NCJ Number
225394
Journal
Journal of Scandinavian Studies in Criminology and Crime Prevention Volume: 9 Issue: 2 Dated: 2008 Pages: 86-96
Date Published
2008
Length
11 pages
Annotation
Utilizing an anonymous self-report survey in an urban police unit in Finland, this study sought to determine the extent police officers reported their own and colleagues’ service misconducts, and whether there was a relationship between reporting misconducts and experiences of organizational rulemaking and the feeling of fairness within the administration.
Abstract
The analyses in this study of police officers in Finland indicated that, in an anonymous self-report survey context, police officers were clearly willing to report on service misconducts, both their own and those of their fellow officers. Thus, the assumed ‘code of silence’ does not seem as strong as the literature suggests. Findings on the relationships between perceived administrative policies/practices and the reporting of misconducts were somewhat unexpected. Misconducts were reported more among those who saw their administration as unfair and partial than among those who saw it as fair and impartial. In summation, the study showed that the willingness to participate was very high and officers were willing to report on their own and on their workmates’ misconducts. However, additional research is recommended to evaluate how useful the self-report method really is on this issue. Police misconducts have very rarely been studied by the self-report method because it is assumed that the ‘code of silence’ is too hard to break even in an anonymous survey research situation. In this study, a self-report method was carried out in a police unit in Finland. Respondents were shown a list of 16 possible conducts and asked whether they knew of an officer who had engaged in 1 or more of the listed conducts. Tables and references