Maybe Reed did it. Maybe Fennel did it. I’ve just thought there was something entirely fishy about the whole thing since it happened, and I hope maybe we will find out the truth of the matter, because I don’t think we have yet.

To other readers, take the previous commenter’s words with grains of salt. I have read the exact same comment at several other web sites the last few days making the exact same claims, and I have to assume they are all by the same person or group of people … and they seem to be talking out of their asses. Saying something over and over doesn’t make it true.

I grew up around good cops. My uncle was a cop, and a great one. People loved him. The cops in my small hometown, aside from knowing my dad a little too well and thus ratting on me all the time, were great guys. Even the state troopers we had to deal with out in the countryside weren’t unfair, though they did have that mirrored sunglasses state trooper cockiness, but always fair. No one got beat up. Hardly anyone got arrested unless they absolutely had to be arrested. Life was good, and I grew up thinking cops were all great guys. Then I grew up and entered the real world.

I haven’t liked the cops here in Austin since I moved here. At best they have shown themselves to be incompetent and incapable, and at worst, they are criminals with badges letting them do what they want to do with no repercussions. I avoid them like the plague. I’d rather stand behind a line of pimps, ho’s and drug dealers while buying my energy drink at the Texaco than be anywhere there is a gathering of police officers. I’ve just had and witnessed one too many bad cops in action to trust any of them.

We have a new police chief, and I like him. He seems to be trying his best to make the APD a respectable bunch who serve and protect rather than boss and bully. We’ll see if he succeeds or not.

I’ve been getting sick of reading about all the bad cops out there in the news every day. I can’t even post all the stories I run across that make my head explode. It would be too depressing. Unfortunately, I agree with you, I only see it becoming a bigger problem. Too bad it’s another one of those things most people don’t care enough about.

My take is that every informed person in Texas, in and out of law enforcement, knows exactly what happened; the question is one of resolution. And, as always, the responsible jurisdiction is looking down the road estimating the cost of an out-of-court wrongful death settlement, for which it may be found in some measure responsible, since it may be shown to have had reason to know he posed a threat to others and did not act.

The problem of bad cops is only going to worsen because there are no longer enough good people going into the business and departments are going to try to meet staffing by hiring probationary types let go elsewhere for dysfunctions, mostly sadism. It’s happening all over.