Circumscribing the Code of Silence

Abstract

Each department uniformly believes that there was no systematic corruption in their agency (a proposition with which we agree), though everyone conceded that it is always possible that an individual officer could abuse his office for gain as long as he could keep the abuse from being discovered by his colleagues. Our study groups also believed that there was a bright line that separated undesirable but tolerable officer conduct from behaviors such as theft, bribery, and the use or sale of illicit drugs. While a somewhat more fuzzy line distinguished excessive from reasonable force, the study groups believed (and our surveys in their agency support them in these beliefs) that officers in their agencies simply would not tolerate what they considered to be excessive force by fellow officers.