Assignment: Cooper's Ethical Decision-Making Model

Cooper’s Ethical Decision Model
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Cooper’s Ethical Decision Model
As public administrators, one is constantly faced with difficult decisions. This is relative to the fact that most of the decisions that one has to make are faced with ethical standards and the need to uphold the work relations and complexities that come with the various needs of the people that they are serving (Pillay & Dorasamy, 2011). In this case, it was the guards Richard Caruso and Steve Rigg, who worked at the Corcoran State Prison and witnessed brutality and even death of the inmates at the hands of the correction officers. Using the Cooper’s ethical decision-making model, there are a number of elements that come out with reference to handling the ethical dilemma in the case.
As Cooper’s Ethical Decision Model indicates, the first stage of unearthing and resolving an ethical dilemma is getting to know what the ethical problems are in the first place (Bradley, 2018). This also requires defining of the problem by breaking it down to elevate the issues and establish the connections. Working at the correction facility, Richard and Riggs witnessed what can be regarded as unethical treatment of the inmates. This is especially the case where the officers were taking advantage of the racial tension. They would use the hate between the different races to spur fights between the rival gangs, in this case between the African Americans and the Hispanics (Dryburgh, 2009). Prisoners from the rival gangs would be released into the recreational yards strategically at the same time, in expectation that a fight would ensue. This is unethical as the correction officers are supposed to be stopping and avoiding such altercations. What is more is that, the officers were seen to bet on the fights which were staged regularly in the yard (Dryburgh, 2009). To control the fights, the officers would also unethically shoot live bullets in the yard towards the fighting inmates. This is against the general practices and breaks the rules of engagement, which require that officers can only result to live ammunition after they have used the wooden blocks and the inmates have not heeded (Dryburgh, 2009). There was also the case of falsifying the case reports and even the press conferences regarding why the inmates were dead.
Cooper model further suggests that it is important to evaluate the courses of action and their consequences (Bradley, 2018). Given the ethical issues established in the case, there are two main cause of actions; Richard and Riggs could have turned inwards and raised concern with the Department of Corrections. This would have meant notifying the authorities at the prison of the events that were taking place, relative to ethical violations. The other option that they had was to seek assistance outside of the system. This would involve another agency that is neutral to the situation at the correction facility but with the mandate and resources to investigate the situation.
As responsible public administrators, t...