Punishment of North American arrested by coppers (7)
I believe the answer is:
penance
'punishment' is the definition.
(penance is a kind of punishment)
'north american arrested by coppers' is the wordplay.
'north american' becomes 'na'.
'arrested by' means one lot of letters goes inside another (I've seen this in other clues).
'coppers' becomes 'pence' (I've seen this before).
'na' inserted inside 'pence' is 'PENANCE'.
'of' is the link.
(Other definitions for penance that I've seen before include "Punishment for religious wrongdoing" , "Act performed in sorrow for sin" , "sackcloth and ashes?" , "Mortification" , "sacrament" .)