HANDBOOK ON POLICE ACCOUNTABILITY, OVERSIGHT AND INTEGRITY
8
Good policing requires public cooperation. Members of the public may be witnesses
and victims of crime, and they can provide the police with relevant information.
14
Yet,
only if people trust the police and regard them as legitimate are they willing to assist
them (for example by sharing information) and comply with their instructions,
15
enab-
ling the police to succeed in carrying out their core functions of maintaining public
order and preventing and detecting crime. In this connection, when police compliance
with new operational methods and procedures is sought, the police must be persuaded
that it is in their professional interests to cooperate.
16
Enhancing police accountability and integrity is primarily meant to establish, restore or
enhance public trust and (re-)build the legitimacy that is a prerequisite for effective
policing.
This may be achieved through establishing a system of civilian oversight. Accepting
external, civilian scrutiny is a hallmark of a democratic police force, that is, one that is
responsive and accountable to the needs of the public.
17
Box 1 provides background on
the issue of the need for the police to regain moral authority.
Box 1. Police scandals worldwide
Over the past three to four decades there have been national scandals concerning police
misconduct, including human rights violations, excessive use of force and corruption in
countries around the world resulting in public outcries.
a
Scandals such as these led to a
need for the police to regain moral authority by improving their integrity and re- establishing
public confidence, resulting in major changes in police accountability structures with the
acceptance of stricter external scrutiny.
a
Examples of measures taken include: an investigation into allegations of corruption in the New York
Police Department by the Mollen Commission in 1994; major reforms of the Belgian police and their oversight
structures following a failure to properly investigate child molester Marc Dutroux; the trial of Los Angeles Police
Department officers after the African American Rodney King was beaten up; the Macpherson Inquiry after the
Metropolitan Police failed to investigate the murder of the black 15-year-old Stephen Lawrence in London in
a professional and impartial way; the order for a full investigation into “the killing of the Apo six” in Nigeria,
which the police had tried to cover up; and the Royal Commission to Enhance the Operation and Management
of the Royal Malaysia Police, which released 125 recommendations in 2005 focusing on three main areas of
reform: crime reduction, eradicating corruption and observing human rights.
14
Ibid.
15
Ibid.; O’Neill, Police Reform and Human Rights (see footnote 1).
16
O’Neill, “Police reform in post-conflict societies” (see footnote 1). More fundamentally, in a democracy, the
police must operate on the basis of laws and principles that are upheld and enforced with public support.
17
See J. Burack, W. Lewis and E. Marks, Civilian Police and Multinational Peacekeeping: A Workshop Series–A
Role for Democratic Policing (Washington, D.C., United States, Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice,
1997); David H. Bayley, “The contemporary practices of policing: a comparative view”, in J. Burack, W. Lewis and
E. Marks, Civilian Police and Multinational Peacekeeping: A Workshop Series–A Role for Democratic Policing (Washington,
D.C., United States, Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, 1997); Christopher Stone and Heather H.
Ward, “Democratic policing: a framework for action”, Policing and Society, vol. 10, No. 1 (2000), pp. 11-45; Osse,
Understanding Policing: A Resource for Human Rights Activists (see footnote 9); Commonwealth Human Rights
Initiative, Police Accountability: Too Important to Neglect, Too Urgent to Delay (New Delhi, 2005); Perez, “External
governmental mechanisms of police accountability” (see footnote 11); Joel Miller, “Civilian oversight of policing:
lessons from the literature” (New York, Vera Institute of Justice, 2002); and the report of the Secretary-General on
securing peace and development (see footnote 4), para. 41.