Police Values: What Is Right and What Is Wrong?

Corrections / Police / Criminal Justice Would I lie to a suspect to get a confession even it was legal to do so? Legal or not, lying to get a confession creates a moral black hole for an officer. To wit, how would an officer who was otherwise a good Christian later feel about getting a conviction albeit he obtained that conviction through deception? That is the question here.

Chances are he would feel guilty; and it's possible that his wife, if she knew he used lies to tease a confession out of a suspect, would confront him. He would have had no place to hide from his sin in his earthly world and certainly spiritually he would live with a sense of guilt.

Looked at a different way, when a good officer who was not a Christian but has always practiced ethical values is told by his superiors in the State of Virginia that lying is legal -- is he then going to use the law to get a confession? If the court in Virginia that made the ruling underwent a thorough legal analysis by objective scholars one would think that evaluation would reveal serious ethical problems. Moreover, because cheating is lying, it appears that many Americans believe lying is okay somehow.

Recent surveys have shown that "large-scale cheating" has been uncovered at the Air Force Academy, Harvard University, and in high schools (Perez-Pena, 2012). Indeed, surveys of high school students in America, the Josephson Institute of Ethics has found that "about three-fifths admit to have cheated in the previous year" (Perez-Pena, p. 2).

In police work, success means getting convictions, and although lying to a suspect might bring me as an officer a sense of success, it would also be a lie that would create guilt which I would carry around with me for a long time, as the author pointed out on page 173.

Can an independent thinker be a team player? An independent thinker (if he is a cop) has no choice but to be a "team player" for several very important reasons: team rules must be followed; policies must be adhered to; firearms and evidence must be accounted for; and officers are sworn to uphold the applicable laws. In those areas or responsibility, every officer must be a team player.

Someone in a higher position sets the schedule (as to which officers are on patrol at specific times, which are doing desk work, and which are investigating current criminal cases) and points to specific investigations that need to be carried out -- and again, team players are needed in order to conduct the business of policing, always with the goal of protecting the public.

That said, the independent thinker -- whose Christian values call upon him to be truthful and avoid deceit or deception -- does not have to be a "team player" when it comes to another officer's wayward ethics. It also means that he doesn't have to be a team player when a police colleague has committed wrongdoing and asks to "cover me" (lie for me).

That doesn't mean he needs to be a "snitch" but he has to have strong values and if his fellow officers know that about him, they are not as likely to ask him to do unethical things. Should we admit to doing wrong? When we are wrong, yes of course we should admit that candidly and thoroughly. In the first place coming right out and revealing culpability for an act is the ethically correct thing to do.

Taking responsibility shows courage, but on the other hand, as the author points out on page 172, "guilty feelings" for things we did that are wrong stay with us for a long time. Christians understand that making mistakes is quite human, but after the fact of an error in judgment, an honest apology or a candid owing up to responsibility for the wrongdoing is the absolute right thing to do.

Living with guilt can be hell, so knowing that out in front should cause all those who espouse Christian attitudes and attend church services to owe up to responsibility. What is the difference between a mistake of the mind and a mistake of the heart? A mistake can be made when the mind is cluttered with responsibilities, deadlines, and when a huge amount of pressure and stress invades a person's mind. No one is above making mental mistakes -- not President Barack.