officers - The Black Vault

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randomly brought together, either pum-· ·
meled King or watched without interfer.;
ing. ·Other officers, 'discovered with equal ·
randomness througlt computer and ·radio
transcripts, ·made easy racial slurs and
corisidereO. th~':beating. humorous;:Such. a.~
rampant lack of discipline'and cofupassio'rr;-·
such widespread decay, can only exist with
the license of force commanders .
. Gates sits at the .. top of the department's I
food. cham;. he sets:-the rules for· sumva1
below. And what are those rules? That
blacks are Ydifferent,'' that Latinos are
· lazy; that immigrant
Jews !)light be Soviet
· ·spies and t}lat a furious ·
beating can be corrective,
remedi!i},:··reli~1Jjlitative;
tel hop~ ·he~(King)'getS'hiS
life. straig4tened .. out,~'
Gates said earlier this
week. uPerhaps t~ wili
be. the vehicle to move
him dowri the road to a
·;>.-> good life instead of the
life he's been involved in for such a: long ·
.time." In other words, King a beneficiary;
his attackers· are ·angels. of tough-love,
Apparently, Gates' rules includ~ self-delusion
and arrogance, too.
Gates cannot be personally responsible
for every bad cop on his force. He is, however,
personally responsible for the vicious
patterns of behavior that-the King episode
has uncovered. And he has, finally, a per·
sonal responsibility to do what he can to
restore honor to his· department and credit
t9 hi~ leadership. That m.eans .he must
resign before he is; in a bruising campaign ··.
that has already begun, forced out..
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