Taiwan saw a group of police cockroaches when the media reported that police officers, either incumbent or retired, regularly had tea and played mahjong at a gangster's hangout in Taichung City where the underworld kingpin was slaughtered in a gangland killing in May. The cockroaches were definitely not the last of their kind in Taiwan after nine police officers in Taipei City were prosecuted in June on charges of helping gangsters find sites to set up gambling dens and providing tips for exacting repayments of debts. Before weeding out criminal organizations around the country, the National Police Agency should probably first eradicate the filth in its own ranks. One of the Taichung policemen caught at the hangout is even a recipient of the police's most prestigious Jin Wu Award. The prosecuted Taipei police, meanwhile, had become bodyguards of the underworld, instead of serving the public. The regrettable incidents are only the tip of the iceberg and show the depth to which ethics in the police have sunk. The slack discipline also reflects corruption in the government that is a result of blurred distinction between right and wrong. The top strategy of straightening out the corrupt government and police should be to rebuild public functionaries' ethics. 