David Giacalone at f/k/a posts about one of my personal favorites, The Blue Wall of Silence. He was prompted by “venerable, inveterate, often pointedly insightful, curmudgeon, Carl Strock” of the Schenectady, NY, Sunday Gazette piece, “ Open letter to Sch’dy’s good cops” (Dec. 2, 2007). Haiku/s aside, I never pass up an opportunity like this.
The thrust of Strock’s piece is that the moldy “one bad apple” theory, pulled out whenever a cop gets caught doing whatever cops get caught doing, doesn’t hold water. It seems that the peer pressure that keeps the Blue Wall from crumbling comes from majority pressure, not “one bad apple.” After all, if a dirty cop was an anomaly, all the good cops would have no problem ratting him out and getting him tossed off the job. Then, there would only be good, honest, trustworthy cops left behind, and no need for a Blue Wall to begin with.
The problem isn’t them, however. It’s us. It’s the public’s refusal (denial?) that we have a problem with these men and women in Blue to whom we have reposed enormous power and authority. We give them shields and guns (not to mention tasers) and set them loose on society. Could we possibly allow this to happen if we accepted the premise that they could go out there and do wrong? That would be nuts. So we believe that they are there to protect and serve, regardless of the evidence to the contrary.
What does the Blue Wall protect? It may be as significant as major theft or rape, or perhaps excessive force (your honor, my fist was attacked by the defendant’s face), petty theft, favoritism and cronyism (it was just a cup o’ Joe and a dozen donuts) down to what I believe to be the most pervasive wrongdoing, testilying. Nothing screws up a decent cross-examination worse than a truthful cop, even when the truth presents “issues”.
If these acts of official misconduct and crime weren’t the norm, why would any cop fear ridding his department of that “one bad apple?” Indeed, the peer pressure would be exactly the opposite, with the majority of good cops pressuring the one bad cop to mend his ways or get out. Why would the majority want to be tainted by “one bad apple?”
Not satisfied? Consider then the most obvious case in recent memory, Abner Louima. Four cops tried. One ultimately left holding the bag, after the others get shown the love reserved only for law enforcement by the Second Circuit. Justice was done, right?
As Justin Volpe (you remember him, don’t you? The sort of cop who took enormous pride in showing how he could use a toilet plunger handle to teach some Haitian who’s the boss) walked out of the precinct bathroom, he waved his bloody plunger for all his brothers to see. Huzzah! The conquering hero proved his mettle to a precinct full of officers, with shields and guns, sworn to uphold the law and Constitution.
Not a single man or woman came forward. No one grabbed Volpe and arrested him. No one told Volpe that he was wrong. And when the feces hit the fan, every single one of them buried their heads in their forms and pretended that it had nothing to do with them.
Why is Louima such an important, valuable example? Because this was a situation that went in a different direction than your typical excessive force case. Usually, it was a cop “tuning up” a reluctant skel to teach them some manners. A few blows to the head and the job is done. The skel survives, no worse for wear, and society is better off for it as far as the cops are concerned. Somebody had to teach him a lesson, right?
But what Justin Volpe did to Abner Louima was sick. It was man on man sexual torture. It could make even a hardened cop puke, thinking about what had just happened in that bathroom. This was not your typical abuse. And still, the silence in the 70th Precinct was deafening.
The public was aghast by what happened to Abner Louima. Just like it was aghast at Serpico, the Dirty 30 and the many police scandals before it. But we got over it, and no systemic changes happened. Why? Because it was just “one bad apple.”
Strock’s attempt to remind us of our devils is valuable, and proof that curmudgeons (and cynics) are merely idealists dressed in wolf’s clothing. But we never seem to learn anything from these scandals or the pieces written about them. Apparently, the only thing stronger than the Blue Wall of Silence is our denial that it exists and shields a paramilitary operation that threatens all of us.
The thrust of Strock’s piece is that the moldy “one bad apple” theory, pulled out whenever a cop gets caught doing whatever cops get caught doing, doesn’t hold water. It seems that the peer pressure that keeps the Blue Wall from crumbling comes from majority pressure, not “one bad apple.” After all, if a dirty cop was an anomaly, all the good cops would have no problem ratting him out and getting him tossed off the job. Then, there would only be good, honest, trustworthy cops left behind, and no need for a Blue Wall to begin with.
The problem isn’t them, however. It’s us. It’s the public’s refusal (denial?) that we have a problem with these men and women in Blue to whom we have reposed enormous power and authority. We give them shields and guns (not to mention tasers) and set them loose on society. Could we possibly allow this to happen if we accepted the premise that they could go out there and do wrong? That would be nuts. So we believe that they are there to protect and serve, regardless of the evidence to the contrary.
What does the Blue Wall protect? It may be as significant as major theft or rape, or perhaps excessive force (your honor, my fist was attacked by the defendant’s face), petty theft, favoritism and cronyism (it was just a cup o’ Joe and a dozen donuts) down to what I believe to be the most pervasive wrongdoing, testilying. Nothing screws up a decent cross-examination worse than a truthful cop, even when the truth presents “issues”.
If these acts of official misconduct and crime weren’t the norm, why would any cop fear ridding his department of that “one bad apple?” Indeed, the peer pressure would be exactly the opposite, with the majority of good cops pressuring the one bad cop to mend his ways or get out. Why would the majority want to be tainted by “one bad apple?”
Not satisfied? Consider then the most obvious case in recent memory, Abner Louima. Four cops tried. One ultimately left holding the bag, after the others get shown the love reserved only for law enforcement by the Second Circuit. Justice was done, right?
As Justin Volpe (you remember him, don’t you? The sort of cop who took enormous pride in showing how he could use a toilet plunger handle to teach some Haitian who’s the boss) walked out of the precinct bathroom, he waved his bloody plunger for all his brothers to see. Huzzah! The conquering hero proved his mettle to a precinct full of officers, with shields and guns, sworn to uphold the law and Constitution.
Not a single man or woman came forward. No one grabbed Volpe and arrested him. No one told Volpe that he was wrong. And when the feces hit the fan, every single one of them buried their heads in their forms and pretended that it had nothing to do with them.
Why is Louima such an important, valuable example? Because this was a situation that went in a different direction than your typical excessive force case. Usually, it was a cop “tuning up” a reluctant skel to teach them some manners. A few blows to the head and the job is done. The skel survives, no worse for wear, and society is better off for it as far as the cops are concerned. Somebody had to teach him a lesson, right?
But what Justin Volpe did to Abner Louima was sick. It was man on man sexual torture. It could make even a hardened cop puke, thinking about what had just happened in that bathroom. This was not your typical abuse. And still, the silence in the 70th Precinct was deafening.
The public was aghast by what happened to Abner Louima. Just like it was aghast at Serpico, the Dirty 30 and the many police scandals before it. But we got over it, and no systemic changes happened. Why? Because it was just “one bad apple.”
Strock’s attempt to remind us of our devils is valuable, and proof that curmudgeons (and cynics) are merely idealists dressed in wolf’s clothing. But we never seem to learn anything from these scandals or the pieces written about them. Apparently, the only thing stronger than the Blue Wall of Silence is our denial that it exists and shields a paramilitary operation that threatens all of us.
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Scott, thank you for covering this issue and pointing to my posting. I think part of the problem is that the cops know that an awful lot of people really do want cops willing to do some dirty-work on the “deserving” bad guys. (They don’t want a police department filled entirely with Dudley Do-Rights who will never cross the line.) Once going over the line is implicitly condoned or winked at for “appropriate cases,” the lawlessness inevitably seeps over into less acceptable instances.
As with politicians, the general public probably gets the cops it deserves and secretly wants. The culpability is more than mere naivety and denial.
I’ve dealt with the “24” syndrome (referring to the TV show) before, and agree that the public wants cops to break the rules to get the bad guys. But this is an outcome oriented approach based on “the end justifies the means.” I don’t think that the public is fine with graft, gratuitous violence, or general lying, and they always seem shocked to learn that it’s happened.
Strock’s point in your post, and the basis for mine, is that the “one bad apple” theory doesn’t hold water. Yet the theory is constantly floated to overcome a serious public shift in sentiment toward police, and people are always ready to accept it rather than deal with the truth. Strock’s point is very well taken, and I appreciate your bringing it forward.
As for your statement that the public gets the police, like the politicians, it deserves, yup. As to why they tolerate dirty cops, I think denial probably plays the strongest role, and the denial is based on your conclusion that people secretly like the idea that the cops play a little dirty to get the bad guys off the street. Which brings us full circle.