The biggest problem with police is it's the sort of job where the more a given person wants that job, the less they should probably have it. For their sake and others.
I don't think requires any union pressure; the department is happy to be both rid of a problem officer and not have to put it in the public record just how bad the problem officer was.
I have a friend who is a cop in Indiana (a "right to work" state), and after talking with him, I've realized that the department, as an organization, can largely be modeled as an entity that takes action to minimize its liability (individual officers are mostly shielded from civil liability, but the department is much less so). Apropos to this subject:
- They want to minimize the number of apparent past bad actors that will be revealed during discover because a lot of past bad actors could be presented as a pattern of poor hiring and/or training. Allowing officers to resign to kill an investigation is golden).
- When something bad happens and it makes it into a courtroom with sufficient evidence that it happened, they want every officer in the department to testify that the action in question is definitely not common practice and completely contrary to training. Such testimony would be greatly undermined by a subpoena that revealed several investigations finding officers to have engaged in such behavior in the past. Again anything that stops the investigation before it can find anything material could potentially save the department millions of dollars in future liability.
...have you not seen the extents that LE agencies and the FOP will go to make sure these folk aren't fired? There's a reason LE have FOP cards in their wallets that include a statement to be read verbatim into a transcript for disciplinary meetings.
- When something bad happens and it makes it into a courtroom with sufficient evidence that it happened, they want every officer in the department to testify that the action in question is definitely not common practice and completely contrary to training. Such testimony would be greatly undermined by a subpoena that revealed several investigations finding officers to have engaged in such behavior in the past. Again anything that stops the investigation before it can find anything material could potentially save the department millions of dollars in future liability.
I recommend reading: https://chicagoreader.com/news/police-misconduct-brady/ (disclaimer: I'm one of the authors)
It's national security related, Was Snowden a traitor or a whistleblower and pokes the bear on whistleblowers and duty to disclose poor and outright illegal behaviour.
Not sure if that's your beat or interest as a reporer .. but it goes to a core issue wt public institutions.
related: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/30/us/politics/tulsi-gabbard...
In Chicago there are two means of holding individuals accountable to this sort of thing. The first is the local records act, which carries a misdemeanor for intentionally violating the act (ie, destroying documents). The other is the city's ethics policy which includes something similar to what you've said -- in that there's a legal obligation to report any observed illegal/fraudulent activity.
From conversations I've had, neither have been used for the sort of corruption you're referring to. Partially because the definitions in these things are intentionally vague. Another part because the local records act misdemeanor I mentioned would have to go through criminal court rather than civil court.
It might be interesting (not say challenging with a real risk of pushback into your RealLife) to get off the record comment about police ranks closing and reacting to anybody that threatened to or actually did spill beans about questionable activity.
The challenge to keeping a clean house is having an open and easy (and anonymous) path to acceptably highlighting the dirt.
For your general curiousity; from my part of the world (there are many stories, this is the bare surface of just one)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Quigley_(politician)
* Quigley was the lawyer for the Western Australian Police Union for 25 years. In 1983, he represented officers at the inquest into the death of John Pat, a 16-year-old Aboriginal boy. He became an honorary life member of the union in 2000 before entering state parliament in 2001.
Lawyer defends police who openly and racially kerb stomped a kid to death in a rough outback town. Police love him and draw him into the fold.
* In 2007, his life membership of the Western Australian Police Union was withdrawn after his parliamentary attack on police involved with the Andrew Mallard case, where he named a former undercover policeman who had a role in Mallard's unjust conviction. He planned to melt down his life membership badge, have it made into a tiepin with the words Veritas Vincit— "Truth Conquers", the motto of the school he attended—and present it to Mallard.
Eventually the daily exposure to defending corrupt police weighs heavy and a heart starts to beat.
* In 2011, he was accused of bringing the legal profession into disrepute, a charge stemming from his campaign to expose the wrongful jailing of Andrew Mallard for murder, to which he replied "...if you take on corrupt police you will be pursued and they will try and destroy you."
* He became the [ State ] Attorney-General on 16 March 2017.
- GP was talking about a dynamic of officers resigning to avoid disciplinary actions on their record and working elsewhere.
- GP suggests this is due to union pressure.
- Indiana has much less strong police unions compared to Chicago
- My point is that there is still an incentive for departments to allow problem officers to retire before any investigation can confirm allegations of wrongdoing.
- I am more than willing to believe that lots of wrongdoing is enabled by the actions of unions, I just think that a policy allowing problem officers to resign with a clean record rather than be investigated is not solely motivated by union pressure.
All politics is local, and the creative expression of discretion is a source of power for many different stakeholders.
The reality is that giving a mulligan to some jackass cop who fucks up has benefits to many stakeholders. Investigations involve looking at things, and sometimes you see things when you bother to look.
This type of behavior is typical in close groups of people with power… see corporate boards, Catholic Church, etc.
Thanks; that paragraph sums up a lot of what I was trying to say.
https://cpdp.co is a good site to review these sorts of questions for. Disclaimer again, though - I'm a contributor to the project.
I'm more worried about the Police than any other class of criminals.
The problem with this view is that there are a lot of high profile cases that are examples of people abusing their power.
I am happy to believe that “most cops” see it that way.
I am less familiar with those police officers supporting reforms that would either expose or suppress the bad behavior of the minority.
The problem is a higher portion of people who just want to power trip apply to these positions, even if they are not the majority of the police force. Basically, it is the dream job for a bully.
It seems there should be severe penalties for "power tripping" (aka misuse of authority and databases for special purposes); slap of the wrist fine, suspended paychecks and internal investigations will not deter this group of people. I don't see how these crimes are considered less than drug dealing.
Specifically the punishment should include mandatory jail time and permanent ban from jobs where they have any form of authority over others including management, teaching, and all government positions.
I wonder if the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act could be used against them in these cases. I'm not a law expert, but it seems to be used for similar "unauthorized access" cases.
You might argue that hey, he has adrenaline flowing and so maybe he was a bit over the line. But they are professionals supposedly trained in effective deescalation techniques. Those techniques aren't just because it is humane, it is because it results in better outcomes. But the ego trippers put all that aside because they enjoy being the punisher.
Both of my grandfathers (and an uncle and a brother in law) were career cops. One of my grandfathers said: the power given to you as a cop either brings out the best in you or the worst.