The Office of Professional Standards was created in November of 2005 to maintain the public confidence, as well as the integrity and professionalism of the Calvert County Sheriff’s Office, through an impartial investigation of citizen and internal complaints within the agency.
The Office of Professional Standards (OPS) serves as an investigative arm to the citizens and employees of the Calvert County Sheriff’s Office. The OPS is tasked with the identification and reporting of employee behavior that tends to discredit the Agency, or violates the Agency's policy and procedures. The Office of Professional Standards reviews complaint investigations for consistency and fairness. Complaints are presented to the Sheriff for a fair and appropriate adjudication with consideration given to the complainant, the Agency, the individual employee, and the public trust.
Investigators receive specific training to efficiently investigate and prepare for agency administrative cases and disciplinary hearing boards.
Police-Citizen Mediation Program
Mediation is a confidential alternative to the traditional complaint process. Mediation offers a different way of handling concerns or frustrations that citizens and police officers may have after interacting with one another. These concerns and frustrations often lead to citizens filing complaints against the officer.The mediator is a neutral third party, trained and experienced in assisting citizens and police officers in talking through and possibly resolving their differences with one another.
OPS identifies those cases during the assessment phase, where the citizen/police officer may benefit from a face to face dialogue that will enable them to voice their different perspectives based on their interaction with one another.
Identified mediation cases are then forwarded to the mediation center for referral. Mediation is a voluntary, confidential process in which both parties must agree to attend. If either party does not agree to attend mediation, then the complaint will be assigned for investigation and the traditional process will take place. If both parties agree to mediation, then there will be no further investigation.The case will be closed with mediation being the resolution.
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