A top Los Angeles County police official has resigned under pressure, following the publication of a series of emails he sent mocking Muslims, blacks, Latinos, women, and others. 

"This incident is one that I find deeply troubling," said LA County Sheriff Jim McDonnell of his now ex-chief of staff Tom Angel.  "Despite the Sheriff's Department's many recent efforts to fortify public trust and enhance internal and external accountability and transparency, this incident reminds us that we and other law enforcement agencies still have work to do."

Mr. Angel sent the emails in 2012 and 2013 when he was the No. 2 police official in the city of Burbank, and were obtained by the Los Angeles Times newspaper under California's public records law.  In both jobs, he was brought in to reform a police agency awash in misconduct within the ranks, allegations of brutality and racism, and sexual harassment.  But the emails were loaded with the kind of low-brow ethnic jokes that suggest he was part of the problem rather than the solution. 

"I took my Biology exam last Friday," said one of the emails, "I was asked to name two things commonly found in cells.  Apparently 'Blacks' and 'Mexicans' were NOT the correct answers."  Some of the other offensive emails were sent to Angel which he then forwarded to others, despite the fact they were the very thing he was tasked to stamp out.

It's a major embarrassment for Sheriff McDonnell, who was elected in November 2014 as an outsider promising to steer the agency beyond its notoriously racist and abusive past.  Before the election, deputies were discovered to be physically abusing jail inmates, while others were found to have singled out African-Americans and Latinos for harassment.