"Scotland's second-biggest police force failed to follow up properly a "significant" number of complaints against its officers, including accusations of criminal behaviour, instead filing them as "miscellaneous inquiries", the Police Complaints Commissioner for Scotland has found. In an unprecedented examination of Lothian and Borders Police's complaint handling over a four-year period, Jim Martin found that 133 complaints had been misfiled in the lesser category, including 16 that would "reasonably be taken to allege criminality on the part of officers". However, despite the seriousness of the latter allegations, in nine of the cases there is no evidence of any attempt to notify the area procurator-fiscal, who would decide whether to bring any prosecution, Mr Martin found. The commissioner, whose post was introduced in April last year, also found evidence that the force had misled complainants, including an MP, as to how their grievances had been handled."
Pretty damning criticism on a massive scale. Looks like the cops were looking after their own. Lots of bad cops ... and it's official.
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