(Part 3) Top products from r/ProtectAndServe

THIS. Use your words. I'm about an inch taller and about 10 lbs heavier than OP, hoping to become an officer but I'm a part-time jail guard in the meantime. Learning to deescalate a situation using your words is always a good idea!

Get yourself a copy of Verbal Judo, read it, use it. If you can find a copy of the 5 minute Policeman, that's also incredibly helpful. Take an improv class to get good at speaking with authority, even if you are just making the shit up as you go along.

And of course, keep working out, train, find things that use your size to your advantage, because that bad day might still happen.

The Job: True Tales from the Life of a New York City Cop Is funny as fuck and a really good read

And a different standpoint from a jail perspective is Corruption Officer It talks about how he slowly spiraled into corruption. Great books recommend them to everyone.

May I recommend "Cop in the Hood" and that former officer's well made podcast Quality Policing.

Basically, Peter wanted to do graduate research on cops by working with an academy class in the Baltimore Police Department. The funding was pulled last minute but the Lieutenant working with him said he should just join the police if he wanted to understand cops. So, he did. The book is an interesting take on Policing since he was never intending on being a cop and was well educated on the academic side of the criminal justice system prior to joining.

The FBI BAU (where the profilers are) is one of the most difficult to obtain jobs in the agency.

First you get hired as an FBI agent. Then you distinguish yourself in your field office doing "regular" FBI agent work. Then you start assisting them with cases from your field office after you have a few years on.

Then you can become a regional case agent for them. Most of that (from what I understand) is keeping track of files and sending information back and forth to the unit at Quantico.

Then if you do a good job there, you intern with them. This involves working with medical examiners and homicide squads in the DC/Baltimore area.

Then and only then can you "become a profiler."

So my advice is don't put the cart before the horse. You need to become an FBI agent first, so focus on that. Lots of really really smart and put together folks apply to them and don't get hired. You can worry about getting into BAU after you're hired.

There is a great book about the BAU that was written by John Douglas called Mindhunter that does a great job of talking about the unit and what it takes to get in.

No book will prepare you for law enforcement, it has to be touched, smelled, heard, and seen. If you're already a cop then the best thing you can do to be better is to be a well rounded human being and books can help with that.

Here's the recommended reading from some of the prior threads I was able to find in the sub.

1. On Killing
   
2. On Combat
   
3. Emotional Survival for Law Enforcement
   
4. Intro to Criminal Evidence
   
5. Blue Blood
   
6. 400 Things Cops Should Know
   
7. Cop: A True Story
   
8. [Verbal Judo] (https://www.amazon.com/Verbal-Judo-Gentle-Persuasion-Updated/dp/0062107704/)
   
9. [What Cops Know] (https://www.amazon.com/What-Cops-Know-Connie-Fletcher/dp/0671750402/)
   
10. [Into the Kill Zone] (https://www.amazon.com/Into-Kill-Zone-Deadly-Force/dp/0787986038/)
    
11. Training at the Speed of Life
    
12. Sharpening the Warrior's Edge
    
13. The Gift of Fear
    
14. Deadly Force Encounters
    
15. The Book of Five Rings
    
    I've read a good portion of the above listed. I highly recommend Emotional Survival and going to see one of Gilmartin's talks if he's in your area. Below are a few of my personal suggestions.
    
    
16. Meditations
    
17. Blink - Not sure if I buy it, but interesting to think about.
    
18. [Armor] (https://www.amazon.com/Armor-John-Steakley/dp/0886773687/)
    
19. Iron John: A Book About Men
    
20. The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics
    

We used this book in my Criminal justice class. Pretty good.

In Defense of Flogging makes the case a little less seriously, but Moskos is still pretty on point.

http://www.amazon.com/10-8-Cops-Honest-Look-Street/dp/0935878130

I adore this book. It's about as real as it gets.

You would enjoy this book http://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Fear-Thinking-Sensibly-Uncertain/dp/0387026207

The Making of a Cop is very good. Gives an insight of the NYPD academy.

A People's History of the United States.

Tater Salad.

We spent an entire semester on it in grad school.

There are people with PhD's in it.

I don't think I can summarize the results in a reddit reply.

Go forth and educate yourself:

Understanding Survey Design and Data

Understanding Opinion Polls

I asked for a home invasion kit for my roadtrip to NOLA and got the same thing but with a different book! /S

I realize the Wikipedia article isn't terribly helpful, which is why I linked the story about the NYPD case. I, and many many others (unsurprisingly!) find that case to be extremely disturbing. And of course, there is the infamous Rampart Scandal in the LAPD, involving over 70 officers accused of some form of misconduct (and many felonies), with several cases still being unsolved today. I also read a book many years ago called Gang Leader For A Day, where a U of Chicago graduate student embeds himself within a gang of drug dealers in the local projects, and witnesses rampant police brutality (including instances of robbery and unwarranted searches and beatings).

Of course, I'm sure you can come up with excuses as to why these examples don't worry you (NYPD/LAPD cases were exception, the book is just anecdotal and probably full of lies to sell more copies or whatever). And that's fine, I can't change your mentality. But I think it is important for LEOs to understand that these narratives are out there, that they are very convincing to the general population, and that they're not going to go away.

Theres a lot of things that can be done, depending on the specific issue.

If I had the infinity gauntlet, I'd abolish capital and property rights which is largely what police exist to serve and protect. But with some basic electoral reform; I'd make having a gun something thats a pain in the ass to do, like the police in the UK for example, their guns are in a locked room somewhere and they need to go through a bit of a hassle to actually arm themselves. Thats first and foremost.

Secondly, ending the "war on drugs" would be huge in dealing with our policing problem. It was a war that was started to target Black radical groups and their white allies. Don't take my word for it, its all perfectly public and googable (I like that word, lets make it a thing)

Speaking broadly, just fire all existing police officers, give them severance and make sure they all have a living wage while they go do other things to make the world a better place. And replace the police as we know them, with people who are elected by their communities to keep the peace, settle disputes and so on.

These are broad strokes, when your instinct kicks in to defend the system as it exists, just remember how awful it is for so many humans and rethink it.

This system isn't working for poor people, black people, mentally disabled people, women, largely anyone thats not in the middle and upper class. So if your solutions don't deal with how police act as an occupying force using leftover weapons from the military, then its not a real solution. I'd love to hear your thoughts though, what do you think should be done to stop police murdering innocent people, stealing more from citizens than burglars, and in general terrorizing impoverished neighborhoods?

https://www.cnn.com/2016/03/23/politics/john-ehrlichman-richard-nixon-drug-war-blacks-hippie/index.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/11/23/cops-took-more-stuff-from-people-than-burglars-did-last-year/

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/09/the-counted-police-killings-us-vs-other-countries


EDIT- I'm not an expert, not that I should need to be to comment on the gaping problem here, but I have read what the experts think, and I'm going to link some books that I have read and some that I'm going to read when I have the time and money, and you can get the solutions straight from the horses mouth. Now you've gone through my posts so you already know the books I'm about to link:

https://www.versobooks.com/books/2530-police

https://www.versobooks.com/books/2426-the-end-of-policing

https://www.amazon.com/Our-Enemies-Blue-Police-America/dp/1849352151

https://www.amazon.com/Police-Power-Patriarchy-Foundations-Government/dp/0231132077