---

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, January 29, 1992                   TAG: 9201290319
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-12   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

---

BUREAUCRATS COVER FOR EACH OTHER

YOUR EDITORIAL Jan. 24 about the Bristol sheriff said (and I agree): "It must be asked how such wrongdoing could go on so long without notice, in a system supposed to be full of checks and balances."

The answer is: through complicity and/or malfeasance on the part of another bureaucrat, usually close to the culprit.

This incident is just the tip of the iceberg. Bureaucrats at every level are notorious for covering for each other.

The justice and law-enforcement systems need to be rebuilt from the ground up. Duplicity is common with those of this ilk, and they have more allegiance to each other than the Mafia has for itself. HAROLD BOWMAN SALEM

---