ABSTRACT
Like criminal law itself, the “blue code of silence” is a normative injunction but unwritten. Sometimes called a blue wall, curtain, or cocoon of silence, it is embedded in police subculture. At its best, the feelings of loyalty and brotherhood that sustain the code may facilitate policing and protect officers against genuine threats to safety and wellbeing (Kleinig, 2000: 7). However, the same code of loyalty and brotherhood can, as a code of silence, sustain an oppositional criminal subculture protecting the interests of police who violate the criminal law.
