Tuesday, April 22, 2014

Individual vs. Institution Corruption

When an individual commits a serious crime it is a tragedy for those involved. When an institution does, it is a tragedy for society.

Recently in Chicago five police officers were caught lying in Court regarding an arrest.
After they all testified regarding an arrest, the defense submitted a video from a camera mounted on one of the police cars proving that the cops lied and conspired together to do so.

If it was one officer lying that would have been bad enough. But the fact that five officers conspired to all lie in court is incredibly disturbing. The problem is that it puts the whole judicial process in jeopardy. After all, if five police officers all lie in court on one matter, it makes all testimony by all police officers less reliable. This leads to judges and juries becoming less likely to convict the real bad guys. And it leads to more crime being committed because criminals can rationalize their actions by believing, accurately to an extent, that the judicial process isn't fair and the police are corrupt.

No doubt the officers rationalized away their crime by believing it was only done to put a “bad guy” (as they define it) away. But the effect is to actually create more criminals and keep more of them on the street.

There are always bad apples in any group. There are priests who sexual abuse minors, people that embezzle money from work, cops who deal drugs, and politicians who run guns. People understand that. And when these individuals are caught and punished for their crimes, it reinforces the belief that the system is fair and just. But when groups conspire in an institution to act unethically or commit crimes (cops in Chicago or lawyers in divorce cases) people stop believing that the institution itself is fair and just. And rightly so. Think about it – if five police officers in Chicago were caught on a fluke committing perjury in court, how prevalent do you think perjury by cops in Chicago is?

In my case, Nelly Wince, I think you will agree if you read the evidence, blatantly lied in court. The result? She was rewarded by the judge and protected against punishment by the Office of Lawyers Professional Responsibility. And, although I do not have a lot of hard evidence for other infractions, I can assure you that Nelly Wince committed a host of other unethical actions and crimes as did numerous others that were involved with the case. The fact that they all acted unethically and/or criminally makes it very clear to me that the institution itself is corrupt. In no way to I believe my experience is unique. The only unique aspect in my case is that, like the video that proved the Chicago officers were lying, I have hard evidence that Neely Wince lied in court.


Think of it. The very institution charged with ensuring equal justice under the law, is, or at least parts of it are, corrupt.  

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