Technical and Professional Communication:
Guide and samples for Criminal Justice and Pre-law majors

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Exigences and audiences

(introish paragraph on exigence, audience, and professional writing)

Note on private, protected, and confidential information

I don't expect you to file and pay for Freedom of Information Requests, and it's understandably rare for people to post private or protected correspondence on the internet for anyone to access. While I would not simply say "give up looking," if you're not networked with a professional or have professional experience as an employee, volunteer, or intern, private documents will be very difficult to get hold of.

Thankfully, there are dozens of other genres that you can access when researching professional writing online.


Professional writing for lawyers, judges, clerks, and law- or court-related professions

Blogs and websites

Memos, Letters, and Correspondence

Instructional, training, or professional development resources

Part of being a professional is participating in professional communities.

Briefs

Motions

Court opinions and orders

Reports

Journals


Professional writing for policing and law enforcement

Social media and networks

All kinds of organizations use social media and social networking sites for a variety of professional purposes. This is exactly the kind of distributed writing work that you might be expected to contribute to as an employee of the organization.

See an overview of Corpus Christi PD's social media and police-media relations.

Blogs

Blogs are used in a variety of ways: as police blotters, as easy-to-update methods for publishing information to the community, as narrative storytelling forums (what role might that have in the profession, as a form professional writing?) or as informational and educational resources.

Newsletters

Reports

Formal reports

Crime and other data-centered reports

Local PDs publish Uniform Crime Reports in a variety of formats:

Memos, Letters, and Correspondence

Policies and policy explanations

Training materials and manuals

Press releases

Community policing-related and Public safety-related documents