Policing Vulnerability

In a constantly evolving context of performance management, accountability and risk assessment, police organisations and frontline police officers are required to pay careful attention to what has come to be known as ‘at risk people’, ‘vulnerable populations’ or ‘vulnerable people’. Vulnerable people have become a key focus of policy.

Concurrently, there have been stronger demands on police, and a steep increase in police powers in relation to their interaction with vulnerable people. The premise of this protectionist and interventionist agenda is threefold: to protect the rights of vulnerable individuals proactively cater for their vulnerability within the justice system; and to secure police operations and protocols within strict guidelines.

This collection unpacks ‘vulnerable people policing’ in theory and practice and guides the reader through the policing process as it is experienced by police officers, victims, offenders, witnesses and justice stakeholders. Each chapter features a single step of the policing process: from police recruit education through to custody, and the final transfer of vulnerable people to courts and sentencing.

This edited collection provides analytical, theoretical and empirical insights on vulnerable people policing, and reflects on critical issues in a domain that is increasingly subject to speedy conversion from policy to practice, and heightened media and political scrutiny. It breaks down policing practices, operations and procedures that have vulnerable populations as a focus, bringing together original and innovative academic research and literature, practitioner experience and discussion of policy implications (from local and international perspectives).

The particular nature of this collection highlights the multi-disciplinary nature of police work, sheds light on how specific, mandatory policies guide police officers steps in their interaction with vulnerable populations, and discusses the practicalities of police decision making at key points in this process.

Isabelle is the Discipline Coordinator of Police Studies, University of Tasmania and Senior Researcher, Tasmanian Institute of Law Enforcement Studies. Isabelle teaches and researches policing, and specialises in the topic of vulnerable populations and policing. She teaches this very topic at the Tasmania Police Academy, a role she was already undertaking with the New South Wales Police Force, when she was working at Charles Sturt University.She is a member of the Australian University Community Engagement Alliance Scholarship Committee, a member of the Ethical Review and Research Governance Advisory Committee of the Australian Institute of Police Management.She is also an Associate Investigator at the Centre of Excellence in Policing and Security, and a member of the Australia Crime Prevention Council. She is an Adjunct Senior Lecturer at Charles Sturt University, in the School of Police Studies.Nicole is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Social Sciences and Humanities at Deakin University, and Associate Senior Research Fellow with the Tasmania Institute of Law Enforcement Studies, University of Tasmania.Nicole has worked as a practitioner and academic in the areas of policing hate crime, and policing in culturally and linguistically diverse societies for over 15 years.Her current research with the London Metropolitan Police Service uses forensic linguistics to understand the context of hate speech in hate crime. Her work has been published in a range of edited collections and journals, and she is the co-author (with Rob White and Janine Haines) of Crime and Criminology.

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