You might be surprised to know that the Police Union have him in their sights due to a recent discipline action taken by the Chief against the officer that shot a mentally challenged homeless man, in a park, for trying to assault him. Don't know all the details but I am hearing very valid arguments from both sides.
Therein lies another problem. Back to the "Us and Them," perception discussed earlier. We are not the Taliban. They are not Seal Team 6. They instinctively "circle the wagons," when one of their own is on the carpet. Right or wrong. I understand why. They are, after all, a union. Their obligation is to the employee and not the management. But it would seem to me that a collective unit of good cops, as I believe them most to be, would work harder than anyone to rid the bad cops from their ranks. And I'm sure there's a unit for that as well. The public perception is that the line of the law goes from the Meter Maid, through the street cop, to the department heads, through the district's prosecution's office all the way to the bench. It's hard to trust that, this connected stream of professionals, or any stream of professionals for that matter, who instinctively "circle the wagons," could fairly approach such sensitive matters, concerning justice against their own connected stream, from the ground up, could render any punitive actions with any balance of fairness.
As mentioned earlier, it is automatically assumed that a police officer's word is always considered to be above your's or mine.
We need to work on this "Us and Them" perception. It's going to take equal effort from "us," and "them," to even hope that would work.
