As a former police officer and someone who consistently advocates for the use of confidential informants, this documentary makes for painful watching. It deals with informant management in Bexar County Sheriff’s Office and the wrongful conviction of a number of people.

‘A Necessary Evil’: The Cost of Confidential Informants,” a KSAT 12 Defenders investigation.

Watch the whole documentary with an open mind. I started watching with a healthy degree of skepticism and ended annoyed at how many things were wrong with the police investigation. If you get to the end and are in anyway defending the police give your head a shake. This is a systemic failure and any attempt to defend the people involved is just burying your head in the sand. At best it is incompetence from the beginning, including the prosecuting lawyers.

Confidential informants (HUMINT,confidential human sources,CHIS) are effective but carry with them significant risk.

If there are not proper management systems in place corruption and misuse is almost inevitable. If you are the Chief of Police or the Sheriff and don’t have those systems in place it is negligence. It is harmful for everyone involved.

And the annoying thing is, it is so easy to fix.

1. Select a limited number of officers to manage informants and train them properly. Their sole role should be recruiting and managing informants. Their job is to provide the information your investigators need.

2. Write procedures and policies that cover every aspect of the management of informants. Include what is allowed and what is not allowed. It will be long 100 - 200 pages and must include how all information from informants, is turned into intelligence prior to its use.

3. Buy yourself a purpose-built informant management software such as the ACOS solution from Altia.

Had these steps been taken in Bexar County Sheriff’s Office the problems highlighted in this documentary could not have happened.

If law enforcement do not change how they manage informants laws will be enacted that make it all but impossible to use them effectively.

At HSM Training we can ensure that the systems your agency has in place to manage informants safely and effectively. You will get more and better information from better informants. It will be timely and will lead to the results you want. Your new systems will create an ethical framework and informants managed in a way that respects civil liberties and the judicial system. We can address the issues raised in this video in a way that satisfies the critics.

The little voice in your head right about now that is telling you don’t need any help,or that your system works just fine, that is hubris talking.

Call us: + 44 7739 370 969 or email info@hsmtraining.com

We are here to help law enforcement.

In keeping with our policy if we mention your agency in one of our blogs and you want your informant systems audited there is no charge for our time.