No way to get by as an honest cop.
1) I did, for 8 1/2 years in Dade County, FL, from 1982 to 1990. Most spent in "Central District". Think: where the riots were. Lot of good arrests, putting people in jail who needed to be there.
2) Most of the officers I rode with were honest. Rogue cops were the ones who got shunned. Being around them put your job, your freedom and even your life in jeopardy.
3) In the academy, we were specifically introduced to the term "contempt of cop". The lesson was that there was no such thing, and that if you could not find a State Law which had been violated to just walk (drive) away.
4) Most of my time was spent as a Field Training Officer, and part of my job was to weed out recruits who were overly "badge heavy". A single fraudulent report or fabricated arrest report was enough to get washed out, if proven.
I will stipulate there are bad cops and dishonest cops. But I think it's natural that we focus on the abuses we hear about, some of which are admittedly pretty blatant. You just don't tend to read about all the honest cops that just day after day and night after night just get the job done and go home. It's much like the public perception of how dangerous small planes are - when it's off your radar until there's a crash, you're perception is bound to be skewed.
Same thing going on here, I suspect.
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