Nicked criminal freed after leaders of police ignored laws (8)
I believe the answer is:
pilfered
'nicked' is the definition.
(both can mean stolen)
'criminal freed after leaders of police ignored laws' is the wordplay.
'criminal' indicates anagramming the letters.
'after' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'leaders of' suggests taking the first letters.
The initial letters of 'police ignored laws' is 'pil'.
'freed' is an anagram of 'fered'.
'fered' put after 'pil' is 'PILFERED'.
(Other definitions for pilfered that I've seen before include "taken" , "Filched" , "Stole in small amounts" .)