Credibility gap for the Met and prosecution service on racism

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/apr/06/credibility-met-prosecution-service-race

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You report that, in his address to staff, Met police chief Bernard Hogan-Howe said: "We work hard to forge close relationships with people who can advise us and rightly hold us to account" (I will not stand for any racism or racists, 4 April). Is he not aware that one of the factors triggering the riots was identified as aggressive policing? Is he not aware of the high and disproportionate number of black men stopped in the street, including a bishop stopped in his car? And what about the aggressive and sometimes violent policing of peaceful demonstrations? These are not the actions of a few rogue officers; they are endemic in police culture, extending to quite senior ranks.

Every time such incidents come to light, senior police officers say that they will not tolerate them. But nothing changes. Hogan-Howe needs to take a close look at all these ways in which policing does not reflect "all the close work that goes on with communities" and take some radical action. Mike Turner Teddington, Middlesex

• I'm not sure which is more scary, the abuse itself, the fact that the Crown Prosecution Service was content to wilfully obstruct justice by failing to prosecute racist officers, despite there being evidence pointing towards guilt, or the fact that it is only because the Guardian had the guts to place the story on the front page of the print edition that the victims may, at last, be in with a chance to confront their assailants in court.

We often hear about the need for a free press to keep democracy in check; this week we also have a potent reminder why we need a truly free and independent press to scrutinise abuses perpetrated by the criminal justice system and its officers. What use is the IPCC, if, for most cases, it continues to remain asleep until the media gets involved? Toyin Agbetu London

• It's a depressing certainty that, in a few months, the officers in the latest cases, if found guilty, will receive the usual reprimand. Will return to duty and retain their pensions. Will neither be sacked nor prosecuted. Will continue to act with impunity, protected by colleagues, and beyond the control of senior officers. The pattern has repeated so many times, Londoners simply expect no better. There's an opportunity to clear out those officers who can't and won't change, to recruit a better-educated and motivated cadre representative of the of the capital's ethnic diversity from the current large numbers of well-qualified unemployed, but – for all the rhetoric – it won't happen. It's not rotten apples, but a rotten barrel. Dave Young London