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.1
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.2345
References
References
- Delmas-Marty, Mireille; J. R. Spencer (2002) [1995]. "European Criminal Procedures (pdf)" (PDF). Presses Universitaires de France / Cambridge University Press. Retrieved 5 July 2008.
- Benson, Bruce (1998). To Serve and Protect: Privatization and Community in Criminal Justice. New York University Press. ISBN 0-8147-1327-0.
- Rawlings, Philip; Tim Newburn; Les Johnston; Frank Leishman (2002). Policing: A Short History. Willan Publishing. ISBN 1-903240-26-3.
- McLynn, Frank (1989). Crime and punishment in eighteenth-century England. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-01014-4.
- Langbein, John H. (2003). The Origins of Adversary Criminal Trial. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-925888-0.
Further reading
Further reading
- Hitchcock, Tim and Robert Shoemaker. London Lives. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
- Ward, Richard M. Print Culture, Crime and Justice in 18th-Century London History of Crime, Deviance and Punishment. London, UK: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2014.