[Music] law enforcement professionals have a great deal of discretion regarding when to enforce the law how to enforce it how to handle disputes when to use force and so on let's take a look at discretion and Duty every day is filled with decisions some minor some major discretion allows officers to choose different courses of action depending on how they perceive their duty duty can be defined as the responsibilities that are attached to a specific role in the case of police officers there's a great deal of individual variation and how officers perceive their duty one way researchers have described how discretion is utilized is through typology zuv police police Styles can be described as follows the legalistic style of policing is described as the least amenable to the discretionary enforcement officers enforce the law objectively without making exceptions the Watchmen style describes police who define situations as threatening or serious depending on the group or individual involved and act accordingly the caretaker style treats citizens differently depending on their relative power and position in society some people get breaks others do not patrol officers are the most visible members of the police force and have a duty to patrol monitor and intervene in matters of crime conflict accident and welfare discretion also comes into play when an officer is faced with situations that have no good solutions in these cases officers often face extremely difficult decisions which sometimes result in violence when a mentally ill person attacks the officer who won't put down a weapon generally the command language an intimidating approach of police officers is extremely counterproductive when an individual is in mental distress and can lead to violence in situations where lethal force is used such force is almost always legally justified however the actions of the off sir leading up to the threat may have exacerbated the situation rather than helped to avoid the need for the use of force police officers also frequently respond to domestic disputes one officer may ascertain that departmental policy or law does not dictate any action if no party is seriously injured and no one wants to press charges however another officer might take a shaken or distraught victim to a shelter drive her to a relative's home or wait her for with her until family or friends arrive historically law enforcement response to domestic violence was non-interference with the perception that domestic violence was not a crime control matter unless it involved injury amounting to felony assault [Music]