Police-Media Relations at Critical Incidents: Interviews from Oklahoma City

2005 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 86-97 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tory J. Caeti ◽  
John Liederbach ◽  
Steven S. Bellew
Keyword(s):  
Law Enforcement ◽  
Critical Incident ◽  
Critical Incidents ◽  
Hazardous Materials ◽  
Oklahoma City ◽  
Terrorist Attacks ◽  
Oklahoma City Bombing ◽  
Media Relations ◽  
The Media ◽  
Post September 11

The policing of critical incident scenes, including natural disasters, hazardous materials spills, hostage situations, and terrorist attacks, has become an especially salient topic in the post-September 11 environment. Given the attention-grabbing nature of these events, police administrators are often faced with the task of building and maintaining relationships with members of the media at these scenes, primarily reporters and their crews who often pursue goals that are in direct conflict with those of law enforcement. This article examines the issues related to police—media relations at critical incident scenes using interview data from subjects involved in policing the scene of the Oklahoma City bombing and the related trials of Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols. These interviews provide a context for the presentation of guidelines important to police administrators who must be able to forge successful relationships with the media at critical incidents.

scholarly journals Secure Pesticide Storage: Security Against Terrorist Threats

EDIS ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 2005 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Frederick M. Fishel
Keyword(s):  
September 11 ◽  
Cooperative Extension Service ◽  
Oklahoma City ◽  
Terrorist Attacks ◽  
Extension Service ◽  
Publication Date ◽  
Oklahoma City Bombing ◽  
Original Publication ◽  
University Of Florida ◽  
Storage Security

Many farmers and managers of pesticide storage facilities had concerns about biosecurity and agroterrorism even before the Oklahoma City bombing and the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on our nation. Businesses that manufacture, reformulate, sell, distribute, transport, store, or apply pesticides have long known the mitigation steps for safety of their workers, customers and communities. In todays age, these efforts may not necessarily be enough. This document is PI-42, one of a series of the Pesticide Information Office, Florida Cooperative Extension Service, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, University of Florida. Original publication date May 2005.

scholarly journals Witness interview strategy for critical incidents (WISCI)

2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 268-278 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Smith ◽  
Becky Milne
Keyword(s):  
Critical Incident ◽  
Design Methodology ◽  
Critical Incidents ◽  
Terrorist Attacks ◽  
Initial Contact ◽  
Fast Time ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Practical Advice ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Practical Implications

PurposeHigh-profile critical incidents involving multiple witnesses, particularly terrorist attacks, have increased over the years. The purpose of this paper is to describe the components of a witness interview strategy for this type of investigation. Central to these cases is a need for a triage system which deals with a large number of witness/victim interviews that must be conducted fast time.Design/methodology/approachThis paper was developed based on the experience of the authors who provide practical advice and support to these types of investigations and a dialogue with police interview advisers involved in developing this type of strategy.FindingsA witness interview strategy for critical incidents involving multiple witnesses should be set within a framework that covers initial contact with the witnesses, the interview process and post-interview processes.Practical implicationsIt is important that a witness interview strategy is developed for any critical incident involving multiple witnesses to ensure that what could otherwise be a chaotic process is effectively managed.Originality/valueNo other papers have been published that consider the development of witness interview-strategies for multiple-witnesses in critical incidents.

scholarly journals Decision Inertia in Critical Incidents

2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 209-218 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicola Power ◽  
Laurence Alison
Keyword(s):  
Law Enforcement ◽  
Critical Incident ◽  
Critical Incidents ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Psychological Process ◽  
Negative Consequences ◽  
Option Generation ◽  
Political Security ◽  
Military Law ◽  
Future Outcomes

Abstract. When presented with competing options, critical incident decision makers often struggle to commit to a choice (in particular when all options appear to yield negative consequences). Despite being motivated to take action in disasters, terrorism, major investigations, and complex political interventions, decision makers can become inert, looping between phases of situation assessment, option generation, and option evaluation. This “looping” is functionally redundant when it persists until they have lost the opportunity to take action. We define this as “decision inertia”: the result of a process of (redundant) deliberation over possible options and in the absence of any further useful information. In the context of critical incidents (political, security, military, law enforcement) we have discovered that rather than disengaging and avoiding difficult choices, decision makers are acutely aware of the negative consequences that might arise if they failed to decide (i.e., the incident would escalate). The sensitization to possible future outcomes leads to intense deliberation over possible choices and their consequences and, ultimately, can result in a failure to take any action in time (or at all). We (i) discuss decision inertia as a novel psychological process of redundant deliberation during crises; (ii) define the concept and discuss the emerging studies in support of our tentative hypotheses regarding how the cognitively active process of deliberation can result in complete behavioral inactivity; and (iii) suggest recommendations and interventions for combatting inertia.

Capital Punishment, Closure, and Media

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jody Madeira
Keyword(s):  
Capital Punishment ◽  
Traumatic Event ◽  
Oklahoma City ◽  
Oklahoma City Bombing ◽  
Government Officials ◽  
Emotional Process ◽  
Therapeutic Consequences ◽  
Murder Victims ◽  
The Media ◽  
Emotional Events

In contemporary society, “closure” refers to “end to a traumatic event or an emotional process” (Berns, 2011, pp. 18–19)—and, in the more specific context of capital punishment, controversy over what, if anything, is needed for murder victims’ families to attain healing and finality or move forward with their lives, including the execution of their loved one’s killer. The term is highly politicized, and is used by both death penalty advocates and its opponents to build arguments in favor of their respective positions. Closure has been indelibly linked to both capital punishment and media institutions since the late 1990s and early 2000s. The media’s penchant for covering emotional events and its role in informing the American public and recording newsworthy events make it perfectly suited to construct, publicize, and reinforce capital punishment’s alleged therapeutic consequences. Legal and political officials also reinforce the supposed link between closure and capital punishment, asking jurors to sentence offenders to death or upholding death sentences to provide victims’ families with a chance to heal. Such assertions are also closely related to beliefs that a particular offender is defiant or lacks remorse. Surprisingly, however, the association between closure and capital punishment has only recently been subjected to empirical scrutiny. Researchers have found that victims’ families deem closure a myth and often find executions themselves unsatisfying, provided that a perpetrator does not enjoy high media visibility so that the execution has a silencing effect, as did Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh’s execution by lethal injection in 2001. Recent empirical examinations of the link between capital punishment and closure prompt a redefinition of closure through which victims’ family members learn to cope with, work through, and tell the story of a murder and its impact. This redefinition is less sensational and thus perhaps less newsworthy, which may have the salubrious effect of discouraging extensive media emphasis on executions’ closure potential. Another way to decouple closure from capital punishment is for media organizations to change their practices of covering perpetrators, such as by not continually showing images of the perpetrator and by incorporating a more extensive focus on the victims and their families. While government officials have called for the media to exercise restraint in the wake of such events as the Oklahoma City bombing and 9/11, victims’ groups are now beginning to advocate for this same goal, with much success.

Autobiographies of Three Surviving Branch Davidians

2005 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-197
Author(s):  
Catherine Wessinger
Keyword(s):  
Law Enforcement ◽  
Human Dimensions ◽  
Oral Histories ◽  
Initial Report ◽  
God's Will ◽  
Branch Davidians ◽  
The Bible ◽  
American Law ◽  
The Media ◽  
Federal Agents

This article provides an initial report on oral histories being collected from three surviving Branch Davidians: Bonnie Haldeman, the mother of David Koresh, Clive Doyle, and Sheila Martin. Their accounts are being made into autobiographies. Interviews with a fourth survivor, Catherine Matteson, are being prepared for deposit in an archive and inform the material gathered from Bonnie Haldeman, Clive Doyle, and Sheila Martin. Oral histories provided by these survivors humanize the Branch Davidians, who were dehumanized and erased in 1993 by the application of the pejorative ‘cult’ stereotype by the media and American law enforcement agents. These Branch Davidian accounts provide alternate narratives of what happened in 1993 at Mount Carmel Center outside Waco, Texas, to those provided by American federal agents, and flesh out the human dimensions of the community and the tragedy. Branch Davidians are differentiated from many other people primarily by their strong commitment to doing God's will as they understand it from the Bible. Otherwise they are ordinary, intelligent people with the same emotions, loves, and foibles as others.

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