state, usually the emperor of the dynasty. The prefects oversaw the civil administration of their "prefecture", or jurisdiction. Prefects usually reported to the local magistrate, just as modern police report to judges. Under each prefect were "subprefects" who helped collectively with law enforcement of the area. Some prefects were responsible for handling investigations, much like modern police detectives. Eventually the concept of the "prefecture system" would spread to other cultures such as Korea and Japan. Law enforcement in Ancient China was also relatively progressive, allowing for female prefects. Some examples of ancient Chinese prefects include: Chong Fu, prefect of the Ying District in the East Han Dynasty, and Ching Chow, prefect of the modern Shang-tung Province. An example of a female prefect would be Lady Qu of Wuding (serving 1531 – c. 1557). In ancient China, when minor judicial incidents such as robberies occur, the client reports to a police officer (a.k.a. constable) at the prefectural office. To catch a thief, a constable can arrest another thief by baiting him with a forged opportunity and use the thief's same-field knowledge to predict the one in question. The assisting thief would still be punished for robbery but since he assisted the officer his punishment would be lowered. By Ming law, police officers have a strict time schedule to arrest the criminals. They usually have thirty days to arrest the issued criminals. If officers have not capture their assigned criminals after thirty days or assigned deadline, they would subject to physical punishments. Successfully arresting criminals earns police officers promotions. However, this method was often subject to abuse in order to quickly earn promotions. Police officers were appointed by the head officials from the populations. These selected officers, however, were not recognized as part of the magistrates for they were merely runners. Approximately one out of four court cases featured corrupted officers who accepted bribes to ignore certain crimes, or sometimes even assisted the criminals. Officers often focused on building a social network which might include criminals instead of making examples by preventing crimes. Songhai Empire Pre-modern Europe For the most part, crime was viewed as a private matter in Ancient Greece and Rome. Even with offenses as serious as murder, justice was the prerogative of the victim's family and private war or vendetta the means of protection against criminality. Publicly owned slaves were used by magistrates as police in Ancient Greece. In