Other Types of Writing

This chapter helps criminal justice professionals to find a speedy method of organizing material, hints on writing evaluations and comparisons, and ideas for clearer visual presentation. Writing the short memo will give criminal justice professionals practice and confidence in attacking other nonchronological material, such as longer memos, meeting minutes, letters, administrative reports, or research reports. Techniques for the memo are adaptable to letter writing. Electronic communications have some obvious advantages over writing a letter but also disadvantages. The person who completes the presentence investigation report carries a heavy responsibility in report writing. Reports are usually double-spaced and sometimes numbered by line on the left margin. While academic researchers would devote considerable space to a review of previous research, a police research report can simply give a brief summary of what the department has been doing and quickly move on to what the department did to investigate the topic under question.