Introduction I’m a police psychologist for a major metropolitan area and also the newest member of the hostage negotiation team. It is 3:15 pm on a Friday and the team has been called out to a crisis situation. The location is a residential area approximately three blocks from a middle school and a public library. The only information that the team has at this point in time is that the perpetrator is a 42-year-old male who has taken his wife, son and a family friend hostage. The perpetrator has already killed his next door neighbor and is threatening to kill everyone else in the house if his demands are not met. His first demand is immunity from the murder he has already committed in exchange surrendering without harm to anyone else. The…show more content… The police psychologist can be the advisor, integrated team member, primary negotiator or even the primary controller. Most psychologist during a crisis/ negotiation will be the role as the advisor. This role will begin before the incident occurs and continues throughout the situation, and is sustained after the situation has conclude. As the advisor they help in the training of law enforcement personnel before they become involved in a crisis/ negotiation situation. This way they will become the consultant during the actual incident, giving a profile and mental assessment of the perpetrator. They can determine the type of strategies the primary negotiator should use when talking or dealing with the perpetrator. The police psychologist can also be useful in assessing hostages in determining the specific reason the perpetrator choose the hostages or if the hostages are behaving in a manner that maybe beneficial or detrimental to being able to negotiate the situation. They can help with interviews of witnesses and gathering any information vital to the success of the negotiations. (Hatcher, et al. 1998, p. 464-467). If an agency uses a five person team as their crisis/hostage negotiations, the police psychologist could become an integrated part of the negotiation team. The five person model has the primary…show more content… There is only a small number of agencies that will allow the police psychologist to play this role. One of the main reasons this is not recommended is that the perpetrator may have had a bad experience with a mental health professional. Most of the perpetrators do not feel they have a psychological problem and become offended or even hostile if confronted by a psychologist. Most psychologists have little experience working with street behaviors in the public. So this makes it prudent for the officer that has this experience to fill the role as the primary negotiator. The other reason for a psychologist not to fill this role is that deception may have to be used to resolve the crisis. Deception is unethical for psychologist and they may not agree with deceiving the perpetrator is the right way to go. The psychologist should not take the role of the primary controller. This role comes with the responsibility of operational commander or could just oversee the negotiation unit. This person will manage the police officers and will be responsible to make sure everyone is going by policy and procedures. This normally has a person with experience working with the government and mental health. Primary controller should have knowledge of police functions and has participated in most of their training exercises. In this role it can be a very political role,
