Coral Gables police culture

Reading the Sept. 6 article Turmoil swirls among police, about divisions within the Coral Gables Police Department, confirmed my suspicions that one of the core causes of bad police behavior is their childish, ego-driven philosophy of things having to be black or white, good or bad, and the related “Us vs. Them” mentality they seem to have toward the public they are supposed to serve.

While what’s needed is a revolution in police culture, what could more easily solve the divisions within the Gables police department is to fire both of the top cops causing the divisions and their next-in-charge, replacing them with consensus-building outsiders.

Still, after reading Fred Grimm’s column Firing kid at Arby’s easier than bad cop, I began to lose hope that the drastic changes we need in police forces around the country will ever be permitted by self-serving police unions.

This story was originally published September 8, 2015 at 5:19 PM with the headline "Coral Gables police culture."