Talk:Police corruption/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about Police corruption. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Fiction

Would anyone else consider it worthwhile to add any links to fictional/factional examples of police corruption such as Serpico or L. A. Confidential, or The Shield? abdullahazzam

- Frank Serpico is not a fictional/factional example. (GregJackP (talk) 18:49, 10 February 2010 (UTC))

Police corruption can involve a single officer or group of officers, or can be the standard practice of entire police precincts or departments; usually the latter is the case in that even if certain members are not privy to the secrets held by the participating "officials," those members are at least aware that there are indeed secrets. In most major cities there are internal affairs sections to investigate suspected police corruption or misconduct. However, the corruption is always so widespread that any investigation requires an external body with far reaching powers, such as beings from another planet, or militias of angry, victimized citizens. Of course, in reality, everyone on Earth that makes any money at all is too afraid of losing it or being punished in some other way for standing up to the vast conspiracy of corrupt thugs that run things, so the corrupt system stays in place perpetually without opposition while the mouthpiece of the operation, the mass media, daily varnishes and buffs to a sparkling shine the veneer that makes the rulers appear as indignant moralists trying desperately to save the world from lunatic fringe criminals.

That seems fictional, or at least biased--Bisected8 16:52, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

Police corruption causes many problems

Is it that rare?

The article claims that police participation in organized crime is very rare. I'm by no means an expert on this subject, but I wonder whether the qualification "in developed nations" needs to be added? Metasquares 21:35, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how anyone can say it's rare or not - far beyond half of the police officers I have met in my life time were severely corrupt. I would say it's not rare at all. I'm going to delete that part since nobody knows if it's rare or not. BriEnBest (talk) 07:20, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Also, the network of police is often very corrupt, in that they will cover for one another, and lie to a judge to protect eachother from criminal and/or civil liability, after, for example, a case of police brutality. This is corruption, and happens often - at least where I'm from. BriEnBest (talk) 07:20, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

Please. Corruption is as rampant as it is in the political world. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.172.135.42 (talk) 06:37, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Third World

"However, in many third world countries, such as Russia, Ukraine or Mexico, police corruption remains to be one of the largest social problems facing their countries." Since when are any of these countries third world? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.5.146.47 (talk) 20:36, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Well it meant something once. Probably need a more updated adjective. "Developing countries?" Mexico is trying to improve. When that happens the Drug Lords shoot the policeman who can't be bought. I don't know as much about the judiciary in the other two countries, but probably not up to G-7 standards. Student7 (talk) 01:28, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

Developing countries would be a more PC way to put it, but it also depends on how you define "developing country". If you're strictly working with IMF data then yes, all three would be considered developing countries. Looking at the UN Human Development Index, which takes multiple factors into account including GDP, literacy, and life expectancy, all three nations are listed as "high".^[1] The G7 is primarily concerned with financial issues, and each G7 member has very distinct differences in their judicial proceedings, though their basic makeup is along Anglican/Romanesque lines. Russia, interestingly, was a member of G7 until the annexation of Crimea. Bryan Wicker (talk) 20:29, 27 September 2014 (UTC)

^ http://hdr.undp.org/en/content/human-development-report-2014

Peer Review

I think making "The Blue code of Silence" it's own section and expanding on that topic would be helpful. Also there are many different forms of corruption mentioned, but not fully explained I would possibly add a little more details to each of those. Perhaps what they are, why they appeal to police, and what it entails. Oliviashaw (talk) 17:50, 7 November 2014 (UTC) I changed a few in class and completely took out hazing. see what you think about the few changes i made.

Suggestions for revisions and expansions

The "Effects of Police Corruption" section needs to have a clear definition of the rotten apple theory and a reference to support the idea that one bad officer could have a ripple effect on other officers. Also, the section could say more about the economic and political effects of corruption. I second the idea of adding a discussion of international attempts to address police corruption. Perhaps this could be under a new section called "Controlling Corruption" or something like that. Then, subsections could be about controlling corruption at different levels, including departmental, state, national, and international levels. These sections could talk about different control strategies and research on their (in)effectiveness. Profmwilliams (talk) 19:37, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Note that the NGO organization, Interpol, isn't mentioned, which (well down the list) addresses corruption. Nor Europol. I'm guessing that these organizations are considered trustworthy and therefore have active internal policing. There is one event on UK "internal" investigation, but nothing to summarize Internal affairs (law enforcement). I would guess that a large police organization is only as pure as it's internal affairs division is active. Student7 (talk) 21:34, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Note that in a high level article, it is WP:SYNTH to merely select out "bad examples" like Ukraine, Peru, etc. These countries may "be in the news" but picking them out for this level should mean that some neutral source (WP:RS, WP:SECONDARY) has already done this for you. When editors do it themselves, it is "cherry picking" in lay terms, WP:OR in Wikipedia terms. Student7 (talk) 15:50, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

I did try to edit the Peru and Ukraine examples but someone came and switched it back. I do agree with you that it needs to be revised. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colten Hansen (talk • contribs) 18:51, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

Enforcement Droid?

The lead suggests that all laws should be enforced exactly the same for everyone. This is, on paper, nice. And led to the facetious development of RoboCop_(franchise)#ED-209 which has no common sense about anything.

In reality, police are limited by common sense application of laws, guidelines laid down for evidence by judicial prosecutors. The fact that old laws may be thrown out or ignored by courts despite the fact that they are "officially" still on the books. None of this is discussed here and needs to be. This is the flip side of corruption. The public does not really want "automatic Droid enforcement! Student7 (talk) 19:20, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Suggestions

The page needs grammar editing. The flow of the sentences and breaks in paragraphs need to be edited as well. Ellen 307 (talk) 16:35, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Bibliography

Sources we are considering adding to the page:

Democracy Now! covers Police Brutality. (n.d.). Retrieved February 13, 2015, from http://www.democracynow.org/topics/police_brutality

Glazer, S. (1995, November 24). Police corruption. CQ Researcher, 5, 1041-1064. Retrieved from https://hal.weber.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=9512197577&site=ehost-live

Juarez, J. (2004). Brotherhood of corruption a cop breaks the silence on police abuse, brutality, and racial profiling. Chicago, Ill.: Chicago Review Press. Ellen 307 (talk) 16:56, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Punch, M. (2009). Police corruption: Deviance, accountability and reform in policing. Cullompton, Devon: Willan Publishing.Ellen 307 (talk) 15:51, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Sherman, L. (1978). Scandal and reform: Controlling police corruption. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Hopson, J. (2012). Breaking the blue wall: One man's war against police corruption. Bloomington, IN: WestBow Press.Ellen 307 (talk) 15:57, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

More Suggestions

Some of the definitions (like the Rotten Apple Theory and Investigations) should be revised. More citations are needed throughout the article.DannyHumphreys (talk) 17:10, 20 February 2015 (UTC) We are going to restate definitions and go into more detail throughout the page. The page needs to be tweaked and narrowed down to important information instead of focusing on all details. Ellen 307 (talk) 16:16, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Relevant Picture

We recently added a photo that we thought related to police corruption. The picture included a protester holding a sign that reads: "You go into this police station as a human being and come out as an animal!!" The user SantiLak took down the photo twice. We are doing this for a class assignment and believe that the picture is relevant to the topic police corruption. A part of police corruption is when a department is so corrupt that it changes an individual officer to also be corrupt so yes, the sign describes what happens to officers when they enter corrupt police departments. The officers standards and morals seem to change based on the environment they are patrolling in. Ellen 307 (talk) 15:42, 22 April 2015 (UTC)

The photo's description on Flickr present's a different story of a person who it seems like felt like the police shouldn't have harassed him about his signs. It had nothing to do with police corruption. That part of police corruption may be true but it does not apply to this photo which you added. If I might make a suggestion, there are numerous places around the world where people have protested police corruption explicitly, unlike this photo, and there are most likely photos with creative commons licensing that you can upload to commons. - SantiLak (talk) 04:12, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Suggested photo was too media-like. "I say this, therefore it is true." Complaintant may have been lying or exaggerating. Nice to get a real picture of somebody accepting a bribe (that was used in court to convict the person.

Another possibility, which some editors may object to, is to get one from film. Like the fictional police captain working for the Mafia in the Godfather. Copyvio another problem. Student7 (talk) 21:05, 30 April 2015 (UTC)

Criminals Attitudes

Is there any information on criminals attitudes to police corruption in terms of approval or dissapproval, whether they see it as worthwhile or not and whether it actually is worthwhile or not. Many criminals funtion without corrupting the police or public officials ,other crime organizations rely on it completely and other have been brought down by their police contacts — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.68.130.0 (talk) 10:14, 8 September 2015 (UTC)

Suggested improvements

I added a section on the prevalence of police corruption but it could be fleshed out more. There are a few nation-wide reports on police corruption out there; they might be good sources for more detail. Other possible improvements:

More material on other countries, particularly places like Mexico and Brazil where corruption is pervasive and/or institutionalized.
Integration of the "See also" links into the main text of the article (e.g. "Eliot Ness was famous for being 'untouchable' at a time when many of his fellow officers were corrupt." -- only better than that!).
Dealing with corruption: common strategies, the role of internal affairs, commissions like the Knapp Commission, and so on.
Police corruption in fiction, especially film and television. This was suggested a couple of years ago (see above) and it seems like a good idea since it's such a common theme: L. A. Confidential, The Departed, etc.

What else? Jd4v15 (talk) 21:13, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

How about adding a discussion on Interpol and/or the UN and how they are attempting to deal with police corruption internationally? Also, the reference to officers receiving free drinks or meals as corruption of authority should be revised. Corruption is the act of using your position for personal gain, not merely receiving gifts (such as receiving a free cup of coffee). Most of the time, as with the military, officers are being offered these free items as opposed to asking for them. Had they asked for them and expected it because they were in uniform, it would be an act of corruption, but in a typical case it would merely be seen as deviance (receiving gifts for just being an officer). The reference to hazing should similarly be revised. Hazing is a deviant act, not an act of corruption. For example, "pinning on" a new rank is most definitely hazing, but not a corrupt act because nobody gains anything from it. Bryan Wicker (talk) 20:34, 27 September 2014 (UTC)

Topics to consider adding:

Police corruption in the United States

Pre-WWI

Reconstruction

Frontier justice

WWI-Vietnam

Prohibition and the Depression

"McCarthyism"

Vietnam War era and the Civil Rights movement

War on Crime

Kent State

Post-Vietnam and the War on Terror

War on Drugs

Anti-terrorism

Effects of police corruption

Economically

Politically

Rotten Apple Theory — Preceding unsigned comment added by Colten Hansen (talk • contribs) 17:54, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

References:

http://www.jaapl.org/content/26/1/57.full.pdf

http://www.transparency.org/news/feature/crossing_the_line_the_consequences_of_police_corruption

http://www.csdp.org/news/news/corruption.htm Bryan Wicker (talk) 18:10, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

The outline above is more than somewhat pov. It includes the National Guard at Kent State, who, when a mob rushed down on them, fired, killed and maimed people. No one was prosecuted, infuriating the Left and the media, no end. They, however, not only weren't police, they were not trained to handle police methods. Nor should a mob, with any sense, have "rushed" them. Mobs are dangerous. That is why they are called "mobs" not "a crowd" or "a group of people."

"Reconstruction" is apparently supposed to cover the period when the sheriffs "looked the other way" in the South during the period 1870-1960. Actually, during the very short reconstruction, whites were the target of the police, not blacks.

McCarthyism had nothing whatsoever to do with the police or any armed force.

Some of these have nothing to do with police corruption, per se. Anti-terrorism is a Homeland Security function; police carry out warrants that have been issued by lawful authority. Student7 (talk) 18:48, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

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Neutrality issue in US sub-section?

The sub-section on the US reads, "Police corruption in the United States is not reported on in the media." First of all, this is not a grammatically correct sentence and contains an idiomatic error (there are 2 prepositions "on" and "in"). It should be "is not reported by the media." Secondly, doesn't this sound absurd? I mean, I understand that police corruption is not reported daily by the American news media, but to say that it is not reported is just a patent falsehood. Just this morning I read this article. - Ambrosiaster (talk) 00:10, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Comparison of corruption across the world

Can the article include or is there another article that can be linked to, that compares the relative level of police corruption between different countries? I would assume that the relative level of police corruption would correlate to the general level of corruption in a country, and also poor countries with lower paid law enforcement officers, the police would be more liable to areas like bribery than in richer countries. For example I found this site which seems to cover general corruption worldwide: https://www.transparency.org/news/feature/corruption_perceptions_index_2017 John a s (talk) 06:12, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

Irrelevant picture

See "Relevant Picture" above. Despite that discussion, this image was reinserted a year later by Lotje here. I have deleted it again, and requested deletion from Commons on the grounds that "it is not possible to know what this recognisable person is doing (see flickr original comments by photographer). It was not taken outside a police station, and the explanation gained was incoherant. The gentleman may not be well. It is difficult to see how this could be used for anything at all on WP. The file title is particularly inappropropriate as it is entirely speculative." The image is of no value whatsoever to this article - on the contrary all it does is invite time-wasting speculation on what it is about, on which no conclusion can be reached. Davidships (talk) 21:32, 22 November 2020 (UTC)

@Davidships: beg you pardon? The caption read: Protesting police corruption in the United Kingdom (2007). You took if out of the context. Lotje (talk) 06:41, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

@Lotje: Sorry, but you are mistaken. Here is the original - the photographer has no idea what the apparent protest is about - please read his description and his reply in the comments - and he just called the photo Random protest. It was a well-meaning but inexperienced student who uploaded that to Wikimedia on a school project, invented the title "Police corruption", and then added it to this article. There is no basis at all for knowing that this is anything at all to do with the subject of this article. Davidships (talk) 11:46, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

@Davidships: something to cheer you up? Maybe this is an idea to add to the article. After all, This cartoon won a special mention award from Transparency International Bangladesh anti-corruption cartoon contest 2008. The cartoon took place in the annual anti-corruption cartoon exhibition in Dhaka, 2008. Lotje (talk) 12:11, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. As it happens there is no content concerning Bangladesh to illustrate. But since I doubt whether any country is immune to this curse, it will no doubt come along some day. Davidships (talk) 22:29, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

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[1] ttp://hdr.undp.org/en/content/human-development-report-2014

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