Police Exam 2 (2025) – Study Guide and Exam Revision Material
Know the "rotten apple" theory of police misconduct. What evidence supports this theory and
which method of police of misconduct reduction is supported by this theory? What did that
news clip suggest how easy it is to identify bad officers? - ANS ✔✔THEORY
Police misconduct is the result of individual "bad" police officers and not symptomatic of a
wider problem with police in general
EVIDENCE/METHOD
large amount of complaints are accounted for by small number of officers
Early Warning System
VIDEO
pretty easy to identify them, but they're not always dealt with properly
Know the different types of police brutality (e.g. street justice, corruption related). You should
be able to distinguish them by motive. - ANS ✔✔Street Justice - extrajudicial punishment
(motivated by the nonexistence of law and order or dissatisfaction with justice)
Corruption-related - violating a law or regulation and abusing police position (motivated by
material gain (financial))
Excessive Force (motivated by need for authority/safety)
Sexual Abuse/animal abuse (motivated by desire for power/pleasure)
Do most police think that whistleblowing is worth the costs? - ANS ✔✔Yes
Be able to distinguish the various causes of corruption in lecture and the reading. One question
will ask you to identify the cause of corruption that is emphasized in the Dwyer reading. - ANS
✔✔INDIVIDUAL
Rotten Apples
Huge profits from illegal enterprises
Economic condition
,AGENCY
Learned in a corrupt environment
Code of Silence
Lack of oversight & accountability
SOCIETY
Are willing participants in some kinds of corruption
Want corruptibility (news, provides some power over police, can get something out of it)
Noble Cause Corruption - corruption to reach the ethical end
Drug-related corruption can have punitive motives
(Criminals (of color) and undocum. immigrants are easy victims and less credible witnesses.
Younger and less educated are more drug corrupted)
DWYER
Anderson purchased drugs from suspects and gave them to another cop who claimed he got
them from 4 innocent men; trying to fulfill their quotas
agency-level (neutralization)
Know some individual level corruption predictors.
What do officers who had career-ending misconduct tend to have in common? - ANS
✔✔Deviance and failure in background
Low pay
Differential Association (people)
Neutralizations
CAREER ENDING COMMON THREAD
Neutralizations( ??) (seeing it often)
, Sauer describes several pathways into serious corrupt behavior. Which pattern does he describe
as most typical? - ANS ✔✔Slow descent, starting with one small, maybe opportunistic act of
corruption (drugs are a good example - access to lots of cash)
If your goal is to reduce misconduct which types of police should we recruit more of? - ANS
✔✔women
minorities
older
tighter psychological/background checks
Know what Scaramella and others found regarding differences in the ethical (scenario)
judgments of criminal justice students and police officers with respect to perjury (lying to
protect a brutal co-worker) and in responding to an officer pulled over for DWI - ANS
✔✔students almost twice as likely as cops to respond ethically to a variety of situations (less
evidence of willingness to respond with nonfeasance) (Cop DWI)
Far more students than cops showed willingness to perjure themselves to keep
themselves/coworkers out of trouble or to ensure conviction of a guilty person
Pros and cons of allowing police officers to accept gratuities - ANS ✔✔Pros
Strengthen relationship with community (weaken view of citizens as an "other")
Cops feel more valued
Cons
Giver may expect something in return (and cops don't know when they will)
Difficult to draw the line between gratuities and other kinds of unethical behavior involving
money
If public views special treatment, can erode confidence in police
You need to know what the Knapp Commission said about how corrupt the majority of NYC
police were (p. 236) and what stage of corruption most were at. Note that stages 4 and above
Know the "rotten apple" theory of police misconduct. What evidence supports this theory and
which method of police of misconduct reduction is supported by this theory? What did that
news clip suggest how easy it is to identify bad officers? - ANS ✔✔THEORY
Police misconduct is the result of individual "bad" police officers and not symptomatic of a
wider problem with police in general
EVIDENCE/METHOD
large amount of complaints are accounted for by small number of officers
Early Warning System
VIDEO
pretty easy to identify them, but they're not always dealt with properly
Know the different types of police brutality (e.g. street justice, corruption related). You should
be able to distinguish them by motive. - ANS ✔✔Street Justice - extrajudicial punishment
(motivated by the nonexistence of law and order or dissatisfaction with justice)
Corruption-related - violating a law or regulation and abusing police position (motivated by
material gain (financial))
Excessive Force (motivated by need for authority/safety)
Sexual Abuse/animal abuse (motivated by desire for power/pleasure)
Do most police think that whistleblowing is worth the costs? - ANS ✔✔Yes
Be able to distinguish the various causes of corruption in lecture and the reading. One question
will ask you to identify the cause of corruption that is emphasized in the Dwyer reading. - ANS
✔✔INDIVIDUAL
Rotten Apples
Huge profits from illegal enterprises
Economic condition
,AGENCY
Learned in a corrupt environment
Code of Silence
Lack of oversight & accountability
SOCIETY
Are willing participants in some kinds of corruption
Want corruptibility (news, provides some power over police, can get something out of it)
Noble Cause Corruption - corruption to reach the ethical end
Drug-related corruption can have punitive motives
(Criminals (of color) and undocum. immigrants are easy victims and less credible witnesses.
Younger and less educated are more drug corrupted)
DWYER
Anderson purchased drugs from suspects and gave them to another cop who claimed he got
them from 4 innocent men; trying to fulfill their quotas
agency-level (neutralization)
Know some individual level corruption predictors.
What do officers who had career-ending misconduct tend to have in common? - ANS
✔✔Deviance and failure in background
Low pay
Differential Association (people)
Neutralizations
CAREER ENDING COMMON THREAD
Neutralizations( ??) (seeing it often)
, Sauer describes several pathways into serious corrupt behavior. Which pattern does he describe
as most typical? - ANS ✔✔Slow descent, starting with one small, maybe opportunistic act of
corruption (drugs are a good example - access to lots of cash)
If your goal is to reduce misconduct which types of police should we recruit more of? - ANS
✔✔women
minorities
older
tighter psychological/background checks
Know what Scaramella and others found regarding differences in the ethical (scenario)
judgments of criminal justice students and police officers with respect to perjury (lying to
protect a brutal co-worker) and in responding to an officer pulled over for DWI - ANS
✔✔students almost twice as likely as cops to respond ethically to a variety of situations (less
evidence of willingness to respond with nonfeasance) (Cop DWI)
Far more students than cops showed willingness to perjure themselves to keep
themselves/coworkers out of trouble or to ensure conviction of a guilty person
Pros and cons of allowing police officers to accept gratuities - ANS ✔✔Pros
Strengthen relationship with community (weaken view of citizens as an "other")
Cops feel more valued
Cons
Giver may expect something in return (and cops don't know when they will)
Difficult to draw the line between gratuities and other kinds of unethical behavior involving
money
If public views special treatment, can erode confidence in police
You need to know what the Knapp Commission said about how corrupt the majority of NYC
police were (p. 236) and what stage of corruption most were at. Note that stages 4 and above
