I would make the argument that police are becoming more accountable, not less, as a result of technology (particularly cell-phone video) and common knowledge of

I would make the argument that police are becoming more accountable, not less, as a result of technology (particularly cell-phone video) and common knowledge of FOIA statutes (at least in the US). The cases of the man shot on Seattle transit and the abusive officer in Saint Louis that were both caught on video and punished (and otherwise may not have been) come to mind. It's probably better that responsibility for tracking cops is more widely disseminated, so that one or two lazy (or corrupt, or ideologically motivated) reporter(s) can't set the tone for an entire city. On the other hand, it does help to have these things spread by someone seen as neutral, and willing to do some leg-work. Perhaps we need something like a consumerist for police? (I could see this being generalized to local governments too). Or perhaps it will fall into the purview of hyperlocal sites like everyblock. Right now most of these seem to use a highly automated approach, although I imagine they'll evolve into a more user-contributed model. We need something more than the patchwork "Hope someone catches it on video and it makes youtube's front page" model for accountability than we have now, but I'm not sure that local newspaper reporters are the best solution going forward. There's been talk for years about getting a standardized accessible electronic format for crime data across the US (John Udell in particular has discussed this at length) but I think we're a long way from any real implementation of that, sadly.