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导读
中美两国政治及法律制度不同，但作为执法部门的警察职能却基本上大同小异，都是站在第一线上保护公民人身和财产安全，维护社会公共秩序的骨干执法队伍。
美国警校没有学历教育，不属于教育系统，而是警察局的一个组成部分。师资主要由教官组成，教官是从有执法实践经验的警察中选拔，再经过培训而取得教官资质后，方能胜任教官。当然，有些课程也会聘请校外专业人员，如聘请知名律师或检察官教授法律课。教官是轮换的，一般一至两年，教官不能长期脱离执法实践，而让更多的优秀警官参与教学，也会对警官整体素质提高起到促进作用。
The force is weak
孱弱的武装
Police departments struggle to recruit enough officers
警察局难以招募足够警员
A stronger economy is partly to blame
部分原因是经济的发展
Jan 7th 2017 | LOS ANGELES
2017年1月7日|洛杉矶
STAR WARS can be used to sell almost anything, from Lego to a career in policing. Fort Worth’s police department released a recruitment video on its Facebook page in December featuring an officer at target practice with a stormtrooper. The white-clad soldiers are notoriously poor shots, and the video shows the galactic GI missing every attempt he makes until he creeps so far forward that hisgoggles are very nearly touching his target. When the exasperated officer asks “who referred you to us” Darth Vader peeks out from the back of the room, shaking his helmeted head in disgust. The scrolling text at the end of the video, which has garnered 17m views thus far, urges: “Join our Force! If you have what it takes to be a Fort Worth Police Officer and are a better aim than a Stormtrooper.” The advert underscores a serious problem affecting police forces nationwide. Economic and social changes have made it harder for police departments to keep their forces fully staffed, and lead to increasingly desperate recruitment.
星球大战可以作为从品牌销售到开辟政治生涯等几乎所有事情的噱头。12月，沃斯堡的警察局在脸书上发布了一条招募视频，画面中是一个官员和暴风兵(星球大战中的人物)进行目标打击训练。这些身着白衣的暴风兵们一直以枪法没有准星“著称”，在视频里，这些星际士兵们除非蹑手蹑脚接近目标直到面对面，否则没法中靶。当被激怒的官员问到：“到底是谁把你招进来的”，黑武士正在房间后面偷看，嫌弃的摇了摇他戴着黑色头盔的头。视频最后的滚动字幕上显示着：“如果你有成为沃斯堡警官的资历并且能比暴风兵更擅长射击，那就加入我们吧!”这则招募广告揭示了现在全国警局面临的一个问题——经济和社会的发展使得警局难以维持充足的警力，也就导致了这些孤注一掷的招募。
GI: n.美国兵
Goggles: n.护目镜，眼罩
Exasperated: adj.被激怒的
The Los Angeles Police Department was short of nearly 100 officers as of mid-December—only 1% of its total workforce, but still enough to be felt on the ground, says Captain Alan Hamilton, who runs recruitment for the department. Philadelphia had 350 vacancies, largely due to a spate of retirements. Last spring, Dallas cancelled two academy classes for lack of applicants; its preliminary applications dropped by over 30% between 2010 and 2015. In 2012, the ratio of police officers to population hit its lowest level since 1997, according to Uniform Crime Reporting Programme data published by the FBI.
负责警署招募工作的阿兰-汉密尔顿警监谈到：“洛杉矶警察署自12月中旬起空缺近100个职位，虽然这只占职工总数的1%，但是这依然有着切实的影响。”费城的警察职位空缺达到了350个，这主要归因于大量的退休人员。去年春天，因为缺少求职申请者，达拉斯警局取消两期警校培训班。初步的求职申请在2010年到2015年降幅超过30%。根据美国联邦调查局公布的犯罪数据报告数据：在2012年，警官人数占总人口数的比例达到了自1997年以来的最低点。
Spate: n.一大串，洪水，泛滥
The dynamics underpinning the shortages vary by department, but there are national trends making it harder for police forces to attract applicants. The first is a strong economy. Nelson Lim, a researcher at the RAND Corporation, a think-tank, says this is nothing new. When plenty of jobs are available, people are usually less motivated to enter dangerous professions. Police forces as well as the armed forces tend to field less interest in boom times.
每个警局的职员短缺程度不同，但是整个国家的趋势使得招募陷入困境。第一个原因是繁荣的经济。智库兰德公司的调查员纳尔森-里姆表示：“难以招募并不是新的问题。”当工作机会增多的时候，人们就不太愿意去从事危险的工作。警察和武装部队这种职业在繁荣时期往往不是一个令人感兴趣的领域。
The second is the perception of increased danger associated with policing: 135 officers were killed in the line of duty between January 1st 2016 and December 28th 2016—a 10% increase from 2015 but fewer than the 192 killed in 2007. Shooting deaths increased from 41 to 64. Several of them were high profile and gruesome, such as the assassination of five Dallas police officers in July 2016. “When you look around the nation and you see the acts of violence directed at police officers—it makes people reluctant to join. Many people join the profession when they’re 22 or 23 when parents still have a heavy influence,” says Scott Walton, deputy chief in Dallas, though sympathy can also boost recruitment. Dallas has seen an uptick in applications since its officers were attacked.
第二个原因是，在很多人眼中，警察职位是一个危险的工作：从2016年1月1日到12月28日有135名警察在执勤中被杀，相比2015年警察的死亡人数上升了10%，但是相比2017年警察死亡人数减少了57人。死于枪杀的人数从41人上升到64人。其中有几起引人注目的可怕事件：如2016年7月达拉斯警局的五名警察被暗杀的事件。达拉斯警局副局长斯科特-沃顿表示：“当你环顾整个国家，你会看到一些针对警察的暴力事件，这使人们不愿意从事这份警察工作。很多人会在22岁或23岁加入警察的队伍，或者是受到从事警察职业父母的深刻影响而从事这份职业。”，不过对警察遭遇的同情可能也会促进招募工作进行。所以自从警察受到袭击后，达拉斯警局的申请人变多了。
The last is the image of policing. The deaths of several unarmed black men at the hands of police officers and the ensuing backlash seem to have made police work less appealing. “We have a situation where law enforcement is being scrutinised more heavily,” says Mr Hamilton of the LAPD. According to Gallup, a polling organisation, trust in law enforcement generally has remained fairly stable since it began surveying the topic in 1993. But according to data collected by Harris, another polling group, the share of both whites and blacks who believe that African Americans are discriminated against by the police has risen markedly between 1969 and 2014.
最后一个原因就是警官的形象。几位并未携带武器的黑人在警官手里死去，引发了对警察的强烈抵制，这使得警官工作越来越失去吸引力。洛杉矶警局的汉密尔顿先生谈到：“我们正处于执法被公众严厉审查的时期。”。一家名为盖洛普的民意调查机构表示，从起源于1993年公众对执法信任度这一主题的研究来看，人们对执法者的信任程度一直保持在相对平稳的态度。但是，根据另一家民意调查公司哈里斯收集得到的数据来看，认为警察歧视非洲裔美国人的白人和黑人比例在1969到2014年间显著上升。
Baltimore Police Department’s officer shortage led it to Puerto Rico in search of fresh faces. The department also mulled relaxing its stance on past marijuana use. Chicago has cut its minimum age requirement for its police academy from 25 to 21. Several departments have lowered educational requirements for recruits. If President-elect Trump follows through on his promises to beef up military and infrastructure spending, the plight of police departments might worsen, worries Mr Lim. The armed and police forces tend to compete for applicants. If more jobs become available in industry and construction, putting on a badge might become even less appealing to young workers.
巴尔的摩警察局官员短缺使得他们不得不去波多黎各寻找新鲜面孔，该部门还考虑放松其过去对使用大麻的立场。芝加哥已将其警察学院的最低年龄要求从25降至21岁。几个部门降低了对新兵的教育要求。利姆先生担心，如果新晋总统特朗普兑现了自己的承诺，加强军事和基础设施支出，警察部门的困境可能恶化。武装警察力量倾向于争夺申请者。如果在工业和建筑业中有更多的工作机会，成为警察可能对年轻人来说，就不再那么有吸引力了。