Dead, Dead, Dead

Porter, though, wanted and expected more. The way the officers went about their business, he says, makes no sense. If Baxter said Oregon's brother had been selling him drugs for three years, why did the cops rush to the apartment that very night? Why didn't they check their computers to see whether anything in the criminal data banks supported the story? Why didn't they do surveillance to see whether the traffic in and out of the apartment seemed suspicious? Why did they appoint an unauthorized informant to knock on the door?

"It's because they didn't want to do the nuts-and-bolts police work," Porter says. "The problem with that type of police work is that it's not very exciting."

Staying within the parameters of the good sense of departmental guidelines can be boring, says Porter, but if the officers who shot Delaney, Gillum and Oregon had either stayed within those parameters or used their common sense, all three victims might still be alive today.