Introduction
Police are the gatekeepers within the criminal justice system. They are held accountable in discharging their duties in a manner that protects individuals against human rights violations within the confines of the criminal justice system. It is widely believed that police as law enforcement agents possess both integrity and honesty virtues, and are obliged to uphold human rights standard and practices that guide them as they execute their duties. However, it is a matter of great concern that in as much as they are guarantors of an effective criminal justice system, they have also acted as principal sources of grave human rights violations including extrajudicial executions, torture, arbitrary detention, and discrimination. In many occasions, they have failed to exercise their functions, powers, and duties impartially.
Main body
One such area is the wrongful convictions of suspects. Police misconduct leading to wrongful convictions occurs in a wide variety of forms which include but are not limited to false or coerced confessions, withholding evidence, and planting evidence. According to the National Registry of Exonerations (2017), as of 2016, there were a total of 166 recorded exonerations which was an increase from the preceding years.
Corey (2013) in his study and reflection on two mass exonerations, that is, the Rampart and Tulia exonerations, identified police misconduct, and in particular perjury as the primary cause for wrongful convictions. Some of the ways through which perjury was committed included filing of falsified reports and testifying detailed observations of criminal conduct in which the defendants never engaged in. This was facilitated through physically planting contraband materials on the defendants, or misstating that they had found contraband when they had not. The study focused on the Rampart and Tulia cases that met the actual innocence criteria utilized by other researchers in investigating known wrongful convictions. As a result, thirty-seven Tulia exonerees, and thirty-eight Rampart exonerees met this criterion. The results also illustrated that guilty pleas are not shielded from the risk of wrongful conviction. This is because, in more than 80% of the pooled Rampart and Tulia cases, innocent defendants had pleaded guilty.
While the Rampart case in Corey study was based on “real crime, wrong perpetrator” convictions, there exists another sphere which is the “no-crime” convictions. No-crime convictions constitute cases where innocent individuals are convicted of crimes that never happened. Police misconduct also plays a significant role in no-crime convictions, and this is idealistically presented in the Tulia case (Henry, 2018). According to the National Registry of Exonerations (2017), there were 94 recorded exonerations in 2016 with the trend increasing over the years. Elsewhere, Henry (2018) conducted literature research that explored no-crime wrongful convictions as an individual and unique phenomenon. The article examined official misconduct in the element of police lies and aggressive policing tactics as one of the factors leading to no-crime wrongful convictions. Moreover, the article demonstrated instances where police fabricate evidence for personal career advancement, for personal monetary gain or corporate gain. In the latter case, police are under substantial pressure to make arrests to raise revenues from fines.
Conclusion
The ‘noble-cause corruption’ phenomenon has also been identified as a source of police abuse. Using the privileges bestowed upon them, police officers from time to time on perceiving a suspect to be guilty may take steps to remove them from the streets and confine them unjustly. At the level of organizational culture, weak enforcement of standard ethical codes that guide the conduct of police officers has resulted in corruption being entrenched into the police. It is therefore not surprising to find police officers unjustifiably pursuing low-level offenders and less serious criminal misconducts guided by the theory that offenders committing minor crimes maybe be caught committing more severe crimes for personal financial gain (Henry, 2018).
References
- Corey, R. (2013). Police misconduct as a cause of wrongful convictions. Washington University Law Review, 90(4), 1133-1189.
- Henry, J. (2018). Smoke but no fire: When innocent people are wrongly convicted of crimes that never happened. American Criminal Law Review, 55, 1-45.
- National Registry of Exonerations. (2017). Exonerations in 2016. Web.