The Department of Justice report has left this city administration and its predecessors with a no-win situation. If they take the position that they were unaware of these police activities that targeted our black residents, then they can be accused of severely lacking any oversight into police department practices or ignoring complaints from the public. If they take the position that they were aware and did nothing they can be accused of malfeasance. It is inconceivable that these types of complaints did not reach the mayor's office ("O'Malley's tainted legacy," Aug. 14).
We seem to deal with corrective action, in instances like this, by throwing money at it. And I guess this situation will also cost taxpayers. Can't the police department conduct a series of in-house training sessions in conjunction with police officials and law professors versed in criminal law to establish guidelines that police need to follow when considering an arrest? Undoubtedly, our police face a daunting task day-after-day confronting street gangs and gun toting druggies and wondering,"Is this the day they tell my wife and kids that I won't be coming home?"
We talk about zero tolerance for crime, why not zero tolerance for arrests that violate the police guidelines, with penalties to follow? Do we sometimes make solutions as complex as the situations that created them?
Sidney M. Levy, Baltimore