The ongoing, heartbreaking saga of Detective Luther Hall underscores one of the most serious problems confronting the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department: whether its own officers can be trusted to tell the truth and to uphold the law regardless of who breaks it. Hall was beaten and maimed by his own colleagues while working undercover in 2017. His efforts to hold his attackers accountable have run into the infamous blue wall of silence — the unspoken code among officers never to turn on their own.

Hall, who is Black, has tried for 4 1/2 years to get justice, but he's so discouraged that he's considering leaving St. Louis altogether as his city affirms its national reputation as hopelessly corrupt and unredeemable. If a Black officer cannot even get justice when there were dozens of fellow officers who witnessed his beating, how can average citizens ever trust this department to protect and uphold their rights?

Police Chief John Hayden's silence on this issue speaks volumes. Whatever his legacy might be upon retirement, he will nevertheless be remembered as just another brick in that impenetrable blue wall. The police union likewise sheepishly avoids acknowledging the obvious abuse of power by the officers involved and those around them who witnessed the abuses.

Dozens of riot officers were present on Sept. 17, 2017, when protesters marched through streets of downtown to protest police brutality and unaccountability after an officer's acquittal in the shooting death of a suspect under highly questionable circumstances. Some protesters got violent and destroyed property. They deserved to be singled out and arrested. The police department infiltrated the protesters with two undercover officers, one of whom was Hall, who used his phone to record law-breaking protesters and transmit the video back to the department. It turned out that no one on the other end was paying any attention.

Riot officers declared a curfew and used a technique to corral protesters, onlookers and a journalist. Hall, caught in the police trap, was pushed to the ground, restrained and beaten. Officers bashed his face against the pavement. One smashed his phone, thus destroying the evidence of the officers' abuse. Of five officers charged in Hall's case, only one was sentenced to serious prison time.

Hall's injuries will be with him forever — a lifetime sentence for having served selflessly. Racist texts by fellow officers have only added to the sting. No wonder he has lost hope in this city.

A year ago, Hayden pledged an internal investigation accompanied by a tepid statement calling for accountability. The public still awaits.

Until police commanders find a way to dismantle the blue wall and instill a new code among officers — that the law reigns supreme and must apply equally to officers as well as civilians — then the police department can never hope to gain the trust and cooperation of the St. Louisans it purports to serve.

REPRINTED FROM ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH

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