What Are the Six Costs of Police Corruption?
Essay by Mandygar • March 6, 2016 • Term Paper • 390 Words (2 Pages) • 1,998 Views
Lesson 7 Assignment Question 1
What are the six costs of police corruption?
Corruption imposes high costs on the police, the criminal justice system, and society. First, a corrupt act by a police officer is a criminal act. Criminal activity by a police officer undermines the basic integrity of law enforcement.
Second, corruption usually protects other criminal activity. Historically, corruption protected gambling syndicates, which were the major source of income for organized crime. However, today corruption is often related to drug trafficking. A Government Accounting Office report revealed that about half of all police officers convicted as a consequence of FBI-led corruption cases are convicted for drug-related offenses.
Third, police corruption undermines the effectiveness of the criminal justice system. The New York City Commission of Combat Police Corruption argues that “The honesty and integrity of police officers is…critical to the workings of the criminal justice system.” Officers routinely testify in court, and if they have a reputation for dishonesty, their credibility in criminal cases is damaged. In 2000, as a consequence of the Rampart scandal, for example, hundreds of drug convictions were threatened because of revelations that police officers in Los Angeles framed individuals by planting drugs on them and then lying about it.
Fourth, corruption undermines the professionalism of a police department. Effective discipline becomes impossible if supervisors are corrupt and threatened with exposure by officers under their command. Corruption encourages police lying, as officers protect one another. Lying to protect oneself or other officers can then spread to other areas of policing, such as covering up excessive use of force.
Fifth, as former New York Times reporter David Burnham argues, Corruption is “a secret tax totaling millions of dollars a year” on individual citizens of New York City. In some instances, it is a direct tax, as when corrupt police extract bribes from businesses.
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