Police Psychologists: Roles and Responsibilities in a Law Enforcement Agency

This special issue of Police Chief magazine was developed by 33 members of the IACP Police Psychological Services Section (PPSS) and comes 25 years after the section was elevated from an ad hoc committee to section status. The IACP-PPSS was formed during a gathering of police psychologists attending a conference at the FBI National Academy in Quantico, Virginia, in August 1984. The group met again in Salt Lake City, Utah, in October 1984 at the annual IACP conference as an ad hoc committee. On October 25, 1984, the IACP Executive Board voted to establish the ad hoc committee as a standing committee. The Police Psychological Services Committee first convened on October 13, 1985, at the annual IACP conference in Houston, Texas, with the purpose of providing psychological services to IACP member agencies. The Police Psychological Services Committee was elevated to full section status in 1986 at the annual IACP conference in Nashville, Tennessee.