Ray Mallon has made a mockery of justice. For four years, he vigorously protested his innocence.

He said last August: "It is vitally important that the public learns the truth about Lancet, so that those responsible are held accountable for their actions and their costly mistakes are not repeated."

He was right. But after yesterday's result, how are the public to know who was responsible?

Although Mr Mallon's frustration is very understandable, rather than stay and fight for justice, he has thrown the towel in, entered a guilty plea, and walked away for the sake of expediency.

The inconclusive nature of yesterday's result makes a mockery of justice. The charges against Mr Mallon were very serious - it was alleged that he failed to take appropriate action when told that one of his police officers was supplying drugs to prisoners in custody.

The Police Complaints Authority (PCA) said in a statement yesterday that Mr Mallon's conduct "cannot be dismissed as the odd error of judgement or excusable mistakes under pressure.

"The behaviour admitted by him - by an experienced senior manager and detective officer - was wholly incompatible with the standards required of even the most junior police staff".

If the PCA is right, why wasn't Mr Mallon sacked, stripped of his pension and discredited?

Instead, he was merely "required to resign" - what he has wanted to do since August - and keeps his pension.

The PCA is making a mockery of justice. It said yesterday that Mr Mallon has "admitted that during 1997 he received information and reports alleging the most serious misconduct by officers under his command, and that he failed to act on these in the way he should have done".

This amounts to a criminal offence, misfeasance in public office. Yet, two years ago, the Crown Prosecution Service rejected the PCA's evidence of any criminal wrong-doing on Mr Mallon's part. In fact, of the 393 criminal allegations made against 61 Cleveland officers, not one was proceeded with, yet still the PCA suggests that offences occurred.

The system itself is a mockery of justice. On top of the Old Bailey, blindfolded Justice holds two evenly balanced scales. This was never the case in Operation Lancet.

As the superintendents' association said yesterday: "Mr Mallon found himself in a David and Goliath struggle."

Once he ran out of personal funds and out of legal insurance, Mr Mallon was left to defend himself alone in the face of Cleveland Police's legal department, a leading local QC and a junior barrister.

The hearings were held in private before a chief constable appointed by Cleveland Police - a force whose senior echelons have themselves been investigated for allegedly leaking material harmful to Mr Mallon to the national Press (the findings of this investigation by South Yorkshire police have yet to be made public, although they were known to Cleveland Police last August).

All of this apparent lack of balance has offended the British public's innate sense of justice - one of the reasons for Mr Mallon's popular support - and enabled him to say yesterday: "I do not feel this outcome affects my reputation - when you have an inquiry so clearly biased and devoid of integrity, then the outcome is irrelevant."

Cleveland has become a mockery of a police force. All the while Operation Lancet has been spinning out of control, the force has been beset by countless embarrassments.

One officer was told by a judge that he had shown "no regard for the criminal justice process", yet he was promoted, sent to Lithuania, only to be returned home in ignominy after urinating on a presidential palace.

Another head of criminal investigations could not remember who was driving his own car and was let off his speeding ticket.

One assistant chief constable (ACC) retired following a mysterious 999 call from his home, but turned up running the police force on the Turks and Caicos Islands; another ACC was accused of being "disingenuous" with his evidence by a judge.

A stolen boiler was itself stolen, only to re-appear in a police officer's house.

There have been booze cruises in the force social club minibus, and pornography discovered on a computer in headquarters . . .

The taxpayers of Cleveland have been mocked. For four years, they have paid for policemen to investigate criminals, but for four years policemen have been investigating other policemen, at a cost of £7m.

For £7m, the taxpayers of Cleveland deserve to know who is responsible for the mockery of their police force and that it cannot happen again. They deserve to know that their agony is at an end, but six officers still remain suspended and Middlesbrough MP Stuart Bell yesterday suggested that there may yet be criminal action against Mr Mallon. Lancet will not lie down.

Politicians have made a mockery out of Cleveland. In 1997, when Mr Mallon and the Cleveland force were riding high, Tony Blair, Jack Straw and Michael Howard were only too keen to bask in the reflected glory.

Then Mr Mallon fell, and Cleveland lurched from embarrassment to crisis without a murmur from those on high.

Mr Straw, when Home Secretary, refused to accept that the Lancet legacy was the "very exceptional circumstances" that allowed him to intervene.

Now, surely David Blunkett has to call for an independent inquiry to ensure that such an expensive mess never happens again and to ensure that the people of Cleveland can again have a police force unblemished by scandal.

And to ensure that justice is no longer so openly mocked