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bilgerat57 wrote:Don't misunderstand me, I'm not concerned about this cop. I believe he needs to spend a little time behind bars. My concern is that bad guys will be released for no other reason than the fact that this cop "screwed up" on this one incident. Not to mention the added expense of new trials granted because this one officer was discredited. I'm quite sure there will be at least one defense attorney who will use this incident to try to discredit the entire agency so his client can walk out the door. I would be willing to bet that the DA's office has already reviewed the cases this officer was involved with, to determine which ones would have to be re-fought and which ones were lost causes. I would also expect that the FBI has also considered the possibilty of a civil rights violation investigation. This is one giant sized can of worms.........

bilgerat57 wrote:The most unfortunate aspect of this incident has yet to occur. I cannot imagine that an internal affairs investigation will do anything but call for the dismissal of the one officer, and will most likely recommend criminal prosecution of some sort. Shortly thereafter, the defense attorneys attached to any case this officer is involved with are going to go into a feeding frenzy. The actual merits of any case he has touched will become irrelevant. His "taint" will attach itself to everything regardless of the degree of his involvement. Traffic stops, felony arrests, all of it stands to be thrown out of court because of this incident. This glue trap of a situation is going to get extremely messy.......and the citizens of the community are going to be the real losers.