informant#Jailhouse informants

Informants are extremely common in every-day police work, including homicide and narcotics investigations. Any citizen who provides crime-related information to law enforcement by definition is an informant.Palmiotto, J., Micheal. Criminal Investigation. 4th ed. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2013. pp. 65–66

Law enforcement and intelligence agencies may face criticism regarding their conduct towards informants. Informants may be shown leniency for their own crimes in exchange for information, or simply turn out to be dishonest in their information, resulting in the time and money spent acquiring them being wasted.

Informants are often regarded as traitors by their former criminal associates. Whatever the nature of a group, it is likely to feel strong hostility toward any known informers, regard them as threats and inflict punishments ranging from social ostracism through physical abuse and/or death. Informers are therefore generally protected, either by being segregated while in prison or, if they are not incarcerated, relocated under a new identity.

File:Program Aids - CHS Assessing.pdf Anchorage aid for assessing confidential human sources]]

Informants, and especially criminal informants, can be motivated by many reasons. Many informants are not themselves aware of all of their reasons for providing information, but nonetheless do so. Many informants provide information while under stress, duress, emotion and other life factors that can affect the accuracy or veracity of information provided.

Law enforcement officers, prosecutors, defense lawyers, judges and others should be aware of possible motivations so that they can properly approach, assess and verify informants' information.

Generally, informants' motivations can be broken down into self-interest, self-preservation and conscience.

A list of possible motivations includes:

• Self-Interest:
• Financial reward.Lyman, D., Micheal. Criminal Investigation: The Art and the Science. 6th ed. Columbia College of Missouri. Pearson, 2010. p. 264
• Pre-trial release from custody.
• Withdrawal or dismissal of criminal charges.
• Reduction of sentence.
• Choice of location to serve sentence.
• Elimination of rivals or unwanted criminal associates.
• Elimination of competitors engaged in criminal activities.
• Diversion of suspicion from their own criminal activities.
• Revenge.
• Desire to become a spy.
• Self-Preservation:
• Fear of harm from others.
• Threat of arrest or charges.
• Threat of incarceration.
• Desire for witness protection program.
• Conscience:
• Desire to leave criminal past.
• Guilty conscience.
• Redemption.
• Mutual respect.
• Genuine desire to assist law enforcement and society.{{cite book|last1=Allen|first1=Bill Van|title=Criminal investigation : in search of the truth|date=2011|publisher=Pearson Canada|location=Toronto|isbn=978-0-13-800011-0|page=217|edition=2nd}}

Corporations and the detective agencies that sometimes represent them have historically hired labor spies to monitor or control labor organizations and their activities."Private detective agencies and labour discipline in the United States, 1855–1946" by RP Weiss. The Historical Journal, 2009. Cambridge Univ Press Such individuals may be professionals or recruits from the workforce. They may be willing accomplices, or may be tricked into informing on their co-workers' unionization efforts."Judicial Control of Informants, Spies, Stool Pigeons, and Agent Provocateurs" by RC Donnelly – Yale Law Journal, 1951

Paid informants have often been used by authorities within politically and socially oriented movements to weaken, destabilize and ultimately break them."Thoughts on a neglected category of social movement participant: The agent provocateur and the informant" by GT Marx – American Journal of Sociology, 1974

File:Confidential Human Source Policy Guide (redacted).pdf

Informers alert authorities regarding government officials that are corrupt. Officials may be taking bribes or be participants in a money loop also called a kickback. Informers in some countries receive a percentage of all money recovered by their government.{{Citation needed|date=March 2012}}

The ancient Roman historian Lactantius described a judiciary case which involved the prosecution of a woman suspected to have advised another woman not to marry Maximinus II: "Neither indeed was there any accuser, until a certain Jew, one charged with other offences, was induced, through hope of pardon, to give false evidence against the innocent. The equitable and vigilant magistrate conducted him out of the city under a guard, lest the populace should have stoned him... The Jew was ordered to the torture till he should speak as he had been instructed... The innocent were condemned to die.... Nor was the promise of pardon made good to the feigned adulterer, for he was fixed to a gibbet, and then he disclosed the whole secret contrivance; and with his last breath he protested to all the beholders that the women died innocent."{{cite web|url=http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf07.iii.v.xl.html|title=On the Deaths of the Persecutors|author=Lactantius|author-link=Lactantius}}

Criminal informant schemes have been used as cover for politically motivated intelligence offensives."CIA Assets and the Rise of the Guadalajara Connection" J. Marshall – Crime, Law and Social Change, 1991

Jailhouse informants, who report hearsay (admissions against penal interest) which they claim to have heard while the accused is in pretrial detention, usually in exchange for sentence reductions or other inducements, have been the focus of particular controversy.[http://scc.lexum.umontreal.ca/en/2000/2000scc11/2000scc11.html scc.lexum.umontreal.ca] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101110084712/http://scc.lexum.umontreal.ca/en/2000/2000scc11/2000scc11.html |date=2010-11-10 }} Some examples of their use are in connection with Stanley Williams,{{cite web |url=http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/11/30/153247 |title=A Conversation with Death Row Prisoner Stanley Tookie Williams from his San Quentin Cell |website=Democracy Now! |date=November 30, 2005 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071115033333/http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05%2F11%2F30%2F153247 |archive-date=November 15, 2007 }} Cameron Todd Willingham,{{cite news|title = Man executed on disproved forensics|first1=Steve|last1=Mills|first2=Maurice|last2=Possley|url=http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0412090169dec09,0,1173806.story|newspaper=Chicago Tribune|date=December 9, 2004|access-date=September 1, 2009 }} Thomas Silverstein,{{cite web|url=http://www.projectposner.org/case/1985/768F2d790|title=UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. CLAYTON FOUNTAIN, THOMAS E. SILVERSTEIN, and RANDY K. GOMETZ, Defendants-Appellants|publisher=Project Posner|accessdate=May 28, 2007|archive-date=September 28, 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070928123334/http://www.projectposner.org/case/1985/768F2d790|url-status=dead}} Marshall "Eddie" Conway,{{cite book |title=Warfare in the American Homeland: Policing and Prison in a Penal Democracy |editor-last=James |editor-first=Joy |year=2007 |publisher=Duke University Press |location=Durham, NC |isbn=978-0-8223-3923-6 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/warfareinamerica02unse_2/page/96 96–99] |url=https://archive.org/details/warfareinamerica02unse_2/page/96 }} Temujin Kensu{{cite news |title=Is Temujin Kensu a 'ninja killer' or wrongfully convicted man? |work=NBC News |date=2021-03-21 |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/all/temujin-kensu-ninja-killer-or-wrongfully-convicted-man-n1260983 |last=Rappleye |first=Hannah |access-date=2024-12-30}} and a suspect in the disappearance of Etan Patz.{{cite news |url=https://abcnews.go.com/2020/etan-patz-missing-boy-case-reopened-31-years/story?id=10749565 |title=Etan Patz Case Reopened 31 Years Later|last1=Berman |first1=Thomas |last2=Sher |first2=Lauren |date=May 26, 2010 |access-date=July 16, 2011 |work=ABC News}} The Innocence Project has stated that 15% of all wrongful convictions later exonerated because of DNA results were accompanied by false testimony by jailhouse informants. 50% of murder convictions exonerated by DNA were accompanied by false testimony by jailhouse informants.{{cite news|url=https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2011/12/27/wrong-convictions-spur-florida-to-rethink-using-jail-informants/ |title=Wrong convictions spur Florida to rethink using jail informants|work= Orlando Sentinel |first=Rene |last=Stutzman|date= December 27, 2011}}

{{Redirect|Narc (Narcotics)|another usage of the phrase "narc"|Drug addict}}

Slang terms for informants include:

• blabbermouth{{cite web|url=http://www.thesaurus.com/browse/snitch|publisher=Thesaurus.com |title=snitch|date=September 2023 }}
• cheese eater
• canary – derives from the fact that canaries sing, and "singing" is underworld or street slang for providing information or talking to the police.{{cite book|last1=Orwant|first1=Jon|title=Games, Diversions & Perl Culture: Best of the Perl Journal|year=2003|publisher=O'Reilly Media|isbn=9781449397784|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1GkMNv7PM68C&q=canary+informant&pg=PT189}}
• dog – Australian term. May also refer to police forces who specialize in surveillance, or police generally.
• ear – someone who overhears something and tells the authorities.
• fink – this may refer to the Pinkertons who were used as plain-clothes detectives and strike-breakers."The Origin of fink 'informer, hired strikebreaker'" by William Sayers. A Quarterly Journal of Short Articles, Notes, and Reviews. Winter 2005 Cornell University
• grass{{cite book|title = Criminal Classes: Offenders at School|first = A|last = Devlin|date = 1995|publisher = Waterside Press|isbn = 9781906534493}} or supergrass"The Intelligence War in Northern Ireland" by K Maguire – International Journal of Intelligence and CounterIntelligence, Volume 4, Issue 2 1990, pp. 145–165 – rhyming slang for "grasshopper", meaning "copper" or "shopper",{{cite dictionary |title=grass |dictionary=Oxford English Dictionary|quote=A spy or informer, esp. for the police}} having additional associations with the popular song Whispering Grass and the phrase "snake in the grass".{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6tpC-7A7y-cC|title=Supergrasses: a study in anti-terrorist law enforcement in Northern Ireland |year=1995|isbn=9780198257660 |last1=Greer |first1=Steven C. |publisher=Clarendon Press }}
• narc – a member of a specialist anti-narcotic law enforcement agency or police intelligence force.Chicano intravenous drug users: The collection and interpretation of data from hidden Populations by R Ramos. 1990
• nark – this may have come from the Romani term nak for "nose" or the French term narquois, which means "cunning", "deceitful", and/or "criminal".Prison patter: a dictionary of prison words and slang by A Devlin. 1996"Some ethical dilemmas in the handling of police informers" by C Dunnighan, C Norris – Public Money & Management, 1998
• nose{{cite dictionary |dictionary=Oxford English Dictionary |title=nose |quote=A spy or informer, esp. for the police}}
• pentito – Italian term meaning "one who repents". Originally and most frequently used in reference to Mafia informants,{{cite book |author1-last=Nicaso |author1-first=Antonio |author2-last=Danesi |author2-first=Marcel |year=2013 |title=Made Men: Mafia Culture and the Power of Symbols, Rituals, and Myth |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5fEQAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA86 |location=Lanham, Maryland |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield |edition=1st |page=86 |isbn=978-1-4422-2227-4 |lccn=2013006239 |oclc=1030395983}} it has also been used to refer to informants for Italian paramilitary and terrorist organizations{{cite journal |author-last=Rossi |author-first=Federica |date=April 2021 |title=The failed amnesty of the 'years of lead' in Italy: Continuity and transformations between (de)politicization and punitiveness |editor-last=Treiber |editor-first=Kyle |journal=European Journal of Criminology |volume=20 |issue=2 |pages=381–400 |location=Los Angeles and London |publisher=SAGE Publications on behalf of the European Society of Criminology |doi=10.1177/14773708211008441 |doi-access=free |issn=1741-2609 |s2cid=234835036 |quote=The 1970s in Italy were characterized by the persistence and prolongation of political and social unrest that many Western countries experienced during the late 1960s. The decade saw the multiplication of far-left extra-parliamentary organizations, the presence of a militant far right movement, and an upsurge in the use of politically motivated violence and state repressive measures. [...] The early 1980s were characterized by the appearance of the first pentiti (justice collaborators), waves of arrests and trials, and the incarceration of several hundreds of radical left activists, many of whom were sentenced to very long terms (22 years and over). According to available data, 4087 activists were detained at the beginning of the 1980s in prisons around the country, including a few hundred in maximum security facilities.|url=https://openresearch.lsbu.ac.uk/download/56eac4694759293784fc3cdea6a41935b73428098612bf02849a1bb12bf040d6/163633/14773708211008441.pdf }} (such as the Red Brigades{{cite book |last=Drake |first=Richard |year=2021 |origyear=1989 |chapter=The Blast Furnace of Terrorism: 1979–1980 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xG0cEAAAQBAJ&pg=PT220 |title=The Revolutionary Mystique and Terrorism in Contemporary Italy |location=Bloomington, Indiana |publisher=Indiana University Press |edition=2nd |page=220 |isbn=9780253057143 |lccn=2020050360}}{{cite book |author-last=Sullivan |author-first=Colleen |year=2011 |chapter=Dozier, James Lee (1931– ) |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FAVqklkq2uUC&pg=PA162 |editor-last=Martin |editor-first=Gus |editor-link=C. Augustus Martin |title=The SAGE Encyclopedia of Terrorism |location=Los Angeles and London |publisher=SAGE Publications |edition=2nd |pages=162–163 |isbn=9781412980166 |lccn=2011009896}} and Front Line), and people who delivered confidential informations to the authorities during the "Maxi Trial" and "Mani pulite" nationwide judiciary investigations.
• pursuivant (archaic)"Speaker and Structure in Donne's Satyre" by NM Bradbury. Studies in English Literature, 1500–1900, 1985.
• rat{{cite journal|title = The Role of the "Rat" in the Prison|first = HA|last = Wilmer|journal = Fed. Probation|date = 1965|volume = 29|url = https://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/fedpro29&id=46&men_tab=srchresults}}"Sociology of Confinement: Assimilation and the Prison 'Rat'" by EH Johnson. The Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology, and Police Science. 1961 – informing is commonly referred to as "ratting" in American English.
• snitch"Reflections on the role of statutory immunity in the criminal justice system" by WJ Bauer – Journal of Criminal Law. & Criminology, 1976 – informing is commonly referred to as "snitching", term originally used within the African-American community and more recently associated with hip hop music, hardcore rap, and trap, alongside their derivative subgenres and subcultures.{{cite book |last=Natapoff |first=Alexandra |year=2009 |chapter=The Role of Rap and Hip Hop |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gkMx-o6dNK8C&pg=PA135 |title=Snitching: Criminal Informants and the Erosion of American Justice |location=New York and London |publisher=New York University Press |pages=135–138 |isbn=9780814758588}}
• snout{{cite dictionary |dictionary=Oxford English Dictionary |title=snout |quote=A police informer}}
• spotter"Instigated Crime" by S Shaw – Alta. LQ, 1938
• squealer
• stikker – Danish term meaning "stabber", mainly used in relation to World War II. During and after the Nazi occupation of Denmark (1940–1945), the word has been used specifically to indicate the Danish whistleblowers, agents, and spies which informed the German secret police, the Gestapo, in order to undermine the Danish resistance movement.
• stool pigeon or stoolie"Elevating the Role of the Informer: The Value of Secret Information". MW Krasilovsky. ABAJ, 1954
• tell tale or tell-tale"On Truth and Lie in a Colonial Sense: Kipling's Tales of Tale-telling" by A Hai – ELH, 1997"Telling tales in school" by A Minister. Education 3–13, 1990
• tattle-tale
• tittle-tattle
• tout – Northern Irish term for an informant, often one who informed on the activities of Irish paramilitary organizations during "the Troubles".{{Cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/oct/29/northernireland.humanrights |title=End of 'touts' in Northern Ireland |last=McDonald |first=Henry |date=2000-10-28 |access-date=2018-02-01 |language=en}}{{Cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/4877704.stm |title=The murky world of informers |date=2006-04-04 |work=BBC News |access-date=2018-02-02 |language=en-GB}}
• trickPrison ministry: hope behind the wall by Dennis W. Pierce – 2006
• turncoat
• weasel
• X9 - A slang term in Brazil, possibly inspired by the comic strip Secret Agent X-9.{{cite web|url=https://super.abril.com.br/coluna/oraculo/de-onde-surgiu-o-termo-x-9|language=pt|title=De onde surgiu o termo X-9?|publisher=Super Interessante Magazine|date=21 December 2016|access-date=11 August 2023}}

The term "stool pigeon" originates from the antiquated practice of tying a passenger pigeon to a stool. The bird would flap its wings in a futile attempt to escape. The sound of the wings flapping would attract other pigeons to the stool where a large number of birds could be easily killed or captured.{{cite book |last=Fuller |first=E. |author-link=Errol Fuller |title=The Passenger Pigeon |publisher=Princeton University Press |year=2014 |location=Princeton and Oxford |isbn=978-0-691-16295-9 |pages=72–88}}

• Tim Allen, actor, who was arrested with cocaine and provided the names of other dealers in exchange for a sentence of three to seven years rather than a possible life imprisonment
• Nicky Barnes, head of The Council, which he would later testify against
• Whitey Bulger, Boston Irish mob boss
• Nicholas Calabrese, a made man who testified against the Chicago Outfit
• James Carey, Irish terrorist
• Stephen Flemmi, Whitey Bulger's partner-in-crime
• Flores twins Pedro and Margarito
• Nicola Gobbo, former Australian barrister who provided information on her own clients{{Cite web |date=2020-09-04 |title=Lawyer X: how Victoria police got it 'profoundly wrong' with informant Nicola Gobbo |url=http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/sep/05/lawyer-x-how-victoria-police-got-it-profoundly-wrong-with-informant-nicola-gobbo |access-date=2022-08-27 |website=the Guardian |language=en}}
• Sammy Gravano, former underboss of the Gambino crime family
• Daniel Hernandez a.k.a. Tekashi 6ix9ine, American rapper, who testified against Nine Trey Gangsters
• Henry Hill, Lucchese crime family associate
• Frank Lucas, New York City drug dealer turned informant
• Joseph Massino, the first boss of one of the Five Families in New York City to turn state's evidence
• George Orwell, author of Orwell's list{{Cite magazine|url=http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2003/09/25/orwells-list/|title=Orwell's List|work = The New York Review of Books|date=September 25, 2003|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160305071504/http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2003/09/25/orwells-list/|archive-date=2016-03-05 |last1=Ash |first1=Timothy Garton }}
• Abe Reles, Murder, Inc. hit man
• Freddie Scappaticci, member of the Provisional IRA
• Joseph Valachi, soldier of the Genovese crime family
• Salvatore Vitale, former underboss of the Bonanno crime family
• Richard Wershe Jr. (commonly known as "White Boy Rick"), the youngest FBI informant ever at age 14

A system of informants existed in the Russian Empire and was later adopted by the Soviet Union. In Russia, such people were known as osvedomitel or donoschik, and secretly cooperated with law enforcement agencies, such as the secret-police force Okhrana and later the Soviet militsiya or KGB. Officially, those informants were referred to as "secret coworker" ({{langx|ru|секретный сотрудник}}, sekretny sotrudnik) and often were referred by the Russian-derived portmanteau seksot. In some KGB documents has also been used the designation "source of operational information" ({{langx|ru|источник оперативной информации}}, istochnik operativnoi informatsii).[http://www.yale.edu/annals/sakharov/documents_frames/Sakharov_008.htm Andropov to the Central Committee. The Demonstration in Red Square Against the Warsaw Pact Invasion of Czechoslovakia. September 20, 1968] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071012132901/http://yale.edu/annals/sakharov/documents_frames/Sakharov_008.htm |date=2007-10-12 }}

{{Main|Unofficial collaborator}}

{{Main|pl:Tajny współpracownik}}

{{Main|Snitch Law|:es:Patriota cooperante}}

{{commons category|Informants}}

• Agent provocateur
• Aguilar–Spinelli test
• Counter-terrorism
• Covert interrogation
• Denunciation
• Espionage
• Hollywood blacklist
• Pentiti
• Plea bargain
• Turn state's evidence
• United States Marshals Service
• Watergate scandal
• Whistleblower
• Witness Protection Program

{{Reflist|30em}}

{{Commons category-inline}}

• [http://www.nealirc.org/Chicago/GangSnitches.html Federal informants in Chicago gangs]

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Category:Organized crime members by role

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