Question

Making Difficult Decisions at Work

Lorena has been a police officer with the Pleasanton Police force for eleven years. Until last year, she was primarily assigned to foot patrol in the downtown business and shopping district. Merchants and other locals knew her by name and commented on her firm yet fair approach to maintaining a safe place for people to work, live, and shop. The safety rating in her jurisdiction was always rated as excellent, with fewer than ten violent crimes per year and fewer than five robberies per year.

Last year, one of the patrol officers retired and the sergeant asked Lorena to change assignments from foot patrol downtown in the commercial district to car patrol in one of the outlying neighborhoods. Lorena was ready for a change, so she agreed. She even offered to walk the downtown patrol with her replacement to introduce him to local merchants. Derek, a relatively new member of the police force, was selected to take over the downtown foot patrol. Lorena spent a half day with him showing him around the commercial district.

At first, everything seemed to be going along fine. Lorena was enjoying her new assignment, and Derek reported to her that criminal activity in the commercial district was down. However, after six months the sergeant called Lorena into his office to discuss a confidential matter. He noticed in his quarterly report that violent crimes and robberies were on the rise in the downtown area. He expressed concern and asked Lorena for her opinion. She offered to go chat with some of the downtown merchants to see if they had any observations or information to share. What she learned was shocking. The merchants told her that Derek was involved with an illegal gambling operation. Instead of patrolling the streets, he was focusing his time on collecting gambling debts.

Questions

1. If you were Lorena, would you report Derek? Why or why not?

2. If you were Derek’s supervisor, how would you handle this situation once you found out about the illegal gambling operation?

Answer 1

Answer

✓ if I was Lorena, I would first collect the solid evidence regarding the gambling of Derek before reporting, and ones all the evidence, facts and guilt is found, I would report him and take action against him. Because, it's illegal work and his ignorance is giving the criminal activities an encouragement.

✓ if I was Derek's supervisor, I would go to Derek with all the evidence and facts and ask him for clarification. If he failed to prove himself innocent then legal charges will be imposed on him. And I will take it to the senior who can take the further decision under the law.