With Leaders Like These...

According to the DOJ/FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program there are 14,169 county and city law enforcement agencies that participate in their UCR statistics gathering project on crime rates in the US. We can estimate from there that there are, perhaps, at least 15,000 law enforcement agencies in the US since one state, West Virginia, does not participate in the UCR and the data excludes state and federal agencies.

Now, since there are likely 15,000 law enforcement agencies in the US we can roughly conclude that there are probably 15,000 law enforcement leaders (police chiefs and sheriffs) in the US as well… after all, each agency requires that there be an individual responsible for that agency, even when there’s only one employee.

With that in mind, in our 2009 Semi-Annual police misconduct statistics report released last month, there were 207 law enforcement leaders cited in reports of police misconduct. These reports involving police leadership included misconduct issues ranging from policy issues up to criminal acts ranging from theft in office to assault and rape.

Now, 207 divided by the six, the number of months of tracking done so far, gives us an average of 34.5 law enforcement leaders per month who are associated with reports of police misconduct. So far, in the month of October, there have been 26 law enforcement leaders implicated as well. Which, with about a week left, isn’t too far off the average…

…and if that average held it would mean that there would be a projected 414 law enforcement leaders implicated in reported cases of alleged misconduct…

…which would give us a 2.76% misconduct rate for law enforcement leadership… or, for comparison:

Law Enforcement Leadership Misconduct Rate – 2760 per 100k
Law Enforcement Officer Misconduct Rate – 847 per 100k

Need some examples of what kind of police leadership misconduct we’re talking about? Here are a few of the reports taken directly from our National Police Misconduct News Feed for this month alone:

• The Northern Illinois University police chief who recently hired the problematic Colorado State University police chief who was accused of telling students it was ok to lie about police brutality is now, himself, accused of threatening & attempting to bribe a student journalist into spinning an article critical of the department.
• The Knightstown Inidiana police chief has been suspended by city council for refusing to release internal investigation into a local woman’s death.
• The former Dunson Louisiana police chief has been arrested for malfeasance & theft after an audit finds $5,100 missing from traffic fine funds that disappeared while he was chief.
• Worcester Mass. police chief issues a media blackout against a local newspaper after that paper published a critical article about their bonus for degrees program.
• The New Castle Maine police chief admits to attorney general that he stole over $8,000 in funds from a police food drive charity.
• A Flint Michigan interim police chief who once pushed a “saggy pants ban” has plead guilty to fraudulently receiving public money for a job he never did.
• The former Sleepy Eye Minnesota police chief has filed a discrimination lawsuit against that city claiming that they were wrong to fire him over issues related to his drug addiction “disability”.
• The Lincoln County North Carolina Sheriff has been indicted on two counts of felony obstruction for his contradictory testimony at coworker’s criminal trial in an attempt to cover for that employee.
• The Sleepy Hollow New York police chief who is the subject of a federal police brutality investigation has been placed on leave for misuse of a departmental vehicle.
• The Waterville Ohio police chief, who is also the local school district’s DARE officer, has resigned for “medical problems” after showing up to council meeting under the influence where officers also found a plastic cup full of liquor on the front dash of her cruiser.
• The now-former Wynona Oklahoma police chief has been sentenced to 30 years in prison after confessing to molesting a juvenile relative over 100 times since she was 8 years old.
• The McKean County Pennsylvania sheriff is the subject of a video that suggests the sheriff lied about the reasons he gave for the rough arrest that injured an 87 year old WWII veteran.
• The Winnsboro South Carolina police chief has been suspended after charged with assault for his part in an off-duty bar fight that left a man with broken nose.
• The now-former University of Texas at Dallas police chief is now the subject of a lawsuit by two former officers alleging that they were fired for reporting that ex-police chief’s misconduct.
• The Rockbridge County Virginia sheriff has been charged with assault and battery over allegations that he stormed into the office of that county’s emergency services coordinator and assaulted him.
• The Bellows Falls Vermont police chief has plead guilty to federal wire fraud and embezzlement charges for using police gun funds and a city credit card to pay for gambling debts.

With leadership like this serving as an example to police officers under their command, it’s little wonder that our police misconduct statistics aren’t much higher than they are.

But, this leads us to question those statistics since the law enforcement leaders are ultimately responsible for ensuring that misconduct allegations are properly recorded, investigated, reported, and acted upon… and if those leaders are covering for their own misbehavior, how reliable is the information they release about the misconduct of those under their command?

Ultimately, we also have to question that, if local governments are this lax in selecting those who lead their police agencies, then how much more lax is the selection process for regular police officers?

…and, perhaps equally as pertinent, how is it that elected law enforcement leaders like this keep getting re-elected by the public?

Just something to keep in mind as you may, or may not, be heading into the polls for mid-term local elections this year.