The use of lying and deception by police in their daily activities has been acknowledged, justified and approved by the Courts, police departments and society. The distinction between tolerated lying and reprehensible perjury in New York State is described in Penal Law. Despite this clear definition of perjury, the Mollen Commission Report (1994) on corruption in the NYPD rarely used the term “perjury.” It did recognize that police practices of falsification were so common that it spawned its own word “testilying.” Testilying and fasifications are simply euphemisms for perjury. This study aims to determine underlying conditions and circumstances that an officer would take into account in making a decision to commit perjury.

Read the full report from 2000 here.