On Wednesday, city taxpayers saw more of their hard-earned wealth go flying out the treasury in the form of a lawsuit settlement. Three homeless men accepted $10,000 each because city marshals arrested and jailed them four months ago under an ordinance that didn't exist.

After their attorney collected $15,000 in fees, the bill to the public totaled $45,000, roughly the median household income in this valley.

To be sure, the amount is small potatoes compared with the $1.48 million county taxpayers coughed up to settle a lawsuit brought against the Metropolitan Police Department more than a decade ago. The settlement, approved Monday, was struck because police gave special treatment to an officer's wife after she was involved in a deadly accident in 1994.

Unfortunately, the disparity in the settlements was proportional to the accountability taxpayers received in return for their financial support of local law enforcement.

The settlement for the homeless men was borne from an ordinance approved by the City Council in August. A provision in the ordinance targeted the homeless by making it illegal to sleep within 500 feet of a pile of feces or a puddle of urine. The council repealed that provision in September.

According to City Attorney Brad Jerbic, a memo about the repeal of the provision was sent to the city's marshals in November. However, a single sergeant misread the memo and believed it addressed a new ordinance, not a repealed one. He told his subordinates of the law's specifics, and they responded by arresting Eastman Webber, David Hicks and Jerry Halfpap for sleeping too close to poop downtown.

In the larger, record settlement involving Las Vegas police, the lawsuit alleged 14 officers tried to conceal the fact that Janet Wagner, the wife of officer David Wagner, had been drinking alcohol before her vehicle struck and killed bicyclist Erin DeLew in 1994.

Although Ms. DeLew was found at fault in the accident for not having lights and making an unsafe lane change, Mr. Wagner was allowed to take Mrs. Wagner home, and she did not have to submit to a blood-alcohol screening until three hours after the incident, documents showed.

The public is paying for these injustices, but do police even care? The city of Las Vegas conducted a full investigation of the breakdown in communication between marshals to make sure such an egregious infringement of civil liberties "never happens again," said Director of Detention and Enforcement Karen Coyne. Although city policies prohibit her from discussing specific personnel matters, Ms. Coyne said discipline was issued where deserved.

What of the 14 Metro officers named in the lawsuit brought by Ms. DeLew's family? An internal investigation cleared all of any policy violations. Nine are collecting their pensions and five, including Mr. Wagner, remain on the force.

"I don't believe the officers were malicious or wanton in their actions out there," Sheriff Doug Gillespie said last week. "I don't think they tried to cover up the fact that Mrs. Wagner had been drinking, but when you put together the kinds of things we have been talking about, it gives the impression that they did."

So a $45,000 settlement results in an investigation, discipline and policy changes, while a $1.48 million settlement yields a whitewash? Something is very wrong with this picture.

Local law enforcement officers are paid far too well, both on the job and in retirement, to cost taxpayers so much more.