IACP Law Enforcement Policy Center
For more than 30 years, the IACP Law Enforcement Policy Center has been identifying leading practices and providing sound guidance to the law enforcement profession to assist in developing policies for individual departments.
Policy Center Resources
The Policy Center offers four types of resources:
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Model Policy: Provides officers with concrete guidance and directives by describing, the manner in which actions, tasks, and operations are to be performed.
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Considerations: Intended to present items for agencies to take into account when developing their own policies on a topic. This format recognizes that expectations and capabilities vary by agency, and it aims to present recommendations to the law enforcement field without dictating exact approaches.
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Concepts and Issues: Designed to provide background information on the topic to support the Model Policy or Considerations document.
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Need to Know...: Synthesizes the key points of the topic into a brief, one-page overview.
Click here to visit the full list of Policy Center topics.
Featured Policy Center Resources
Welfare Checks
Welfare checks are requests for the police to check on an individual due to concern for their safety or well-being. Reasons for such requests vary...
Electronic Control Weapons
Law enforcement officers should use only the force that is objectively reasonable to effectively bring an incident under control, while protecting the safety of the...
Search Warrants
The search warrant is one of the more powerful and valuable tools in the law enforcement arsenal. While the process of applying for and obtaining...
Crime Scene Response
Protection of the crime scene, appropriate documentation, and preservation of evidence are crucial steps in criminal investigations and often provide the basis for effective identification...
Firearm Recovery
With violence involving firearms dominating the news headlines, it is crucial that all law enforcement agencies have timely and sustainable protocols for the recovery and forensic...
Alternatives to Arrest
Programs offering alternatives to arrest have the potential to positively alter the outcomes for individuals who come into contact with the criminal justice system. By...
Facial Recognition
Facial recognition technology can be helpful in identifying possible suspects or persons of interest by performing a comparative analysis of facial attributes observed in digital...
Discretionary Response to Calls for Service
Responding to calls for service efficiently is one of a police officer's primary duties, but public safety remains a priority. Inappropriate responses to calls for...
Standards of Conduct
Law enforcement officers must accept and abide by a high ethical and moral standard that is consistent with the rule of law they are sworn...
Employee Mental Health and Wellness
Personnel are the most valuable assets in a law enforcement agency. The documents provided are intended to assist agency personnel in developing policies, procedures, and guidelines...
Recruiting & Hiring
Hiring decisions are among the most impactful decisions a police agency can make. Agencies that want to build positive relationships with their communities, improve their public...
All Policy Center Resources
Pandemic Flu
Health care professionals predict that a pandemic influenza outbreak is highly likely, if not inevitable, based on current conditions and historical data. Should the current...
Patrol Rifle
This is stand alone document, unaccompanied by a model policy, explores the primary issues surrounding the issuance of rifles to line patrol officers. Following extensive research, the...
Performance Recognition Awards
The recognition of personal excellence is an important aspect of a law enforcement agency’s activities. Presenting departmental awards for meritorious service provides that recognition, thereby...
Personal Relationships in the Workplace
Among the more challenging personnel problems faced by law enforcement administrators is the difficulty created by certain personal relationships existing or developing among employees of...
Personally Assigned Vehicles
Personally assigned vehicles are designated to officers of some law enforcement agencies in order to enhance public safety through increased visibility of police vehicles in the...
Personnel Transfer and Rotation
Duty assignments available in law enforcement agencies vary widely with regard to required skills, knowledge and abilities, job demands, benefits and desirability, as well as the...
Police Chaplains
Police chaplains assist police agency personnel with personal, spiritual, moral, and ethical consultation. Police chaplains are clergy whose function is to provide support and guidance...
Police-Citizen Contacts
Police interactions with citizens form the cornerstone of effective police work. With that in mind, all officers should follow the provisions of agency policy to...
Polygraph Examinations
The polygraph examination is a valuable investigative aid when used in conjunction with, but not as a substitute for, a thorough investigation. The polygraph may...
Post-Shooting Personnel Support
Law enforcement duties can expose officers to mentally painful and highly stressful situations that cannot be resolved through normal stress coping mechanisms. Unless adequately treated...
Pregnancy
A diverse police workforce is a valuable asset, and trained and experienced female police officers are critical resources. Pregnancy is a temporary physical condition, unique to...
Preliminary Death Investigation
Reported deaths of persons, other than those under the immediate care of a physician at a hospital or similar health care facility, should be responded...
Protection of Firearms and Explosives
Civil disorders have been demonstrated to present highly fruitful opportunities for violence-prone elements of society to steal firearms, ammunition, explosives and incendiary devices. In the...
Recording Police Activity*
Members of the public, including media representatives, have an unambiguous First Amendment right to record officers in public places, as long as their actions do...
Recruiting & Hiring
Hiring decisions are among the most impactful decisions a police agency can make. Agencies that want to build positive relationships with their communities, improve their public...
Reporting Use of Force
The authority to use force carries with it the need for accountability in order to safeguard the rights of the public and preserve the integrity...
Research Partnerships*
The ability of a law enforcement agency to respond to emerging issues and long-range goals is dependent upon the ability to implement new policies, programs, strategies...
Retaliatory Conduct
Law enforcement agencies should prohibit retaliatory conduct against or interference with an employee who reports, assists, or seeks to report breaches of department policy, procedures, or...
School-Police Partnerships
Policing on school property requires an understanding of the limitations placed on law enforcement officers and the responsibility of school authorities for supervision of children under their care...
Search Warrants
The search warrant is one of the more powerful and valuable tools in the law enforcement arsenal. While the process of applying for and obtaining...
Every effort has been made by the IACP Law Enforcement Policy Center staff and advisory board to ensure that these documents incorporate the most current information and contemporary judgment on these issues. However, law enforcement administrators should be cautioned that no model policy can meet all the needs of any given law enforcement agency. In addition, the formulation of specific agency policies must take into account local political and community perspectives and customs, prerogatives, and demands; often divergent law enforcement strategies and philosophies; and the impact of varied agency resource capabilities, among other factors. Readers outside of the United States should note that, while these documents promote procedures reflective of a democratic society, their legal basis follows United States Supreme Court rulings and other federal laws and statutes. Law enforcement administrators should be cautioned that each law enforcement agency operates in a unique environment of court rulings, state laws, local ordinances, regulations, judicial and administrative decisions, and collective bargaining agreements that must be considered and should, therefore, consult their agency's legal advisor before implementing any policy.
The IACP Law Enforcement Policy Center documents are periodically updated, and the most current versions are published to this website. To minimize confusion and to help ensure reference to the most recent documents available, the IACP Policy Center does not distribute prior versions of any documents that have since been updated.
