Corruption by Correctional Personnel

Up to 50% of correctional officers in Baltimore correctional facility have been indicted for helping inmates smuggle in contraband. Some of the criminal activities the officers are involved in include smuggling weapons, drugs, money, and cell phones into the prison.
The corrupt correctional guards helped members of the Black Guerrilla Family (BGF) gang run a lucrative drug operation. Tavon White, who is leaders of the gang pleaded guilty to racketeering and drug-and-money laundering. Forty-four members of the BGF gang have been indicted. More than half of the indicted individuals are female correctional officers. The officers smuggle the contrabands by hiding it in their hair, underwear, body curves, and their private parts. The investigations also revealed that BGF gang members were charging inmates money to reside in the jail. According to the Maryland U.S. Attorney, high-ranking gang members are able to direct crime on the street when behind bars (Bui, 2013).
Any employee misconduct has significant warning signs. Most scandals start with one employee doing relatively insignificant unethical actions; however, the acts grow to whatever level the leaders overlook them. Indifference toward integrity by the leaders is what serves as the breeding ground for misconduct, especially in the law enforcement agencies. Poor recruitment and hiring is perhaps the greatest undoing in the Baltimore case. As an employer, the correctional department cannot change the character of its employees; therefore, it is more prudent to hire exceptional people (Pollock, 2012). On the job training programs assimilate new employees into the organizations culture. Placing new employees with senior employees who have a dishonest attitude prompts them to acquire the same attitude through peer pressure. The employees rationalize their misconduct through the belief that their seniors are the enemies.
To reduce corruption in correctional facilities, leaders must do more than supervise their juniors. They must steadfastly set an example by instilling straightforwardness and honesty. The most important element in law enforcement is the hiring process. The management must conduct in depth background checks because the best indicator of future behavior is past behavior. The corrections department must conduct internal ethical training to equip the officers with effective career survival training (Pollock, 2012). The corrections department must make character and role modeling the most important considerations for promotions. Officers placed in first line supervision roles are the first line of defense against corruption. They are the one who make a choice whether to confront or overlook minor lapses.
Leaders play a critical role in the promotion or prevention of corruption. Given the troubling condition of corruption, it is safe to assume that corruption is a learned behavior. No one is born corrupt and ideally, correctional officers undergo careful scrutiny before employment. Assuming the scrutinizing process is cheat proof, the only logical explanation of corruption among correctional officers is that they learn it while conducting their job. If this is a probable explanation, then it is imperative that the officers work in an ethical environment to lower the chances of becoming corrupt. Although correctional facilities are subject to the same standards of professional ethics as other public organizations, the prison environment makes the standards harder to apply. This is because the effects of prisonization. This makes both the officers and inmates more easily agitated and less inclined to use logical reasoning (Pollock, 2012).
Public service institutions, such as the Baltimore correctional facility operate in a continuum between professionalism and corruption. This depends on the agencys culture, workers knowledge, and management style. The Baltimore case involves more than half the officers in the facility. This indicates that the problem involves all officers in the facility at all levels. The management of the facility has failed in creating a civil work environment, which is conducive for productivity. The performance of the officers is dependent on the institution culture tolerated by the management. The management of the Baltimore corrections facility has tolerated practices that diminish the civility of the institutions and are to blame as much as the officers indicted (Pollock, 2012).



 References
Bui, L. (2013). Investigators: More than Half of Corrections Officers at Jail Helped Inmates Smuggle In Contraband. Retrieved from: http://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2013/11/22/investigators-more-than-half-of-corrections-officers-at-jail-helped-inmates-smuggle-in-contraband/
Pollock, J. M. (2012). Ethical dilemmas and decisions in criminal justice. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning.