Abstract
Jammed Up is a comprehensive study of police misconduct that occurred in New York City Police Department (NYPD) over 21 years, from 1975 to 1996. The authors examine various types of misconduct that resulted in the “separation” of 1,543 officers from the department during this period. Even though “police misconduct,” as a term, has become a part of our regular vocabulary—mostly because of media exposure and advanced technology, coupled with Internet and social media—the authors highlight the complexity of defining police misconduct. By examining career-ending misconduct, the authors note that police misconduct can range from crime committed by on or off duty police officers, to abuse of authority, as well as failure to follow departmental policies and regulations. Instead of defining police misconduct, Kane and White provide an expansive outline of many forms of police deviance, including police crime, police corruption, abuse of authority, psychological abuse, physical abuse, legal abuse, and off duty misconduct.
There are eight chapters in the book along with preface written by Candace McCoy of John Jay College. In the various chapters of this study, which is primarily qualitative, the authors used biographical portraits of a few separated officers to highlight the characteristics and diversity of police misconduct cases.
In the introduction, the authors provide an overview of the book and discuss the methodology for the study in great detail. This will be very helpful for those who would like to do similar research. Through an extensive review of NYPD documents, the study identified 1,543 police officers who were separated from the department. The researchers also identified 1,542 control officers who were not separated from the department during the study period to make a comparison between the “jammed up” officers and other officers. This comparison helps readers to understand factors that contribute to police deviance.
In Chapter 2—“What We Know and Don’t Know about Police Misconduct—Kane and White note that even though police misconduct is a highly discussed topic in Academia, as well as in public discourse, serious police misconduct is a rare phenomenon. This chapter provides a review of available literature on different aspects of police misconduct and illustrates a number of explanations to explore why there is a difference between eastern and westerns cities in terms of the number and nature of police misconduct. The authors note that historically, in the eastern cities, police misconduct is mostly profit motivated; whereas, in the western cities police brutality is more prevalent. According to the authors, “the prevalence of profit-motivated corruption may be tied to the socioeconomic and crime-related features of older eastern cities” (p. 31). In this chapter, Kane and White also address both community/organization and individual level correlates of police misconduct and provide a theoretical explanation about who may succeed as a positive police officer.
Chapter 3 looks into the historical context of NYPD focusing on police misconduct in different eras, namely, The Knapp Era, Post-Knapp and the Fiscal Crisis: 1975–1979, Post-Fiscal Crisis and the Hiring “Spree”: 1980–1984, Drug Testing and the “Buddy Boys”: 1985–1989, Mollen Commission Era: 1990–1993, and Post-Mollen Era: 1994–1996. The study notes that there were both similarities and differences in the nature of police misconduct during the different historical periods. The authors state that “the most stable form of career-ending misconduct in the NYPD overtime has been primarily criminal and profit-motivated, committed by co-offending officers, who were usually on-duty when the events occurred” (p. 59).
Chapter 4 discusses the prevalence and types of misconduct among NYPD police officers from 1975 to 1996. Kane and White note that “the population of 1,543 officers separated for cause represents about 2 percent of all officers employed by NYPD from 1975 to 1996. In simple terms, career-ending misconduct in the NYPD rarely occurred during the study period” (pp. 68–69). The authors also classified eight types of misconduct, with their occurrence rate, that separated officers from the department. According to the authors, “Nearly one-third of the charges involved administrative offenses—most typically for violation of departmental regulations concerning attendance, performance, obedience, and reporting” (p. 70). The authors also examined the characteristics of separated and control officers in this chapter in terms of officers’ preemployment personal history, prior criminal history, and military history. They found significant differences between the two groups on a number of variables. For example, “There are also significant differences between the military ranks by separated and control officers, and they are in the direction one might expect: separated officers generally achieved less success in the military than did control group colleagues” (p. 77).
Chapter 5 was built on the previous chapter where the authors continued the discussion on characteristics of two groups of officers by providing statistical analysis and developed a scheme of risk and protective factors of police misconduct. The findings of the study highlight the importance of several protective factors such as promotion, education, and training. According to the authors, “officers with Associate’s or Bachelor’s degrees were less likely to be separated for misconduct (i.e., criminal and drug failures) as compared to less educated officers” (p. 102).
Chapter 6 underscores the importance of understanding the influence of macro level characteristics—such as systemic resource deprivation, barriers to upward mobility, and political marginalization—on individual officer’s conduct. The authors note that these advantages “likely created opportunity structures for police misconduct, and at the same time made it difficult or impossible for community members to effectively hold the police accountable for misconduct” (p. 108). The study also points out that in extremely structurally disadvantaged communities incidents of police misconduct were the strongest predictor of violent crime.
Chapter 7 provides an explanation of police deviance within the frameworks of four criminological theories: strain, social learning, self-control, and life course. Kane and White note that all these theories could explain police misconduct and its risk factors. For example, earlier in the study, the result shows that Black and Latino officers were more likely to be engaged in misconduct and separated from the job. The authors assert that strain theory can explain this phenomenon. They speculate that “ … it may be the case that minority officers are observed more closely than their white counterparts and subsequently punished more seriously. This tokenism can also be understood as a source of strain unique to minority officers” (p. 135).
The book ends with authors’ recommendations to reduce and/or prevent police misconduct. They also highlight the importance of good policing, which is a different construct, and provide guidelines to foster good policing. Drawing on Fyfe’s “Protection of Life” philosophy, Kane and White introduce a model of good policing where the officers are reminded “to respect and value people who are contacted by police while at their worst, people who are not thinking clearly, even people who pose some threat to public order and public safety” (p. 170).
This book is a must read for police scholars, researchers, and practitioners who want to get a better understanding of police deviance and take steps toward good policing. Overall, it is an easy and fascinating reading, and it can capture a broader audience that is not part of the criminal justice field.