1 "Just the Facts Ma'am: A Case Study of the Reversal of Corruption in the Los Angeles Police Department" R. Mark Isaac* and Douglas A. Norton** *Isaac (corresponding author) is at Florida State University,
[email protected] **Norton is at Florida State University,
[email protected] 2 Los Angeles “appears, in the light of recent developments, [to be] one of the most vice infested” cities in the nation ---- Los Angeles civic reformer Clifford Clinton, 1938. * * * * * Philip Marlowe: “They say there’s a gambling house up the line.” [Los Angeles] Policeman: “They say.” Philip Marlowe: “You don’t believe them?” Policeman: “I don’t even try buddy,” he said, and spat past my shoulder.---- Raymond Chandler, The Little Sister, 1949 * * * * * Sgt. Joe Friday, LAPD Badge 714: “I live in this town. I work here, and I like it. There are 4,000 other men in the city who feel the same way…men who are trying to prove that the law is here to protect people, not cut ‘em down.” ---- “Dragnet”, 1954 * * * * * The Los Angeles Police Department “has become a model for police administrators throughout the world….”----O.W. Wilson, Dean of the School of Criminology, University of California Berkeley, 1957. I. Introduction Development economics research on corruption has surged in recent years, in part, because there is a growing consensus that the efficacy of foreign aid hinges on the honest management of funds. 1 The overall theme of the literature is the corrosive effect corruption has on enterprise and the political process. 2 We present here a case study of successful institutional change in the 1950s Los Angeles Police Department in which Police Chief William H.