Police Corruption Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Police Corruption - Essay Example This can be attributed to the fact that the word ‘corruption’ is not actually neutral. This implies that anything said to be corrupt is just bad and cannot be tolerated. As a result people tend to pay les attention to what is preferred as corrupt action. Hence police corruption has been viewed as a type of subculture. One form of police corruption is the petitioning for and receiving bribes in return for not reporting a crime or any illegal activity as suggested by Cole and Smith (2007. Other form may include a police officer breaking the police code of conduct so as to prevent conviction of a suspect, for instance via the use of untrustworthy evidence. In most major cities like in the cities of the United States, there are sections of internal affairs whose work is to investigate police officers who have been suspected of corrupt actions. For instance in the United States there is the Knapp Commission which inspected issues of police corruption in the New York city in t he 1970’s. There are various sorts of police corruption acts; one is the corruption of authority where police officers are given free items by the suspects. Secondly, there is the act of opportunistic theft from the suspects and the victims of a criminal act. The other act of corruption is the kickbacks which refer to receiving payment through referring individuals to other businesses. Shakedowns are other acts of corruption which refer to receiving bribes instead of pursuing a crime. Another corrupt act is a police officer protecting illegal activity by individual and accepting payments in return from the individual involved. Fixing is another corrupt crime which involves the police officer withholding evidence on a crime or not presenting himself or herself in court during the judicial hearing for favor of the suspect. Another act of corruption is the internal payoff whereby prerogatives of the law enforcing organizations for instance holidays are sold and bought. The other sort of police cor ruption is where the police officers engage in the direct criminal activities. Last but not the least is the frame-up sort of police corruption where the police officer ads or removes information about suspects evidence in his/her favor. In American policing some forms of police corruption can be a norm as opposed to exception. However despite the form of police corruption it might be, police corruption is illegal and those who practice it should face the law. Incarceration Police corruption can be a major threat to the issue of incarceration. As a result reducing police corruption can reduce incarceration. This is due to the fact that if police officers fail to receive bribes many criminals will reduce their criminal acts hence reduced imprisonment. Reducing or ending police corruption also can reduce the period of imprisonment of some criminals according to Kenney (1999). This is due to the fact that some police officers can get corrupted by others so that they can keep criminals behind bars for a long time. In case where police can not be bribed by those who report criminal acts to imprison the suspects then incarceration is likely to reduce. For instance officials in New Orleans who work in conjunction with the FBI have been able to reduce cases of police corruption which have also reduced incarceration and homicides. Police corruption however, can reduces rate of incarceration in that those who involved in criminal acts can chose bribe the police so they can minimize their cases hence less imprisonment period. Police corruption can increase ones incarceration due to the fact they are not able to bribe in order to reduce period of impris