Hello dear readers! It is a very unlikely but certainly possible state of affairs that long-term social isolation has reduced you to confirming the current day of the week through the blog posts.  If that is the case, your normally eloquent and verbose humble blogger, though certainly made even more humble by such a duty, cannot find the words to describe the enormous sadness he would feel if this really was the situation.  Well… happy WEDNESDAY, dear readers (just in case).

Speaking of sad news, I’ve got a bitter-sweet item to report to you.  A former Los Angeles Police Department officer, Michael Simon, of Redondo Beach, plead no contest to grand theft and insurance fraud.  As reported by MyNewsLA.com, convict Simon was accused of “misrepresenting the nature of his injuries to his employer to collect additional financial assistance” and “of engaging in activities inconsistent with his claimed injuries while he was off work in disability.”

The article reflects that he had been an LAPD officer for 12 years before resigning.

As this blog often points out, the conviction of a law enforcement officer or, really, any person in a particular position of trust in our society, is bitter-sweet.  On the one hand, it is justice being served to have a person engaged in deceit and fraud to be caught, publicly shamed, and for restitution to be made to the victims – in this case the tax-payer funded budget of the public sector employer.

But there is a bitter taste to such victories as well – every time a law enforcement officer is convicted of fraud, the testimony of honest LEOs in the prosecution of any trial is just a little bit less persuasive.  Even the convictions that Mr. Simon contributed to in his 12 years as an LAPD officer, perhaps fairly and honestly reached, are now tainted and impeached.

Of course, every defense attorney who ever represented a criminal defendant convicted even in part by the testimony of Mr. Simon is cracking open his or her old file for a new appeal and a new trial – one that the County of Los Angeles’ DA office probably has limited resources to re-try (perhaps several years later!).

Unfortunately, “what’s to be done?” has a very limited option for meaningful response. In your humble blogger’s estimation, the right thing was done here: upon finding a rotten apple in the barrel, the local authorities investigated and removed it.

Unfortunately, few details are available of how Mr. Simon was caught with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar.  Such details would help educate the defense community in how to better identify and document fraud, but, in all likelihood, would also shape more elaborate fraudsters. 

Congratulations to the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office on a successful prosecution, from the bottom of your humble blogger’s cabin-fevered heart!