In a letter to the editor (6-9), Mr. Lawrence Smith of U.P. vented his frustration at police officers for, among other complaints, our move towards military-style uniforms. His letter drew several online responses both for and against his viewpoint.

This may seem like a small matter in a world that is daily filled with momentous events, but it actually reminded me of a quote from one of the most famous protagonists in American literature, Atticus Finch.

In case you’ve forgotten, Finch was the stoic and principled lawyer in Harper Lee’s classic, “To Kill A Mockingbird”, in which he told his daughter, Scout,”You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”

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Friday’s Trib (6-3) contained a letter to the editor in defense of Tacoma Police Chief Don Ramsdell. I knew the author, Mike Hanagan, as an articulate and outspoken officer and co-worker in the ’90s, before he earned his law degree and moved into a new career. At the risk of re-stirring the pot, his remarks about the controversial events surrounding Zina Linnik’s homicide raise a corollary topic worthy of discussion.

To paraphrase, Mike states that the information withheld from the public–the delay in initiating an Amber Alert already mentioned ad nauseum–was never for public consumption. He argues that internal police issues are best handled outside the public forum, a rationale consistent with Chief Ramsdell’s actions following the July 2007 incident.

Maybe he’s right, but this is not about handling internal issues. Rather, it is about a department’s choice of the substance and amount of truth it willingly discloses to the public.

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