This is well known. Just as many fire responders are arsonists.

I watch a lot of TV and movies and ideas like this seem to be repeated so often in plots that it would seem like a training ground for many officers.

I think it's impressive that they are charged before the video comes out. This is Memphis, after all.

They are examples of the mental and emotional defectives that can be found in every society to a greater or lesser degree around the world. I find it pathetic that the decision-makers in the United $tates of Absurdity refuse to do anything effective about the issue.

@K9Kohle789 It's true that a lot of cops (and border patrol) are ex-military. Moving from the military to law enforcement does make sense at some level. There is a lot of commonality between the two occupations. Like long stretches of boredom punctuated by short episodes of intense or even terrifying activity. And let's not forget that when it is the moment to confront a determined and dangerous criminal, you do want (need) a tough SOB in your corner. The real trouble, I think, stems from systemic societal problems that set up the conditions for confrontation. The biggest of these is historical income inequality, racial discrimination, lack of opportunity, and very poorly conceived notions of what is criminal behavior.

To expand on this last point, consider the War on Drugs. It's a total fiasco, start to finish. We criminalize behavior that should be treated as a public health issue, and in do doing, create black markets and empower organized crime. That the War On Drugs is a complete failure is obvious. The availability of dangerous street drugs continues to increase while their prices continue to decline. Law enforcement makes ever bigger seizures of contraband because there are ever greater quantities of drugs flowing across our borders.

We run freeways through poor (colored) communities instead if investing in their schools and infrastructure. We warehouse men (and women) in private, for profit prisons which, instead of focussing on rehabilitation through education and training, are crime universities. Vast numbers of people have been chewed up by this system, so it's no wonder that there are some dangerous people on the streets. It's a jungle out there, so cops go into the field with a paramilitary mindset. None of this excuses what these five cops did, but it helps in understanding it. I feel as sorry for the coos and their families as I do for their victim and his family. There are no winners here.

@Flyingsaucesir Police in other western countries do not act this way though. If they do it is something that looked into at once.