That's a really good point!

An area journalist made a really good point today about the stark hypocrisy of two local officials who had harsh words about the miscarriage of justice in Ferguson:

"I am perplexed and astounded that in this case, the prosecutor certainly took as long as he wanted to explain everything (and) I did not hear any explanation, or more importantly a justification, for why that young man was shot," [Mayor Michael Nutter] said, according to the Associated Press.

It was a remarkable sentiment coming from a mayor who has shown little interest — arguably none — in substantive reforms to his own city's criminal-justice system.

Nutter has opposed efforts to increase the funding and stature of the city's hard-working but mostly toothless Police Advisory Commission — this despite rampant excessive use of force and corruption as exemplified by the recent federal indictment of six narcotics officers for running a violent six-year-long robbery operation out of the police department. Many officers accused of simply beating, punching or stomping on civilians, however, are not prosecuted or substantively disciplined. Yet, Nutter's spokesperson once told me that the Mayor "believes that the current institutional arrangement works."

Ditto for DA Seth Williams, who also voiced outrage:

This D.A., however, has little empathy for the victims of his own misbegotten initiatives, including a nationally notorious civil-asset forfeiture program that seizes cash and even homes from people who have not even been convicted of a crime; the same D.A., last year, did his best to keep Eugene Gilyard and Lance Felder, two Black men from North Philadelphia, imprisoned for life for a murder it became clear they did not commit. Williams has, in fact, fought most any effort by the Pennsylvania Innocence Project to exonerate the wrongfully convicted.

The bad news about what happened in Ferguson last night...is what happened in Ferguson last night. The good news is that there are many opportunities to improve justice, probably in your own community. In Philadelphia, for example, levels of police brutality and corruption and poor prosecutorial decisions are far too high -- but the remedies such as real civilian oversight, body or dashboard cams and ending unfair programs like civil-asset forfeiture are all causes worth fighting for.