ABSTRACT
The investigative work of all law enforcement agencies relies to a great extent on informants. Detective work has always centred around their cultivation but informants are recruited and paid in by many law enforcement agencies. For example, although Customs does not have the general law enforcement mandate of the police and, to that extent, their opportunities to recruit informants are fewer, their extensive regulatory and inspection powers with respect to traders provide for plenty of recruitment opportunities. Inland Revenue in the UK has been authorised to pay informants since 1890 and normally pays amounts anywhere from £100 to £20,000 depending on the amount of tax subsequently collected (Observer, December 1, 1996, 2). Some areas of law enforcement, it is fair to say, simply could not exist without them: ‘Without a network of informants - usually civilians, sometimes police - narcotics police cannot operate’ (Skolnick, 1994, 117).
