GGD-98-111 Law Enforcement: Information on Drug-Related Police
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United States General Accounting Office Report to the Honorable GAO Charles B. Rangel, House of Representatives May 1998 LAW ENFORCEMENT Information on Drug-Related Police Corruption GAO/GGD-98-111 United States General Accounting Office GAO Washington, D.C. 20548 General Government Division B-277817 May 28, 1998 The Honorable Charles B. Rangel House of Representatives Dear Mr. Rangel: Recent police corruption cases in several cities, including New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia, highlight the association of police corruption with illegal drug activities. You asked us to study the impact of drug trafficking on the corruption of police in large cities that have a high incidence of drug trafficking and drug abuse. As agreed with your office, in conducting our preliminary work, we sought to identify commission reports and research studies on drug-related corruption in city police departments, as well as to identify relevant databases and other pertinent information. We did not locate any central data sources that would allow us to reliably estimate the extent of police corruption or how much of corruption is drug-related. However, the reports and studies we reviewed, as well as our interviews with officials and academic experts, provided descriptive information on the (1) nature and extent of known drug-related police corruption in certain large cities; (2) factors associated with known drug-related police corruption; and (3) practices that have been recommended or implemented to prevent or detect drug-related police corruption. We briefed your office on these developments and on the information we gathered during our preliminary work, and your office asked us to summarize the results of our work, focusing on these three areas. This report responds to that request. To determine what information was available on drug-related police corruption, we (1) conducted a literature search and review to identify relevant commission reports, academic studies, symposium results, and other literature (see bibliography); (2) interviewed academic experts on police corruption and members and/or staffs of two anti-police-corruption Page 1 GAO/GGD-98-111 Drug-Related Police Corruption B-277817 commissions—one in New York City1 and the other in Chicago;2 (3) interviewed officials with the Department of Justice (DOJ) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in Washington, D.C., the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices for the Eastern and Southern Districts of New York, and the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP); and (4) contacted international, national, and state law enforcement associations, including the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP). In addition, we met with officials from the New York City Police Department’s (NYPD) Internal Affairs Bureau (IAB) and the current New York City Commission to Combat Police Corruption.3 We did our work in Washington, D.C., and New York City, New York, from August 1997 through April 1998. The information we provide in this report is derived from our review of a limited number of existing reports and studies, as well as interviews with various officials and academic experts, not from any primary data collection or analysis undertaken by us. We did not attempt to verify the adequacy of the methodologies used to produce the various findings, nor did we attempt to assess the appropriateness of the conclusions. Accordingly, our presentation of the findings and conclusions of these reports and studies should not be construed as our endorsement of them. Moreover, we recognize that the policies and practices of the police departments discussed in the reports and studies may subsequently have changed. However, reviewing current policies and practices in particular departments was beyond the scope of this report. Appendix I includes further details on our scope and methodology. We provided copies of a draft of this report for a review of the facts, as presented, to various DOJ units and selected police organizations and academic experts. At an exit conference, we discussed the contents of the draft with DOJ officials, including the Criminal Division’s Deputy Executive 1The Commission to Investigate Allegations of Police Corruption and the Anti-Corruption Procedures of the Police Department, commonly referred to as the Mollen Commission, was established in July 1992 by an executive order of New York City Mayor David N. Dinkins. The commission was given a threefold mandate: (1) to investigate the nature and extent of corruption in the New York City Police Department, (2) to evaluate the department’s procedures for preventing and detecting corruption, and (3) to recommend changes and improvements in those procedures. The commission issued its report in July 1994 and was subsequently disbanded. 2The Commission on Police Integrity, also referred to as the Chicago Commission, was appointed on February 7, 1997, by Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley. The commission’s charge was to examine the root causes of police corruption, to review how other urban police departments approach the issue, and to propose possible changes to Chicago Police Department policies and procedures. The commission issued its first report in November 1997 and was still active as of April 1998. 3In response to a recommendation of the Mollen Commission, the New York City Commission to Combat Police Corruption was created on February 27, 1995, by an executive order of Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. The New York City Commission was established to monitor the performance of the NYPD’s systems for combatting corruption. This commission is charged with, among other things, performing audits, studies, and analyses to assess the quality of these systems. Page 2 GAO/GGD-98-111 Drug-Related Police Corruption B-277817 Officer and representatives of the Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section and Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section, the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys (EOUSA), and the Bureau of Justice Assistance. We also contacted the Chief of the FBI Criminal Investigative Division’s Public Corruption Unit; the Commanding Officer, Office of Chief, NYPD’s IAB; the Director of Research, IACP; Judge Milton Mollen (retired), former Chairman of the Mollen Commission; and Richard H. Ward, Professor of Criminal Justice, University of Illinois at Chicago and Executive Director for the Chicago Commission. The various officials and experts provided technical comments, which have been incorporated in this report where appropriate. According to a number of commission reports, academic publications, and Results in Brief other literature we reviewed and the officials and academic experts we interviewed, drug-related police corruption differs in a variety of ways from other types of police corruption. In addition to protecting criminals or ignoring their activities, officers involved in drug-related corruption were more likely to be actively involved in the commission of a variety of crimes, including stealing drugs and/or money from drug dealers, selling drugs, and lying under oath about illegal searches. Although profit was found to be a motive common to traditional and drug-related police corruption, New York City’s Mollen Commission identified power and vigilante justice as two additional motives for drug-related police corruption. The most commonly identified pattern of drug-related police corruption involved small groups of officers who protected and assisted each other in criminal activities, rather than the traditional patterns of non-drug-related police corruption that involved just a few isolated individuals or systemic corruption pervading an entire police department or precinct. Regarding the extent of drug-related police corruption, data are not collected nationally. Federal agencies either do not maintain data specifically on drug-related police corruption or maintain data only on cases in which the respective agency is involved. Thus, it was not possible to estimate the overall extent of the problem. However, the academic experts and various officials we interviewed, as well as the commission reports, expressed the view that, by and large, most police officers are honest. The FBI provided us with data on FBI-led drug-related corruption cases involving state and local law enforcement officers. However, since the Page 3 GAO/GGD-98-111 Drug-Related Police Corruption B-277817 total number of drug-related police corruption cases at all levels of government is unknown, the proportion constituted by FBI cases also is unknown. Data from local sources, if collected, pose several problems. For example, drug-related police corruption cases may not be readily identifiable from the offense charged or departments may view this information as proprietary or confidential and may not release it. Notwithstanding the lack of systematic data, the commissions and some academic experts described cases of drug-related police corruption in large cities such as Atlanta, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York, and Philadelphia. Many of our sources consistently reported certain factors to be associated with drug-related police corruption, although these factors may also be associated with police corruption in general. Not every source identified every factor, and the sources differed to some degree on the emphasis to be placed on a factor. However, if all of the factors are considered together, they provide a consistent framework. Also, the factors discussed in this report may not encompass all factors associated with drug-related police