Police Procedural

 

AGENCIES

Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms
http://www.atf.gov/
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) is a principal law enforcement agency within the United States Department of Justice dedicated to preventing terrorism, reducing violent crime, and protecting the Nation. The men and women of ATF perform the dual responsibilities of enforcing Federal criminal laws and regulating the firearms and explosives industries. They help investigate and reduce crime involving firearms and explosives, acts of arson, and illegal trafficking of alcohol and tobacco products.

CIA
https://www.cia.gov/
The CIA engages in research, development, and deployment of high-leverage technology for intelligence purposes.
 
Criminal Intelligence Service of Canada
http://www.cisc.gc.ca/
CISC is a strategically-focused organization that facilitates the timely production and exchange of criminal information and intelligence within the Canadian law enforcement community.
 
DEA
http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/index.htm
The mission of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is to enforce the controlled substances laws and regulations of the United States and bring to the criminal and civil justice system those organizations and principal members involved in the growing, manufacture, or distribution of controlled substances appearing in or destined for illicit traffic in the United States.
 
Federal Bureau of Investigation
http://www.fbi.gov/
The very heart of FBI operations lies in its investigations—which serve, as their mission states, "to protect and defend the United States against terrorist and foreign intelligence threats and to enforce the criminal laws of the United States." They currently have jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal law.
 
Interpol
http://www.interpol.int/
INTERPOL is the world’s largest international police organization, with 186 member countries. Created in 1923, it facilitates cross-border police co-operation, and supports and assists all organizations, authorities and services whose mission is to prevent or combat international crime.

Mi-5
http://www.mi5.gov.uk/
The Security Service, more commonly known as MI5, is the UK's security intelligence agency. They are responsible for protecting the country against covertly organized threats to national security. These include terrorism, espionage and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

National Security Agency
http://www.nsa.gov/
The National Security Agency/Central Security Service is America’s cryptologic organization. It coordinates, directs, and performs highly specialized activities to protect U.S. government information systems and produce foreign signals intelligence information.
 
Royal Canadian Mounted Police
http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/
 he Royal Canadian Mounted Police is the Canadian national police service and an agency of the Ministry of Public Safety Canada. The RCMP is unique in the world since it is a national, federal, provincial and municipal policing body. They provide a total federal policing service to all Canadians and policing services under contract to the three territories, eight provinces (except Ontario and Quebec), more than 190 municipalities, 184 Aboriginal communities and three international airports.

Scotland Yard
http://www.met.police.uk/
The Metropolitan Police Service, otherwise known as Scotland Yard, is famed around the world and has a unique place in the history of policing. It is by far the largest of the police services that operate in greater London (the others include the City of London Police and the British Transport Police). The Royal Parks Constabulary have now become part of the Metropolitan Police Service. The Metropolitan Police Service employs 31,141 officers, 13,661 police staff, 414 traffic wardens and 2,106 Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs), and, since the realignment of police boundaries in April 2000, it covers an area of 620 square miles and a population of 7.2 million.

U.S. Department of Justice
http://www.usdoj.gov/
The USDOJ has become the world's largest law office and the central agency for enforcement of federal laws.
 
U.S. Coast Guard
http://www.uscg.mil/
The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is a military branch of the United States involved in maritime law, mariner assistance, and search and rescue. Its stated mission is to protect the public, the environment, and the United States economic and security interests in any maritime region in which those interests may be at risk, including international waters and America's coasts, ports, and inland waterways.

U.S. Marshals
http://www.usdoj.gov/marshals/
The Marshals Service is the nation’s oldest and most versatile federal law enforcement agency. Protection of federal judicial officials, which includes judges, attorneys and jurors, holds a high priority with the Marshals Service. They are also responsible for fugitive investigations (in 2006 , the Marshals Service apprehended more than 36,000 federal fugitives, clearing 39,000 federal felony warrants, more than all other law enforcement agencies combined); government witness security; prisoner transportation and housing; asset forfeiture program (managing and disposing seized and forfeited properties acquired by criminals through illegal activities); and special operations.

United States Secret Service
http://www.secretservice.gov/
The United States Secret Service is a federal law enforcement agency with headquarters in Washington, D.C., and more than 150 offices throughout the United States and abroad. The Secret Service was established in 1865, solely to suppress the counterfeiting of U.S. currency. Today, the agency is mandated by Congress to carry out dual missions: protection of national and visiting foreign leaders, and criminal investigations.


CRIMINAL JUSTICE DATABASES & METASITES

Crime Lynx
http://www.crimelynx.com/

Crime Spider
http://www.crimespider.com/

Michigan State University Criminal Justice Resources
http://staff.lib.msu.edu/harris23/crimjust/index.htm

World Criminal Justice Library Electronic Network
http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~wcjlen/WCJ/


CRIMINAL JUSTICE SCHOOLS & DEGREE PROGRAMS

Criminal Justice Schools
http://staff.lib.msu.edu/harris23/crimjust/acadscho.htm
A listing from Michigan State University of schools providing degree programs in criminal justice and forensics.

Online Criminal Justice Schools
http://www.academicinfo.net/crimjust.html
In addition to information about online degree programs, there are also links to criminal justice resources (tools, books, databases, etc.).


CRIMINAL PROFILING

APA
http://www.apa.org/monitor/julaug04/criminal.html
An article from the American Psychological Association

Crime Library
http://www.crimelibrary.com/criminal_mind/profiling/index.html
An introduction, historical overview, the FBI’s role, investigative psychology, behavioral evidence analysis

Criminal Profiling
http://www.criminalprofiling.ch/introduction.html
An introduction to the subject, with additional articles on profiling types and bibiographies

Criminal Profiling Made Easy
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/11/12/071112fa_fact_gladwell?currentPage=all
An interesting article by Malcolm Gladwell at The New Yorker.


EYEWITNESS EVIDENCE

Eyewitness Evidence: A Guide for Law Enforcement
http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/178240.pdf
A pamphlet from the U.S. Department of Justice


GENERAL PROCEDURES & INFORMATION

Categories of Killing
http://poptop.hypermart.net/homchart.html
The classifications of death, i.e., what constitutes self-killing, lawful killing, unlawful killing (murder in the first, second, and third degree), and manslaughter

Commonly Used Police Abbreviations and Police Terminology
http://www.sentinelstudio.com/blogtopia/2004/11/commonly-used-police-abbreviations-and.html
From the St. Louis County Police Department

Police and Law Enforcement Services Policy & Procedure Manuals
http://www.mrsc.org/subjects/pubsafe/le/le-manual.aspx
Sample Law Enforcement Manuals


POLYGRAPHS & LIE DETECTION

American Polygraph Association
http://www.polygraph.org/
Basic information, a glossary, an FAQ, legal issues, instrument manufactuers, etc.

Detecting Lies
http://www.blifaloo.com/info/lying-resources.php
Various links to more information on lying detection, statement analysis, micro  expressions, forensic psychology and related subjects like polygraph testing.

POLICE PROCEDURES

American Police Beat
http://www.apbweb.com/
This is the web site presence of the print publication American Police Beat, which includes news, products, essays, action shots of actual police, and one of the few sites with links to real-time police scanners you can hear with a Real Audio player.

Cop Quest
http://www.copquest.com/
A web site for police merchandise of all shapes, sizes, and categories

Cops ‘n’ Writers
http://www.copsnwriters.com/
Cops 'n Writers is a consulting service, for writers who wish to incorporate law enforcement elements into their writings, by John Cheek, writer's consultant. Initial consultation is free, with rates for everything from a sentence to an entire manuscript.

Crime and Clues
http://www.crimeandclues.com/
The Art and Science of Criminal Investigation, including articles on crime scene protection, processing, and reconstruction, fingerprint evidence, physical evidence, demonstrative evidence, digital evidence, testimonial evidence, behavioral evidence, death investigation, and more

Crime Magazine
http://www.crimemagazine.com/
Crime Magazine is about true crime: case studies on organized crime, celebrity crime, serial killers, corruption, sex crimes, capital punishment, prisons, assassinations, justice issues, crime books, crime films and crime studies.

Firearms Tutorial
http://library.med.utah.edu/WebPath/TUTORIAL/GUNS/GUNINTRO.html
Information on firearms including terminology, “anatomy,” ballistics, patterns of tissue injury (with graphic photos), crminialistics lab methods, examinations of gunshot residue, and other issues and injuries.

Home Security Information
http://www.homesecurityinformation.com/
This site, linked from a commercial home security company in Calfornia, http://www.homesecurityca.com (with information and resources for that region), includes some articles and tips on how to protect private property from theft and may also be helpful for crime fiction writers in providing details on available security types and methods.

How Police Dogs Work
http://people.howstuffworks.com/police-dog.htm
A site intended for kids, it provides an overview of how police dogs work and assist their human partners.

How Police Interrogation Works
http://www.howstuffworks.com/police-interrogation.htm
From the same site, with information about how police go about questioning suspects.

Latent Fingerprint Examination
http://onin.com/fp/
Lots of information on fingerprints and evidence collection; even has an “Ask the Expert” section

Lee Lofland
http://www.leelofland.com/
Lee Lofland's career in law enforcement spanned nearly two decades. Beginning as a patrol officer, Lee worked his way up to the highly-prized gold shield of detective. Lee solved cases in areas including narcotics, homicide, rape, murder-for-hire, and ritualistic and occult crimes. He worked in a sheriff's office, and a city police department serving as a uniformed officer, as a detective, and as an undercover officer for several jurisdictions. He’s the author of the Writers Digest Books Howdunit series, Police Procedure and Investigation.

National Police Car Archives
http://www.policecararchives.org/
This site’s goals is to present photos of law enforcement vehicles from every single agency in the United States of America. As there are almost 18,000 law enforcement agencies, it’s an ongoing task.

Officer.com
http://www.officer.com/
Created in 1995, officer.com was created to be a comprehensive law enforcement resource site, and quickly became one of the top police sites on the web. It has news, articles, forums, merchandise, free webcasts and podcasts and training and technology videos.

Online Police Procedures Courses or Tutorials
http://www.docnmail.com/learnmore/criminal-justice/police-procedures.htm
Links to free or affordale online police procedural courses or tutorials; the free tutorials include An Explanation of Probable Cause, Stop & Frisk Law, Search & Seizure Guide, and Affidavits and Warrants; courses available for a fee of around $22 include Criminal Laws and Your Legal Rights, Basic Death Investigations, and Criminology Basics.

Police Body Language and Behavior
http://thinklikeablackbelt.com/blog/why-you-need-to-learn-street-cop-body-language/
Insights from a cop on how and why officers act as they do

Police Driving
http://www.policedriving.com/
The mission of this web site is to make police officers and citizens safer through an active driver training program within law enforcement agencies and includes news stories and articles.

Police Employment
http://www.policeemployment.com/
Links to local, state, and federal law enforcement jobs around the U.S.

Police Magazine
http://www.policemag.com/
Includes up-to-date news, articles, a forum, and products

Police One
http://www.policeone.com/
News, columns and various products and merchandise for police officers and agencies

Police Scanner Codes
http://www.radiolabs.com/police-codes.html
Examples of common codes, including the 10/11 codes; note however, that these can vary from one jurisdiction to another and that some jurisdictions have done away with them all together

Police World
http://www.policeworld.net/
Forums frequented by police officers

Real Police.net
http://www.realpolice.net/
Police news, products and resources including firearms, uniforms, and more, actual police videos and stories, links to scanner frequencies, forums (including one on firearms and another on “Ask a Cop”)

Searching and Seizing Computers in Criminal Investigations
http://www.justice.gov/criminal/cybercrime/docs/ssmanual2009.pdf
A PDF publication from the U.S. Department of Justice as a guide for all law enforcement agencies on how to search and seize computers and other electronic evidence during investigations in a legal manner that will stand up in court

Special Operations
http://www.specialoperations.com/
Information on both U.S. and International Special Operations, both military and law enforcement

Traffic Accident Reconstruction Origin
http://www.tarorigin.com/
Although no longer updated, it has lots of archived articles and information on traffic accident reconstruction issues.

Types of Wiretaps, Bugs and Methods
http://www.tscm.com/typebug.html
Almost everything you wanted to know about wiretapping


PSYCHOLOGY OF CRIME

Crime Psych Blog
http://www.crimepsychblog.com/
The purpose of this blog is to collate news and information of interest in a forensic psychological context. Because the blogger is based in the UK, many of the reports tend to have a UK focus.

Crime Times
http://www.crimetimes.org/
Crime Times is a quarterly publication of The Wacker Foundation concentrating on the links between brain dysfunction and disordered/ criminal/ psychopathic behavior. You can search through their database of articles on related topics.

Criminal Psychology; a manual for judges, practitioners, and students
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1320
Hans Gross was an Austrian criminal jurist and examining magistrate, believed to be the creator of the field of criminalistics. He established the Institute of Criminology in Graz. The release of his 1893 ”Handbook for examining magistrates, police officials, military policemen” has been marked as the birth of the field of criminalistics. This web site, from the Project Gutenberg free e-books, has a downloadable version of the book in English (translated from the original German).

Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology
http://psychweb.cisat.jmu.edu/spcp/journal.html
http://maamodt.asp.radford.edu/Psyc%20405/Teaching%20Corner/Forensic%20PowerPoint%20Slides.htm
Basic information about police psychology, with lists links to schools with training in police and criminal psychology   Free PDF articles from this, the official journal of the Society for Police and Criminal Psychology.

PubMed
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/
PubMed is a service of the U.S. National Library of Medicine  that includes over 17 million citations from MEDLINE and other life science journals for biomedical articles back to the 1950s. PubMed includes links to full text articles and other related resources.


PRISONS

Correctional Officers Occupational Outlook Handbook
http://www.bls.gov/ooh/protective-service/correctional-officers.htm
A look at correctional officers, who are responsible for overseeing individuals who have been arrested and are awaiting trial or who have been convicted of a crime and sentenced to serve time in a jail, reformatory, or penitentiary.

Federal Bureau of Prisons
http://www.bop.gov/
They have an article on Alcatraz, a list of federal excutions since 1927, statistics about the current U.S. inmate population and types of sentences imposed, and an inmate and facility locator

JailBase
http://www.jailbase.com/
A searchable database that aggregates arrest and booking records that are publicly available in the U.S.

Michigan State University Corrections Links
http://staff.lib.msu.edu/harris23/crimjust/correct.htm
Quotes, Web Sites, Links to Articles, Publications, and Reports, with annotated entries

Mugshots
http://mugshots.com/
Current and archived mugshots from people arrested around the U.S.

Pace Law School Library:  Prisoners’ Rights
http://www.llrx.com/features/prisonersrights.htm
Links and a bibliography

United States Sentencing Commission
http://www.ussc.gov/
Includes federal sentencing statistics by state, district, and circuit, reports to Congress and sentencing guidelines