Police Misconduct and Reinvention of Department Culture

Excerpts from the Paper

Police Misconduct and Reinvention of Department Culture
Americans are no stranger to stories of police abuse, brutality, and misconduct. And cases like the Rodney King beating highlight the volatility of the issue. While it might seem to the casual observer that events like the Rodney King beating are isolated events caused by a few rogue police officers, history and accounting of the facts would tell another story. The problems are widespread and they impact police precincts and departments across the nation. And why is police misconduct so ubiquitous and prevalent in America? The basic problem is that complex cultural forces convene that cause police officers to act in ways that are simply beyond the justifiable reach of their...

..... of profound changes requires extraordinary leadership, commitment, and insight. And that is precisely what Commissioner Murphy’s success in New York demonstrates. He understood the culture of the New York department because he came up in it from top to bottom. And he knew that change would demand more than just blaming incidents on individual rotten apples. It requires censure and indictment of top officials and executives. Only by doing that can integrity be built into the system in a way that promotes durable and lasting change. And that serves to reinvent department culture in a way that makes police misconduct entirely unacceptable.
REFERENCES
Skolnick, J.H. & Fyfe, J.J. (n.d.). Above the Law: Police and
the Excessive Use of Force.