Abstract

The Off-Duty Gun
Gross, Kenneth G. | March 11, 1968 issue

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It is the gun, the deadly potential, the implicit threat that makes cops different. They should be forced to check their pistols at the precinct door. An off-duty cop should not be armed. He should be an ordinary citizen, taking his chances, with the city. He might begin to understand what it is like to be a defenseless citizen in, an armed camp. It is the gun that changes him and makes him different, And it is the authority, usually the obligation, to carry the gun off duty that makes him different on duty. He begins to think of himself as different. He sets up a different category of personnel. People and cops. Creeps and cops. Threats and cops.

See Also:

POLICE; POLICE professionalization; POLICE-community relations; FIREARMS; WEAPONS
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