Macdaniel affair

{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2019}}

{{Use British English|date=June 2019}}

File:Stephen Macdaniel Thief Taker.jpg

The Macdaniel affair or Macdaniel scandal was a political scandal in the United Kingdom. In 1754, a group of bounty hunters, led by Stephen MacDaniel, were revealed to have been prosecuting innocent men to their deaths in England in order to collect reward money from bounties.{{cite web|url=http://www.deastore.com/pdf/cambridge20040427/0521591104ws.pdf|title=European Criminal Procedures (pdf)|last=Delmas-Marty|first=Mireille|author2=J. R. Spencer|date=2002|origyear=1995|publisher=Presses Universitaires de France / Cambridge University Press|accessdate=2008-07-05}} {{Dead link|date=October 2010|bot=H3llBot}} The scandal was an unintended consequence of the British government offering rewards for the capture of criminals, as before those rewards were instituted, thief-takers depended primarily on privately funded rewards from victims seeking return of stolen property or other restitution. The Macdaniel affair formed part of the impetus for the formation of salaried public police forces, who did not depend on rewards, to combat crime in the country.{{cite book|last=Benson|first=Bruce|title=To Serve and Protect: Privatization and Community in Criminal Justice|publisher=New York University Press|date=1998|isbn=0-8147-1327-0|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RD9w0bKW_Z4C&dq=Macdaniel+affair&pg=PA221}}{{cite book|authorlink1=Philip Rawlings|last=Rawlings|first=Philip|authorlink2=Tim Newburn |author2=Tim Newburn |author3=Les Johnston |author4=Frank Leishman|title=Policing: A Short History|publisher=Willan Publishing|date=2002|isbn=1-903240-26-3|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=x7zlGBD5hCkC&dq=Macdaniel+affair&pg=PA93}}{{cite book|last=McLynn|first=Frank |title=Crime and punishment in eighteenth-century England|publisher=Routledge|date=1989|isbn=0-415-01014-4|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jXe5XQJWqmkC&dq=Macdaniel+affair&pg=PA31}}{{cite book|last=Langbein|first=John H.|title=The Origins of Adversary Criminal Trial|publisher=Oxford University Press|date=2003|isbn=0-19-925888-0|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ptDoLvpBUWgC&dq=Macdaniel+affair&pg=PA155}}