It was a really dumb thing for the officers to do. I hate the thought of crimes going unpunished, but this tainted each case with the possibility the officers were prejudiced by their silly game and wanting to mark a spot off. Maybe if a case could be successfully prosecuted entirely without any involvement or reference to the officers’ testimony or actions it could proceed, but otherwise they botched this up big time.
I don’t hate the thought of a crime going unpunished at all. In the scheme of things, punishing one particular crime isn’t nearly as important as having the state respect our rights to the letter.
Or it added to good police work by incentivizing doing a thorough job.