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Whistle-Blowing and the Code of Silence in Police Agencies

Policy and Structural Predictors

Gary R. Rothwell

Georgia Bureau of Investigation

J. Norman Baldwin

University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa

This article reports the findings from a study that investigates predictors of police willingness to blow the whistle and police frequency of blowing the whistle on seven forms of misconduct. It specifically investigates the capacity of nine policy and structural variables to predict whistle-blowing. The results indicate that two variables, a policy mandating the reporting of misconduct and supervisory status, surface as the most consistent predictors of whistle-blowing. Contrary to popular belief, the results also show that police are slightly less inclined than civilian public employees to subscribe to a code of silence.

Key Words: whistle-blowing • code of silence • police • procedural justice theory • structural functionalism

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Crime & Delinquency, Vol. 53, No. 4, 605-632 (2007)
DOI: 10.1177/0011128706295048
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This Article
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