Police Misconduct and DUIs : Dispatches from the Culture Wars

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Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of Michigan Citizens for Science and co-founder of The Panda's Thumb. He has written for such publications as The Bard, Skeptic and Reports of the National Center for Science Education, spoken in front of many organizations and conferences, and appeared on nationally syndicated radio shows and on C-SPAN. Ed is also a Fellow with the Center for Independent Media and the host of Declaring Independence, a one hour weekly political talk show on WPRR in Grand Rapids, Michigan.(static)

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Police Misconduct and DUIs

Posted on: September 4, 2007 9:23 AM, by Ed Brayton

The Seattle paper has an astonishing series about police officers caught driving drunk and getting off light, often times just being let go by their fellow officers. Not astonishing in the sense of surprising, but some of the stories are so incredibly blatant, including cops showing up for work drunk, having driven to the station, and having virtually nothing done to them.

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For a new cop, there is official probation and unofficial probation, the latter of which takes years to complete, and it comes at unexpected times, when you are expected to do the right thing, proving your loyalty to your brothers in arms.

If a windfall comes up -- drugs or money -- you're expected to take your share. If a brother officer has a moment of rage and shoots somebody dead, you're expected to cover for him. If a bunch of cops have guns pointed at somebody and one of the guns goes off, then since an accidental discharge could ruin a career, everybody must empty their guns into somebody to prove they had no choice but to shoot.

The 'thin blue line' is an armed mob held together by mutual blackmail, and it's always been that way.

Now, knowing that your brother cops will kill you if you rat them out, if you were a cop would you rat out a cop?

Posted by: Crikey | September 4, 2007 12:08 PM

BTW, 'misconduct' is a euphemism for crime. Please don't encourage the news media to keep being mealymouthed.

Posted by: Crikey (again) | September 4, 2007 12:12 PM

As a former bartender and waiter in Seattle, I can admit to seeing some hammered off duty cops climb into cars and take off. My general fear of these heros/authority figures kept me from doing anything. Their behavior seemed to be accepted at the time. Purely anecdotal, though it may be.

Posted by: Phil | September 4, 2007 1:52 PM

My buddy from Chicago said he was going back to a place where the government actually worked for the people.

The best historian we ever had was a guy by the name of Bill Speidel who wrote a great book called Sons of the Profits about the founding of Seattle. The name says it all.

Posted by: Michael E | September 4, 2007 5:32 PM

Crikey: "...if you were a cop would you rat out a cop?"

Yet they complain about the "Stop snitchin'" ethos which makes crime-fighting more difficult.

Posted by: Grumpy | September 4, 2007 11:03 PM

Clearly what is needed is the application of the Pink Hello Kitty Armband of Shame

Posted by: Daniel Kim | September 6, 2007 4:23 AM