Officer Peterson would be on "Administrative Leave".

       Occasionally it happens.  We get a report of a police officer crossing the line and beating someone.  When a cop crosses that line, even if the person on the receiving end of that beating clearly had it coming; there is due process.

       That officer is put on administrative leave, or suspended with pay, until such time as the incident is resolved.  Many say they should be put on unpaid leave, but then we always presume innocence in this country, so that would not be fair.  They are not presumed guilty, but they are kept from their duties.

       Any complaints from the town, or department, that they don't have enough officers without this one on the job are disregarded.  Any complaints that the limited budget that the department has is now paying someone to sit at home are also, rightfully, disregarded.

       The reason being that we can't take the chance that the officer is found guilty, and we did nothing.  They are supposed to be role models, after all.

       So now we have the NFL.  From them we accept the "innocent until proven guilty" logic in allowing an accused player to keep playing.  This is backed up by the logic that they wouldn't have enough good players if they benched this particular player.  And then we pile on the reason that it would be unfair to bench someone when there is a salary cap.

       In short we accept excuses as valid reasons from the NFL that we would never accept from a public official.  Good thing kids can name more police officers than NFL players...

   Oh, wait...