The highest danger level of corruption is reached when corruption captures the public authorities, including law enforcement, i.e. those same bodies that should combat it. The crimes committed by officials, who are primarily responsible for law enforcement, cause social danger to society. Crimes committed by police officers undermine the very basis of law enforcement agencies, reduce their credibility and form negative public attitudes to them, contributing to the development of legal nihilism in the country. Transparency International's 2010 Global Corruption Barometer found that, around the world, the police are one of the four most corrupt institutions. It should be noted that the level of corruption crimes among police officers has increased since the late 90s. Police criminality was so acute in New Orleans during the 1980s and 1990s that people were afraid to report crimes for fear that corrupt officers would retaliate or tip off organized crime figures. A characteristic feature of criminal manifestations is their qualitative change. Earlier, corrupt activities were accomplished by a particular person for a particular purpose. Now the whole group of police officers may be involved in illegal activities.

This phenomenon is generated by various social factors and conditions. In order to successfully fight corruption, one has to define and reduce the factors and conditions that give rise to it. However, this is a long-term task; it cannot be done at once. The crimes the police officers commit are dangerous to the public and are characterized by high latency though the police are an institution that is to protect the public.

Factors Causing Corruption

Among the major factors which cause corruption in the case described in the article are the lack of a careful selection of personnel, cursory inspection business, poor moral qualities of the candidates to serve in the police, and low level of discipline. Causal factors of corruption can be divided into two main categories: the ones which are connected with the exterior and those, which result from personal, internal order.

Motifs generated by the external environment can be divided into structural and organizational. Structural context is an officers’ reaction to the pressure of external circumstances, their attitude to the opportunities and risks arising in the course of performing specific functions as a member of the police force. Pressure of external circumstances is particularly clear if police officers perform duties facing illegal business activities, such as drug trafficking.

The relationship between officers and informants is an area of particular risk. Some officers pay informants without permission to do this, developing a special relationship and hiding those from authorities. Such extraordinary relationships between the officer and the informant do not fit the existing job descriptions and rules. There are certain areas where the protection of various objects creates particularly favorable conditions for corruption. Thus, regulation of drug trafficking, prostitution, etc. is a source of illegal income for many police officers, especially senior ones.

The above factors create an atmosphere of risk, which is particularly strong in conjunction with the organizational context, i.e. with the specific internal order characteristic of a particular police department. Organizational pressure is associated with a feeling of a powerful team. Organizational context of corruption reaches its maximum in cases where leaders of the subdivision are corrupted, as in the article. Organizational pressure is also evident when there is a unique subculture among law enforcement officers, which is characterized by loyalty towards colleagues, by hiding their misdeeds. Mutual responsibility is facilitated by many circumstances, including public hostility towards employees as representatives of the government. Weak management control over the activities of subordinates contributes to the manifestation of corruption. Functioning of police staff suggests dispersal over a large territory since bosses are not directly watching how officers act on their sites. In addition, there are numerous variables that contribute to the spread of corruption. They vary from department to department across the country. In connection with this, fixation and analysis of any specific territory where corruption spread should be carried out on the local level.

The officer’s attitude towards corruption and own behavior in the environment presenting many temptations and risks is largely determined by officer’s personal qualities. Faced with the pressure of the performance of official functions, any officer unit can choose own model of behavior in these circumstances. However, there are personal qualities associated with susceptibility to corruption if one does not even take into account these factors.

Anti-Corruption Mechanisms

It is impossible to get rid of corruption, but that does not mean that it cannot be fought. Anti-corruption mechanisms may be different depending on the structure and size of the organization. The more complex the system, the greater the need to be involved in its anti-corruption measures. It is necessary to improve the vetting procedure in order to prevent the employment of the persons prone to corruption. This requires the collection of more complete personal information and organization of individual work with psychologists. The inspector should collect characterizing materials of a candidate applying to work in the police to find out whether he or she has experience in working for any civic organization. The acceptance of administrative or disciplinary liability for knowingly giving false information on the candidate is required, particularly in transfers within the police system. Upon the expiration of the internship, personal characteristics of the trainee must be defined by a mentor. Responsibility for checking negative characteristics reduces the possibility of employing the candidate proven to be perfidious. One of the effective administrative and legal means of preventing and combating corruption in the police is staff turnover and a redistribution of duties every 2-3 years. It also includes the establishment of specific disciplinary action for the police heads. An important trend in the prevention and suppression of corruption in law enforcement institutions is properly organized office checks. It is advisable to carry out inspections on their own initiative, monitoring in particular those who obviously live beyond their means. The recommendations described above are not free or cheap to organize, all these methods and technologies will cost much for a government just because there are a lot of departments to serve across the whole country. However, corruption leads society to a crisis, therefore such checking departments will prove the government’s spending. Talking about the risks of those methods, only one may be defined. This is the possibility of corruption to get to every department that aims at checking the other one, so to say, two-sided corruption. To exclude this, there should be as many institutions as the state can afford to closely penetrate each other to reveal corruption as soon as possible.

The above-mentioned proposals relate primarily to the grant proposal work because they may be taken as a basis for the development and implementation of specific actions within the local context. Proposed administrative and legal means of preventing and combating corruption in the police, in particular, will help to reduce corruption level in the system, as well as contribute to the protection of the rights and legitimate interests of citizens and legal entities. The current problem of fighting corruption in the police cannot be solved only by the internal anti-corruption mechanisms.