On July 18, 1968, a report by the International Association of Police Chiefs (IACP) severely criticizes the command structure of the Seattle Police Department.
The study was suggested by a three-member committee appointed by Mayor J. D. "Dorm" Braman (1901-1980) to investigate allegations of police corruption. The IACP recommended a substantial reorganization of the department, which was completed in 1968. This set of reforms effectively ended the police payoff system, which had persisted for decades. Over the next six years, several dozen officers, public officials, and tavern operators were charged in state and federal court with crimes such as conspiracy, perjury, bribery, grafting, and contempt.
Sources:
Walt Crowley, Rites of Passage: A Memoir of the Sixties in Seattle (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1995), 258; "The Seattle Times documents payoffs to police on January 13, 1967," Historylink Timeline Library (www.historylink.org).
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