Todd Ruger reports in today’s Sarasota Herald Tribune that “city leaders have not yet decided how to get to the bottom of the mishandled investigation of an officer seen kicking a handcuffed man on video.”

What, precisely, is there to get to the bottom of when it comes to Abbott? There’s nothing to get to the bottom of. Abbott’s admitted his wrongdoing. Am I missing something?

Hello? Here’s MC’s advice on getting to the bottom of things when it comes to Abbott:

Fire the Police Chief who greenlighted the attempted bribe, oh, I’m sorry, let me correct myself — it wasn’t an attempted bribe, it was “trying to settle the case”. FIRE HIM NOW.

There’s no other alternative and still be any kind of city that holds its head up without shame.

Fire! As in sayonara bucko — none of this paid leave bullshit. A real cop wouldn’t even accept it under the circumstances. A real cop, a real chief of police would step down in entirety. What he did is just not done — not in any circles, but certainly not in law enforcement circles. He should man up and bear the brunt of responsibility.

Oh, and City Commissioner Clapp was quoted in the H-T saying, “I’m not faulting the chief, he is a good chief. He is a good guy, he knows how to run a department, but we need to get to bottom of this.”

Clapp — are you frickin’ kidding me? He “knows how to run a department”? I’m sorry, but you are aware, aren’t you, that he sanctioned (and by some accounts possibly insisted on) what, in my book, would have amounted to a payoff to make a problem go away? How can that not be faulted? How does that action constitute a “good chief”? How does that behavior jibe with knowing “how to run a department”?

Seriously, if that’s what Clapp thinks constitutes good chiefdom and being a good guy, and knowing how to run something, well, um, I’m glad I live in the county. And, more seriously, if that’s what Clapp thinks, then I think we’ve got bigger problems as a city, than just a bunch of Keystone Cops running around kicking people and then trying to cover it up like a bunch of amateurs.

Ruger’s article says that city leaders — aka the City Manager, I guess, in this case, Bartolotta — don’t/doesn’t know what to do? They’re wringing their hands over what frickin’ consultant to hire and how to handle things?

How about just growing a set? Do the right thing. There’s no need to evaluate whether this kind of abuse is systemic (you’ll NEVER EVER KNOW THE ANSWER TO THAT QUESTION ANYWAY AND JUST BURN THROUGH A BOATLOAD OF TAXPAYER DOLLARS FARTING AROUND IN THE PROCESS OF UM, GETTING TO THE BOTTOM OF THINGS) — just deal with the here and now.

Deal with Abbott first — he’s the worst offender in terms of un-cop-like behavior (actually, he falls extremely low on the un-human-being-like behavior because his actions were after the fact, in the calm of day, and besides he’s supposed to be a LEADER, a CHIEF, someone to LOOK UP TO). No wonder the cops underneath him are kicking people and then ignoring what they see on surveillance and then behaving “stupidly” enough to actually go and try to buy somebody off — they’re learning from the top down.