline, 2013b).
5. Inclusion of the policy type measures as level 1 control
variables that are grand mean
centered rather than as level 2 covariates may seem
counterintuitive. Here, the decision was
made to ensure the stability of parameter estimates at level 2
due to the number of level 2
cases and variables. To ensure that this approach did not change
the results substantively,

162. two preliminary models were conducted with only the sergeant-
level attitudes at level 2 and
all of the level 1 officer characteristics. One model included the
policy type measures as level
1 controls (grand mean centered) and the second included them
as level 2 controls. In both
368
PIJPSM
37,2
models, the sergeant level attitudes (level 2) estimates were the
same, and so the results were
not affected (see also Enders and Tofighi, 2007).
6. Multicollinearity diagnostics were also conducted with no
evidence suggesting that it was an
issue in the final model. OLS regression models were also
conducted treating sergeant-level
measures as level 1 variables. These results also indicated a
significant, negative relationship
between sergeant and officer force policy perceptions.
7. This also helps illustrate the reason why the conditional
effect of sergeant support in Model 2
becomes nonsignificant at the po0.05 level. When sergeant
policy perceptions were average
(i.e. at the mean) or higher on the attitudinal scale, their level
of support had no bearing on
officers’ policy perceptions.
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