The swatter is a malicious or crazy individual. The police failures are systematic. We can (and should) punish or treat the former, but it's overwhelmingly more

The swatter is a malicious or crazy individual. The police failures are systematic. We can (and should) punish or treat the former, but it's overwhelmingly more important to fix the latter. Castigating the swatter carries the risk of overlooking the systemic failure; I have no doubt that there are PR people across the country who are working to shape the public discourse in that direction.