Some people may relish the idea of turning the tables on police officers, especially after getting cited for traffic or parking violations. But some of them have taken it a little too far, filing petty complaints to the Office of Professional Accountability (OPA) for “coercive horn-honking” to, apparently, aggressive mustaches.
OPA independently investigates cases of police misconduct. Based on the 762 complaints OPA already received by June 1, the Seattle Police Department (SPD) expects to receive more than 1,500 complaints this year, as Seattle Police Officers’ Guild president Ron Smith told KING-5 TV; SPD received 893 grievances for 2014.
But only 20 percent of those — still a very high percentage — result in a full misconduct investigation, according to OPA director Pierce Murphy; the rest are sent to SPD supervisors to handle.
To distinguish between legitimate misconduct grievances and minor quibbles is a wasteful misuse of the office’s resources. They could be employed to look into claims of biased policing, harassment and excessive use of force by police officers, along with the policy issues as mandated by the U.S. Department of Justice.
SPD’s tarnished reputation has led to the public’s general mistrust of all police officers. Now, every misstep — no matter how big or small — by an officer is being recorded on cell phones and reported to OPA.
But before reporting them, the public needs to consider whether we’d like OPA to concentrate on reports of excessive use of force or focus on an officer’s mean-looking facial hair. Taxpayers pay for and demand the former.