Rocky Hillside

There's really no check on police power, and that breeds arrogance (probably attracts the arrogant as well). Not long ago, in a suburb of D.C., an officer pulled out from a shopping center and smashed into a car, killing the driver. The investigation found that the officer was responding to a call, but never put the lights/sirens on. The officer was not fired or even suspended.

I've been looking into what can be done, at least in Denver, a bit more. Denver has a complaint process. http://www.denvergov.org/OIM/bComplaintProcessb/ComplaintCommendationForm/tabid/391527/Default.aspx

Perhaps if more people used the process, police behavior would improve. "Discourtesy" is a frequent complaint.

I doubt, though, that police will ever consistently behave well until there is a change in who cities hire. One of my colleagues points out that families with police officers in them have very high domestic abuse rates.

I also don't know how effective a complaint process can be when the police are perceived as having enormous power and the ability to use it arbitrarily. Although one can file a complaint on behalf of another, I think I would be very reluctant to file a complaint as long as anything were pending against me. And once it were over, I suspect I would rather just put the whole thing behind me and not "poke the grizzly." If other people feel the same way, the complaint process would end up collecting only minor citizen complaints and internal complaints.