The Blue Wall of Silence
18th October 2010
Only one of the officers who came to the accident scene that day had any integrity. That would be Seifert, a cop with an exemplary record who once shot an armed man to free two hostages. Seifert is the one who took the witness statements that implicated McCue. He is also the one who documented Bowling’s injuries and testified for Bowling in Bowling’s lawsuit. Here is how The Kansas City Star described what happened to Seifert next:
For crossing “the thin blue line,” U.S. District Judge Julie Robinson wrote, Seifert was forced into retirement.
“Seifert was shunned, subjected to gossip and defamation by his police colleagues and treated as a pariah,” Robinson wrote. “…The way Seifert was treated was shameful.”
Seifert also lost part of his pension and his retirement health insurance. So what happened to the cops involved in the cover-up? Ronald Miller, then Kansas City’s police chief, is now the police chief in Topeka. Officer Robert Lane went on to become a councilman for the town of Edwardsville; he was later convicted of participating in a ticket-fixing scheme and sentenced to 10 days in jail plus probation. Steven Culp, then Kansas City’s deputy police chief, is now, incredibly enough, executive director of the Kansas Commission on Peace Officers’ Standards and Training. Agent McCue is still with the DEA.