Jail Responsibilities Monique Priorello September 23, 2012

One of the main responsibilities of a jail is to give the officers the correct “Police Correspondence” courses. This is because these courses give the officers the effective basic training that they need to do things such as; Writing of Memoranda, Police Reports, and Civilian Letters. What needs to be done first is make sure that there are NO errors. This means in spelling, punctuation, price, and grammar. These should be thoroughly, and constantly, edited. Another thing is conciseness; this means it should be brief or limited in words. Although, concision does not mean deleting words that count just to make your statements ‘rough in manner’. Officers should avoid tired old phrases, also known as triteness. Examples of these are; “in the final analysis”, “cold as ice”, “hard as a rock”, and “last but not the least”. They should also avoid misleading expressions (euphemisms) such as “meet our Creator” which means death and “Policy of Disinformation” which means lying to the public. Weak phrases should be avoided also. Weak phrases are ones such as; “wealthy business person”, “Carrying a child” and “one year old boy”. Instead, what can be used are phrases such as “tycoon”, “pregnant” and “one year of age boy”. Police officers must NEVER discriminate because of gender. Neutral terms should be used to manifest, fairness and equality between sexes. Examples are; “If a woman drives” to “if a person drives”, “man-made” to “artificial” and “manpower” to “human power”. A memorandum is a note, or reminder that one wishes to preserve for future use. Its various tense forms may be done by shortening memorandum to memo. Memorandum is definitely singular while its plural form is memoranda. The tone of a memorandum from a subordinate must always be formal, whereas official of equal positions the tone may be personal. A memorandum must be in a specific format, there are no exceptions. Punctuation and grammar are the two most important things while writing a memorandum. There are several kinds of memoranda. The different memoranda are; Recommendations Memoranda, Justification Memoranda, Progress Report, and Survey Report. Police reports are a chronological account of an incident that took place at a given time. Writing police reports are extremely important because they serve as records for police administrators in planning, directing and organizing the units duties. It can also be used as legal documents in the prosecution of criminals in the courthouse. There are also Beat Inspection Reports and After Patrol Repots that must be filed. A Beat Inspection Report is submitted daily b any duty officer after their rounds; while the after patrol report is submitted by assigned sector using official vehicles and is signed by the team leader. A Situation Report is done on a need basis. This contains the actual situation of a particular incident or incidents which are od public interest. These may be done every hour, every 6 hours, or every 8 hours depending on the situation. During peaceful days, a Situation Report is not necessary.
Formal reports serve as records for administrators in planning, directing and organizing the unit. It may also be used as a legal document in the prosecution of criminals. There are many steps to writing a Formal Report. The first step is the Introduction, or the background statement. The second is the body, which is a detailed presentation of the facts gathered. The third is the summary, which is a brief presentation of the findings (evidence). And the last is the conclusions and recommendations.