See blue wall of silence in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
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"etymology_text": "In reference to blue police uniforms.",
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"ref": "1985 June 25, Sydney H. Schanberg, “New York: The Concrete Wall of Silence”, in New York Times, retrieved 2012-08-12:",
"text": "We've all heard of the Blue Wall of Silence, the code under which cops stay mum about rogue cops who poison the barrel.",
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"ref": "1999 May 25, Frank Pellegrini, “Too Despicable for the Blue Wall of Silence”, in Time:",
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"ref": "2008 July 15, Brandt Williams, Elizabeth Stawicki, “Minneapolis cop indicted on corruption charges”, in Minnesota Public Radio, retrieved 2012-08-12:",
"text": "The indictment of officer Michael Roberts also highlights another color barrier that can complicate matters of police discipline—that's the so-called blue wall of silence. Former Minneapolis police officer Mike Quinn says that wall is what keeps some cops from turning in their fellow cops.",
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"ref": "2009 June 6, Donald Winkfield, “Manhattan DA’s Keystone Verdict”, in Black Star News, retrieved 2012-08-12:",
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"(idiomatic) Strict secretiveness maintained by the members of a police force with respect to information which might be contrary to their interests, especially information concerning questionable police actions."
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"synonyms": [
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Download raw JSONL data for blue wall of silence meaning in English (3.3kB)
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-04-10 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-04-03 using wiktextract (74c5344 and fb63907). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
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