Culling Mexico’s Bad Apples : Mass firing of corrupt cops is a brave action, but only a first step

Firing 737 cops at once, as the Mexican attorney general did last week, is a courageous act. It won’t erase the decades-old disgrace of rogue officers among the federal police, but it is a bold step in the right direction.

The move was in the making for more than a year as an element of a “national public security program,” announced by President Ernesto Zedillo a few months back. Last week’s housecleaning was meant to uproot officers who do not meet high standards and to train or retrain those deemed potentially fit for the 4,700-officer force.

The fired cops belonged to the Policia Judicial Federal, a corps divided in two bodies, one the equivalent of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and the other comparable to the Drug Enforcement Agency.

According to Atty. Gen. Antonio Lozano, the agents were sacked because they did not fit the “ethical profile” required of the federal police. Among the more specific reasons given for their termination were “unfulfilled schooling requirements,” “test failure” and “repeated public complaints of misconduct.” Added up, those terms mean the fired cops were deemed dirty. The finely phrased explanations have failed to convince public opinion that the problem has been solved. Most ordinary Mexicans remain convinced that the judiciales personify corruption and abuse.

The fact that on the day the 737 agents were fired, 10 of them had showed up at their headquarters driving stolen cars, carrying drugs and, in one case, $15,000 in cash, the equivalent of a year’s salary, heightened the public’s skepticism.

Only 10 of the sacked agents have been charged with crimes, a figure that sends chills and doubt across the country. For many Mexicans that simply means that 727 former cops are on the streets during a time of robberies and kidnappings that have left the population jumpy and reasonably convinced that rogue cops have a hand in the troubles.

Nevertheless, the attorney general acted rightly in kicking the rotten apples off the federal force. At least they no longer can hide their unfit “ethical profile” behind a badge.

The problem of corruption within the Policia Judicial Federal is large and long-standing. Cleaning house will help, but clear results may be long in coming. Lozano and his high command should waste no time in overhauling their recruitment standards and building a more professional police force.