The police are employees of the citizens of this nation. Our laws are enacted by elected representatives. Similarly, the police are our law enforcement representatives. Any lawsuit that will arise from this is going to be against not just the individual police officers but the department as well. If the department loses the case then the payment will come from our taxes...so in a very real sense the legal system views policemen as official representatives of the people.
I would like to reiterate my caveat from my previous post you were responding to, which was that IF this account is accurate...but given the poor quality of our media that is never a given.