Does a police officer have to get permission to break the law?

Question

Does a police officer require permission before breaking the law?

Justice Brandeis states:

Decency, security, and liberty alike demand that government officials shall be subjected to the same rules of conduct that are commands to the citizen. In a government of laws, existence of the government will be imperiled if it fails to observe the law scrupulously. Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill, it teaches the whole people by its example. Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law; it invites every man to become a law unto himself; it invites anarchy. To declare that in the administration of the criminal law the end justifies the means — to declare that the government may commit crimes in order to secure the conviction of a private criminal — would bring terrible retribution. Against that pernicious doctrine this court should resolutely set its face.

^{Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438, 485, 48 S.Ct. 564, 575, 72 L.Ed. 944 (1928) (Brandeis, J., dissenting):}

Answer 1

The question is oddly phrased: The law does not give allowances for its violation.

Many laws have exceptions. E.g., the law against killing endangered animals contains an exception for defensive killings.

Perhaps you are thinking of safe harbors? For example, there are general provisions in the law like "exigent circumstances" that allow police to proceed with actions that, absent those provisions, would constitute violations of law.

"Permission" to violate a right can be granted explicitly in the form of a warrant, which allows law enforcement to "violate" specific property and freedom rights.

Finally, one might consider an executive pardon or jury-nullification to be ex post "permission to break the law."

Answer 2

Police officers cannot legally break the law.

However, the law that governs police officers allows them to do things in the course of their duties that would be illegal for other people. This is not permission to break the law: it is that different laws apply to police officers.

For example, the powers of NSW Police are governed by (among other things) the LAW ENFORCEMENT (POWERS AND RESPONSIBILITIES) ACT 2002. Of particular interest is s4 which says:

4 Relationship to common law and other matters

(1) Unless this Act otherwise provides expressly or by implication, this Act does not limit:

(a) the functions, obligations and liabilities that a police officer has as a constable at common law, or

(b) the functions that a police officer may lawfully exercise, whether under an Act or any other law as an individual (otherwise than as a police officer) including, for example, powers for protecting property.

(2) Without limiting subsection (1) and subject to section 9, nothing in this Act affects the powers conferred by the common law on police officers to deal with breaches of the peace.

So, in addition to the specific powers given by this Act (among others) they also have the powers of "a constable at common law"; that is they can draw on about 1,000 years of case law to determine what they can lawfully do.