The 25 Most Despicable Cops In Movies

The corrupt cop has long been a fixture in film, thanks to the many crooked lawmen who've besmirched the badge in real life by accepting bribes, brutalizing suspects, and even committing murder. This Friday, the brotherhood of loathsome movie police gets a new member: Dave Brown (played by Woody Harrelson), an exceptionally dirty and bigoted LAPD officer whose corruption and brutality cause his world to crumble in writer-director Oren Moverman's new crime drama, Rampart. Inspired by Harrelson's breakneck portrayal of Brown's descent, we count down The 25 Most Despicable Cops In Movies.

Written by Jason Serafino (@Serafinoj1)

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As the racist detective who serves as the film’s main antagonist, Dan Hedaya’s role in The Hurricane is truly despicable as he frames black boxer Rubin "The Hurricane" Carter, played by Denzel Washington, for a triple murder he did not commit, putting him behind bars for nearly 20 years.

Because this character is based off of a real police officer, Vincent DeSimone, who served as the lead detective in the homicides, it makes Della Pesca all the more disgusting to watch as he abuses his authority and pushes through a conviction. Fortunately, Hedaya’s character, which has it out for Carter since childhood, was apparently highly fictionalized, and the real DeSimone wasn’t nearly as bad.

In Unforgiven, Hackman's incredibly violent sheriff character, Little Bill Daggett, lets two cowboys off with minimal punishment after they carve up a prostitute's face but then deals harshly with hired guns looking to collect on a bounty the hookers put on the attackers' heads.

In two separate incidents, Little Bill nearly beats the life out of gunfighters English Bob (Richard Harris) and William Munny (Clint Eastwood), then later tortures Munny's partner (Morgan Freeman) to death and displays his corpse as a warning to other would-be assassins. Of course, this sociopathic show makes Clint Eastwood angry, and you should never make Clint Eastwood angry.

Remy Bressant isn’t the most sadistic cop on this list, but his history of planting evidence and general deceit lands him a spot anyway. Gone Baby Gone was a great mystery movie directed by Ben Affleck and by the end, it’s proven that nothing is at it seems. But it is established that Bressant worked with drug dealers in the past to bring down other criminals. Throw in some lost cash and a kidnapped child and you have yourself for a rather filthy cop.

Policing the Texas border town of Frontera, Sheriff Charlie Wade is corrupt and a big ol' bigot. He vows to keep illegal Mexican immigrants from crossing into the U.S. by any means necessary, even going so far as to shoot a bus driver in the back for transporting them. He's not alive for long during the movie, but the specter of the hateful Wade looms large over the entire film.

In the non-linear indie gem Memento, Joe Pantoliano plays a corrupt cop who manipulates a tragic amnesiac, played by Guy Pierce, into murdering various people by convincing him that they killed his wife. Karma is a bitch, though, as Pierce's character plants clues in a fleeting moment of clarity to convince himself that Teddy snuffed out his wife and must die.

After witnessing all of his inexplicably tacky roles in movies like The Wicker Man and Season Of The Witch, it’s easy to forget that Nicolas Cage is actually a very talented actor when he puts forth effort. And while his performance in Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans might not reach the manic tones of Harvey Kietel’s original role, it’s easily one of the more corrupt cop roles we have ever seen.

Sergeant Terrence McDonagh isn’t just rough around the edges, he’s also a full-blown druggie with a prostitute for a girlfriend and a serious hatred for criminals. But despite all of his failings (and there are a lot of them) McDonagh is still viewed as a competent officer and even receives a promotion during the film, further proving that there is no justice in this world.

In Brooklyn’s Finest, Hawke plays an NYPD narcotics officer who commits murder and takes drug money from his raids so he can afford to buy a new, safer house for his pregnant wife and kids. His intentions may be good, but that doesn’t excuse Sal’s actions here. And, unfortunately, his habit winds up catching up with him in the end as he is shot to death with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar.

If his untrustworthy mustache didn’t give away Josh Brolin's sleazy nature in American Gangster then nothing would. He lies, he steals, and he offers to keep notorious drug dealer Frank Lucas out of prison for a price. His actions quickly gain the ire of Lucas, and eventually his whole operation crumbles around him. Brolin’s performance here is pure gold, even if his character isn’t the brightest bulb on the tree.

In Pride And Glory, Colin Farrell plays a corrupt cop who's heavily involved in the drug trade in New York. He torches evidence and even savagely tortures and murders one drug dealer for a rival, framing his brother-in-law for it. On the bright side, he's beaten to death by an angry mob. All's well that ends well.

Lakeview Terrace revolves around Abel Turner, a racist LAPD officer who sets his sights on a newly married interracial couple that moves into his neighborhood. The couple’s homeownership dream is shattered when Turner attempts to drive them from the area with a constant stream of harassment.

He uses every tool in his arsenal to make them move: bright floodlights, loud music, cutting insults, and he even tries to drive a wedge between the couple by hinting about an affair to the husband. This all culminates in a shocking conclusion where any subtlety to his corruption is thrown out the window and shattered by a sea of lead.

His role is brief, but Michael Madsen’s appearance in Sin City is simultaneously brilliant and disgusting as crooked cop Bob. His betrayal of his longtime partner, played by Bruce Willis, is about as bad as a cop can get as he leaves him full of lead and bleeding out on a seedy dock. Although if you take the time to look at Madsen’s resume, the long list of scoundrels he has played should have given Willis’ character a hint as to what he was up to.

How does someone as handsome as Dennis Peck become a crooked cop for the LAPD? Easily. He has dirt on all of his colleagues. He gets away with his crimes by manipulating his fellow officers and telling them that cops have each other’s backs. Meanwhile, he uses his leverage on everyone else to live a life of no consequences and plenty of luxury.

Richard Gere doesn’t often play the villain, but here he is as slimy as three-month-old cheesecake, planting evidence, smashing his partner's wife and arranging his partner's murder, attempting rape, and shooting at Internal Affairs officers.

It’s tough to think of a movie where Ray Liotta wasn’t playing some variety of scumbag, but in Narc he plays a particularly nasty character because he’s supposed to be on the side of good. Detective Henry Oak is a jaded veteran cop that has very little regard for criminals and brutalizes drug dealers.

By the end of the movie we find out that Oak is somewhat noble in his deeds, especially by helping the widow of a fallen partner; however, the way he straddles the line between peace and chaos, trying to force confessions with beatings and guns, is something that shouldn’t be overlooked.

Donlan is the ringleader of a group of crooked cops in NJ who are connected to the mob and basically rule over a whole town with an iron fist. Donlan helps fake the death of his crooked nephew, only to later attempt to murder him to keep him silent.

But because Donlan lives in a town filled with other corrupt officers, who is really going to stop him? Cue Sly Stallone as the one honest cop who brings down Donlan and his criminal empire of crooked cops. However, it’s too little too late as Donlan already gave the whole force a bad name.

He played a straight-up criminal in Stanley Kubrick’s cult-classic noir flick The Killing, but in The Godfather, Sterling Hayden was supposedly on the side of law and order. However, Hayden couldn’t get too far away from his crooked typecasting as his character, Officer McCluskey, was a cop on the take here.

After a brief physical encounter with Michael Corelone, it is assumed that no one would ever think about crossing McCluskey. But in one of the film’s most famous scenes, Michael guns McCluskey down in cold blood in a restaurant. It just goes to show that it’s never a good idea to break the jaw of the star of the film, especially when that star is a future Don.

He may be the star of Christopher Nolan’s Americanized version of Insomnia, but Al Pacino’s cop character is no hero. After planting evidence on a criminal in order to bring him up on charges, Pacino and his partner are brought to Alaska to help with a crime while Internal Affairs investigates them. He soon learns that his partner is going to fess-up to I.A. about the misdeed in order to be granted immunity.

Then, mere hours later, Pacino "accidentally" guns his partner down in cold blood during a foggy shootout with a suspected child murderer, played by Robin Williams. It’s never quite known whether or not Pacino knew what he was doing, but the subconscious mind is a powerful thing, and we don’t buy into coincidences that easily.

Racist, sexist, and homophobic cop Dave Brown's life unravels as his beatings of black and Latino suspects and murders for money finally catch up with him. He's the complete package as far as nasty individuals go. While his violence is shocking, it's not as bad as the fact that he seems to think this is the job he's paid to do.

As far as the public knows, Lou Ford is a polite, dedicated deputy sheriff who takes his job seriously and protects the community. However, he is hiding a violent streak that began when he raped a five-year-old girl when he was a kid. It continues when he begins a sadomasochistic affair with a prostitute that eventually leads him to beat her and frame her for a murder that he committed.

This isn’t just the work of a crooked cop, but that of a deranged serial killer. His actions don’t stem from greed or poverty; instead, they originate from an intense sexual and violent compulsion. It's tough to watch at points, but Casey Affleck’s performance here is simply tremendous.

What makes Crash stand out is how the movie took the cliched character of the corrupt cop and combined it with social commentary and realistic racial conflicts. Usually bad cops in movies are just criminals who extort money and brutalize criminals, but in Crash, Matt Dillon’s character, John Ryan, is just a genuinely bad dude.

One example of his racist mentality is when he wrongfully pulls over an African American couple and sexually assaults the female passenger without any real thought behind it. Ryan is both sickening and fascinating to watch in this movie as it becomes maddening to think that someone in law enforcement could commit these atrocities while wearing a badge. It becomes even worse when you realize that events like this have actually happened in the real world.

Aside from being known for one of the most complicated crane shots in the history of cinema, Touch Of Evil also features a terrific performance by Orson Welles as a corrupt cop named Hank Quinlan. As we have seen over the years, the more overweight and scraggly the cop looks, the more corrupt they are, and here Welles gives new meaning to the term “pig."

Whether he is planting evidence on suspected criminals or strangling suspects, Welles is a half-ton of terror that blatantly abuses his power and authority to accomplish whatever goals he has in mind. Welles once again proves that he is the master of cinema as this performance has withstood the test of time for over 50 years.

In Training Day, Denzel Washington plays a jaded and violent cop who, while taking a young officer under his wing, brutalizes criminals, advocates gangs using vigilante violence against each other to solve their own problems, and even murders an informant drug dealer while stealing his money.

Harris’ power trip isn’t only dangerous to himself and the criminals he catches, but also his partner and anyone else who gets in his way. And as is the story with almost every other bad cop on this list, Alonzo’s story ends in a hail of gunfire.

It’s easy to let James Cromwell’s folksy demeanor and grandfatherly nature fool you, but make no mistake about it—he plays one of the filthiest cops of them all in L.A. Confidential. As Captain Dudley Smith, Cromwell channels his inner sleazeball to play a cop that has a stranglehold on L.A.’s drug trade. He even implores young officers to employ as much violence and brutality as necessary to get things done.

What makes Cromwell so devious in this role is the fact that he’s the last person you would expect to be so evil. He keeps up his appearance in public as an undying crusader of justice, but it turns out that he’s as bad as they come—maybe worse. This is the ultimate modern take on the film noir genre, and Cromwell proves that you can’t always trust what you see.

As perhaps the most clinically insane cop on this list, Gary Oldman’s unhinged turn as Agent Norman Stansfield in Leon: The Professional is one of the most memorable roles of his career. His job as an agent of the law is nothing compared to how powerful he is in the drug trade.

Stansfield doesn’t just sell drugs, but he also gleefully guns down anyone that crosses him. Stansfield is a sophisticated killer that is simultaneously terrifying and charming. Of course that sinful smile on his face might be a byproduct of the pills he pops throughout the whole movie.

Martin Scorsese’s The Departed is a modern masterpiece in the cop drama genre. Filled with deceit and back-stabbing, this movie shows that no one truly exists in a black and white world; we’re all painted with shades of grey. And no character exhibits that more than Matt Damon's Colin Sullivan.

He may be a member of Boston’s Special Investigations Unit, but it is revealed that Damon isn’t working for law and order as he's the inside man for infamous mobster Frank Costello. His job is to tip Costello off on any police action against him and foil whatever sting operations his unit tries to pull off. With his posh apartment, beautiful girlfriend, and deceptive smile, it’s hard to watch this movie without absolutely hating Damon by the end. But that's also the sign of a great performance.

There are no moral grey areas or misunderstood anti-heroes here. Harvey Keitel’s character in Bad Lieutenant is a certified sociopath. Whether he’s smoking crack with drug dealers or taking part in a threesome while on the clock, The Lieutenant breaks every code of conduct possible for a police officer, and there doesn’t seem to be much apprehension about any of it. Instead, he goes about his business with the unrelenting focus of a shark.

This isn’t just a crooked cop, this is a seriously evil individual who only cares about his instant gratification. However, he is also a man at the end of his rope, as he finds his drug use spiraling out of control along with his growing gambling debts. He gets what he deserves in the end, but not before his badass exterior melts away and the audience is left with nothing but pity for him.