Cops don’t just commit misconduct and corruption while on the job, they also tend to prove that they can get quite incompetent when dealing with crime and evidence. It usually results in having an unsolved crime or sometimes, letting the wrong person free. After reading about these cases, you’d stop wondering why some victims’ families no longer have faith in the justice system.
1.) Debbie Wolfe
Debbie Wolfe’s remains was found inside a barrel in a pond behind her cabin. The police forgot about the barrel and left it behind, with the killer coming back to retrieve it when they were gone. Because of this screwup, they vehemently denied ever seeing a barrel on the scene and concluded that Debbie drowned instead of being murdered and stuffed.
2.) St. Louis Jane Doe
The police had a key piece of evidence in their hands but didn’t have a suspect in mind. They decided to send the evidence via USPS to a psychic, which ended up getting lost in the mail.
3.) Adam Walsh
A blood-stained carpet was found at the scene of Adam Walsh’s murder. Unfortunately, the police department in charge of his case was about to move offices and ended up losing the only piece of evidence that could solve the murder.
4.) JonBenét Ramsey
The JonBenét Ramsey murder investigation has never been solved due to the fact that the police failed to secure the entire house when they arrived. People could freely come and go, possibly destroying evidence along the way.
5.) Konerak Sinthasomphone
Konerak Sinthasomphone managed to escape the clutches of Jeffrey Dahmer and had sought the help of two women who took him to a police officer. Konerak was naked, drugged, and was bleeding from the rectum. Dahmer ended up catching up to him and telling the cops that Konerak was his lover. The two women knew that the boy was in danger, but the cops decided to return Konerak to Dahmer’s custody.
6.) Mindy Tran
Mindy Tran was a 7 year old girl who was found murdered in a shallow grave near her parents’ home. The police only followed up on one suspect and ended up botching it and just completely giving up after the suspect was let go. Mindy Tran’s case is yet to be solved.
7.) 1922 Hall–Mills murder
This is one of New Jersey’s most famous unsolved murders due to the fact that two police departments ended up arguing about which of them had jurisdiction to take over the case. While they were busy deciding that, the press and the public raided the crime scene, with some people taking home souvenirs for themselves.
8.) Suzanne Jovin
The police was very negligent in Suzanne Jovin’s case. She was about to meet a person on the night she was murdered, but they had failed to investigate who that mystery person was. They also accused a professor of killing Suzanne, which ended up destroying his career.
9.) Cindy Song
The cops and Cindy Song’s family had a complete miscommunication during the case. The police department didn’t have a translator on hand, so Cindy’s family wasn’t informed that they shouldn’t touch the crime scene and ended up cleaning the whole place.
10.) Kristin Smart
Cops found one of Kristin’s earring at the home of one of their suspects. As they were about to get a warrant to search the premises, they discovered that the key piece of evidence went missing.
11.) Ashley Huff
Ashley Huff was arrested on drug charges when police found her holding a spoon with a blackened substance on the bottom. Huff didn’t have any criminal records and had a clean drug test. After the spoon she was holding was tested, it was discovered that instead of being methamphetamine residue as her arresting officer had noted, it was actually just burned Spaghetti-O’s.
12.) Ted Bundy
After Ted Bundy’s first arrest, he was detained at the courthouse library with no supervision or restraints. He managed to escape by simply climbing out a window and it took days for the cops to re-capture him.
13.) Edward Sanchez
The Dearborn, Michigan officer decided to steal some marijuana from their police station’s evidence locker and took it home. He and his wife baked it into brownies and didn’t realize how potent the mixture was. Sanchez ended up calling 911 because he was high and thought he was being poisoned.
14.) Brendan Cronin
Brendan Cronin decided to get really drunk one day and ended up firing 13 shots at a driver of an idling car. He ended up threatening his fellow officers that he’ll shoot them too if they approached him. And after all that he’s done, Cronin still refuses to plead guilty to what he did.
15.) Steven Robbins
Robbin was only on the 9th year of a 60-year prison sentence that he was supposed to serve. He was surprised when Illinois authorities decided to release him. It took the authorities 2 days to realized what they had done and had to re-arrest Robbins for their mistake.