There is a peculiar affliction in modern governance — a reflex of institutional self-destruction, where public agencies, desperate to placate outrage, turn against their own before the facts are even in. In this world, due process becomes a casualty of optics, and the press conference replaces the courtroom.

Aurora, Colorado, has become a textbook example. Former police officer John Haubert was not just charged with serious crimes; he was publicly denounced, hung out to dry by leadership, and effectively erased from the force long before a jury of his peers had the chance to render a verdict. When that day finally came, they found him not guilty on all counts. But by then, the real damage — to justice, to public trust, and to the officer himself — had long since been done.

The July 2021 arrest of Kyle Vinson made national headlines for its disturbing bodycam footage. What didn’t make headlines — because it wasn’t disclosed — was a trove of discovery material that told a far more complicated story. Civilian and officer witnesses alike described Vinson as violently resisting arrest. Surveillance footage from a neighboring business — Look Optical — showed him flailing, kicking, and making what appears to be a clear attempt to grab Officer Haubert’s firearm. Yet this video, although collected by detectives, was never publicly released. It was never mentioned in the arrest affidavit. It was never referenced in the department’s internal Force Review Board report.

The video’s omission was not the only irregularity. Witness statements corroborating Vinson’s resistance were downplayed or ignored. Vinson’s possession of pills and signs of intoxication at the scene were minimized. Discrepancies between Vinson’s hospital statements and the bodycam footage were overlooked. Even a spontaneous statement by Vinson — “I didn’t grab anything” — recorded at the hospital was seemingly dismissed. All of this material existed in the case file. It simply wasn’t part of the narrative presented to the public — or, it seems, to key decision-makers.

Within days of the incident, then-Chief Vanessa Wilson held a press conference, released edited body camera footage, condemned the officers’ actions as criminal, and pledged an expedited internal review. Haubert resigned under pressure. His partner was charged. And Vinson, who had an active warrant and resisted arrest, later walked away with an $800,000 settlement funded by Aurora taxpayers.

The internal review processes that followed did not correct the record. They appeared to double down. The Force Review Board’s report omitted any reference to the Look Optical video or supporting witness testimony. There was no mention of the alternative surveillance angles that, upon careful examination, revealed a more comprehensive — and far less one-sided — account of the confrontation. Instead, the narrative was reduced to a shallow visual: a white officer wielding a firearm, a Black man being struck, and a city eager to showcase its virtue. The deeper complexities — the resistance, the context, the evidence — were sidelined in favor of a digestible image that fit the national script.

This is not about denying the seriousness of police misconduct when it occurs. It is about ensuring that accountability is grounded in truth, not theater. The danger in what happened here is not just that a potentially innocent officer was prosecuted and a questionable payout awarded. The more serious risk is that public trust and APD morale were diminished — first by omission, then by affirmation and finally by silence.

Following the Vinson incident and its aftermath, Aurora entered into a consent decree — part of a broader national trend toward externally monitored police reform. The aim is noble. Critics will caution that if these reforms are pursued at the expense of fairness and transparency — if the process becomes a performance rather than a pursuit of truth — then we have not reformed the system. We have simply redirected its injustices.

The evidence in the Haubert case was never hidden. It was merely ignored. And that may be the most dangerous kind of concealment.

Aurora still has a chance to get this right. The city has a new police chief — by all appearances, a seasoned and principled crime fighter — who did not create this mess but has inherited it. He now faces the difficult but critical question: How does he assure the officers he leads and the community they serve that such a failure will not happen again? That begins with transparency. Reopen the record. Review the full body of evidence. Make public what was buried in the discovery files. And most importantly, acknowledge that justice demands more than appearances — it requires courage, even when the facts are inconvenient.

Because when cities perform contrition instead of practicing accountability, it isn’t just the accused who suffer. It’s the truth itself that gets condemned.

Michael A. Hancock is a retired high-tech business executive and a Coloradan since 1973. Originally from Texas, he is a musician, composer, software engineer and U.S. Air Force veteran whose wide-ranging interests — from science and religion to politics, the arts and philosophy — shape his perspective on culture, innovation and what it means to be a Coloradan.