Left I on the News

Reporting on the indictment of four New Orleans cops for the brutal killing of two unarmed men in the aftermath of Katrina, and the guilty pleas on lesser charges of five others who helped cover up the crime, AP writes:

Prosecutors say officers fabricated witness statements, falsified reports and planted a gun in an attempt to make it appear the shootings were justified. It was a shocking example of the violence and confusion that followed the deadly hurricane.

No, AP, cops fabricating statements, falsifying reports, and planting guns has nothing to do with "violence and confusion" following Katrina. What it is is a not-so-shocking, but all-too-rare public recognition of practices which are endemic to police departments all over the country. And, just as with the recent rare conviction (on very much lesser charges than warranted) of a cop in the shooting death of Oscar Grant in Oakland, only the most remarkable circumstances (multiple cell-phone videos of the event in that case) ever lead to the open acknowledgment of police crimes, much less any punishment for them.