The 901: Policing is broken — some county commissioners want to...

Tonyaa Weathersbee | Memphis Commercial Appeal

So, more than half of the 25 officers on a list of criminal and tainted cops are from the Memphis Police Department — the largest law enforcement agency in Shelby County.

And that speaks to a couple of things.

First, it suggests that maybe the MPD should use its new eavesdropping technology to spy on itself and not activists; to focus on those wearing badges, not waving picket signs.

But what it also says is that the War on Drugs continues to fail communities like Memphis — because the MPD officers who committed the most heinous crimes apparently decided to not to fight the "war," but to reap the spoils.

Here's what happened.

According to a report by my Commercial Appeal colleague, Daniel Connolly, 13 of the 25 officers on the Brady List, or the Giglio List, are from the MPD. That list includes officers who have been either charged with crimes, accused of lying or breaking departmental rules, and who either worked for, or still work for, the MPD.

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At the top of that list is Lt. Eric Kelly, a former MPD homicide investigator, who is accused of having a sexual relationship with a murder suspect he was investigating.

Kelly has since left the force — even sealing his departure with a smug sign off “It’s been a blast.”

Sadly, any justice for the families of the murder victims whose cases he was looking into has probably left the building too.

But according to other news reports, the woman who Kelly was involved with is apparently a high-ranking member of the Gangster Disciples — a gang that is known for trafficking in drugs and weapons.

Then there’s Sam Blue, a longtime MPD officer, who provided information and police equipment to criminals who were robbing drug dealers.

One man was kidnapped and tortured because he wouldn’t say where he’d stashed money and drugs. Blue has since pleaded guilty to these crimes and is now facing life in prison.

Undercover officers did catch Terrion Bryson and Kevin Coleman as they tried to help transport 2.5 kilograms of heroin to a storage facility in Memphis. Coleman also robbed an undercover officer who he thought was a drug dealer.

Those former MPD officers are sitting in federal prison now.

But along with Blue, the MPD didn’t catch Jeffrey Jones, an MPD lieutenant indicted on charges of raping a 15-year-old girl, Bradley Henthorne, an MPD officer criminally charged with attempted rape and sexual battery, and MPD officers Carrous Davis and Leo Whitmore, who are accused of making fraudulent arrests to pad their statistical reports.

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Nonetheless, the crimes of Blue, Bryson and Coleman reflect how most police corruption is tied to officers either conspiring with drug gangs or robbing or extorting those who are involved in selling drugs, said Diane Goldstein, chairman of the board of Law Enforcement Action Partnership.

The national organization is made up of retired and current law enforcement officials who, among other things, want to reform drug policies.

“When you look at the drug war and the obscene level of profit it creates, it’s [corruption] now crossed over into every level of law enforcement,” Goldstein said.

“This kind of corruption has caused some police officers to adopt a Machiavellian attitude…they begin to victimize people who are living on the margins, people who generally won’t walk into a police station and report them…”

She’s right.

Gang violence has reached epidemic proportions in Memphis, which means that the money and drugs that come along with it make this city fertile ground for police to succumb to such temptations.

Officers working in communities that are overrun by drugs and gangs sometimes adopt the attitude that robbing a drug dealer is no big deal, since they are criminals anyway, or that assisting drug dealers is no big deal because people are going to use drugs regardless.

Said Goldstein: “When we emphasize drug law enforcement but we have this kind of corruption, it makes communities less safe. Why would people report crimes to the police when they can’t trust them on a basic level?”

The other thing it reflects is how the MPD has its work cut out for it when it comes to restoring that trust.

While it foments mistrust when MPD officials won’t say whether they plan to use the department’s new cell phone cracking technology to rummage through the phones of private citizens who haven’t committed any crimes, that mistrust is intensified by the drug war.

It's a war that leads some officers to help the forces they're supposed to be fighting, and to abandon the citizens they're supposed to be protecting.

No doubt, every law enforcement department has its problems. And 13 MPD officers who have either committed crimes or questionable acts doesn't mean that all of its more than 2,000 officers are corrupt, or prone to corruption.

But this city is one where people really should be able to trust the police.

That can’t happen if too many are afraid to do that.

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