Lincoln’s Cops Are Number One! ... In a Bad Way

By: Mr. Wilson on July 26, 2010
Lincoln doesn't look good in the latest police misconduct rates published by Injustice Everywhere. Lincoln has the highest misconduct rate among cities with 100 to 499 police officers. That makes LPD look pretty bad, right? Except ... what kind of misconduct are we talking about here? Beatings? Theft? Bribery? No, nothing quite that serious, though it did involve about 9% of LPD's officers. I'm glad Injustice Everywhere is tracking police misconduct, but I have a hard time putting much stock in a report that treats watching movies the same as, say, murder.

Comments

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David Packman
July 26, 2010 at 5:19PM

Thank you for pointing out a bit of an error in the statistics.

I actually had the same concerns about that report and had revised the count down to 5 from 28 for that entry in our database. (5 supervisory officers were disciplined along with 23 other officers and this appeared to be more of a supervisory failure than anything.)

However, while I did revise that case down for our primary statistics, I neglected to make the change to our localized statistical database used to generate the local agency data.

After you pointed it out I made the corresponding change and have updated the rankings. If it’s any better, Lincoln is now ranked 72nd. The report pages have also been updated.

Next time, though, please do feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns you might have about our statistical data, we do try to be fair about it and I always welcome critical reviews of our information!

Thanks!

Mr. Wilson
July 26, 2010 at 5:38PM

Well dang, I certainly wasn’t expecting a response from Injustice Everwyhere. I naively lumped this report in with all of those other reports floating around out there that purport to rank communities by some arbitrary statistic. (You know the ones: “Top 10 Cities for People Who Like the Color Red!”) I erred, and I apologize for that.

Thank you for following up on this. Not because it makes Lincoln look better, but because it demonstrates that good people are working hard to make your website useful and accurate. As a supporter of your cause, that’s extremely important to me. I just rattled your tip jar. Hopefully it helps.

David Packman
July 26, 2010 at 7:16PM

Mr. Wilson,

Thank you for the help, and very much for helping us make sure that the data we present is honest and accurate. We take this project seriously and hope that people reading it do to. So we very well can’t have that expectation if the data we present isn’t accurate and trustworthy as well.

I still have to check our reporting maps, but the rankings have been fixed.

Thanks again!

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