The big news this past week has been the jury’s findings in the Charleena Lyles inquest case that the two SPD officers used reasonable force when shooting Lyles back in 2017. You can read more about the verdict here, here, and here. As Erica C. Barnett from Publicola reported:
After the ruling, the attorney for Lyles’ family, Karen Koehler, said in a statement that the family “does not blame the jury” for finding that SPD followed its policies, because “SPD’s policies practices and procedures are designed specifically to allow an officer to shoot and kill a person in mental crisis with a paring knife.”
I think what happened here is we got to peek behind the curtain, where this process actually showed that the policies and procedures of that department, which is charged with upholding the law and protecting people, is not actually designed to do that. And so this inquest found that despite all these numerous things that could have been done differently, all of these steps – which weren’t taken and which were – resulted in, largely, law enforcement officers following procedure and it still resulting in the death of a person. And I think that’s probably the most damning and heartbreaking piece of this – if the policy and procedures for law enforcement are truly designed to be followed the way that they were and it still results in the death of a person struggling with mental health, are those policies and procedures valid? Are they necessary? Are they the right policies and procedures?
Seattle News
Some quick news items:
SPD and the City filed a petition in King County Superior Court asking the Court to reverse an arbitration decision that gave a parking enforcement officer his job back after he was fired for wishing we could “bring back lynching.”
The members of the search committee for the new SPD Chief have been announced.
A deal between the city and the county was finalized to fund JustCare, although it will be continuing in a new form. Seattle has promised up to $4.4m to continue to support a diversion-based program that will provide 80 beds of hotel shelter through the end of the year. The County will be using state money that was allocated to clear homeless encampments located along state highway rights of way and to provide shelter and wraparound services to the people living there to continue funding some hotel beds.
Seattle’s Redistricting Commission will begin creating their final proposal soon. They are scheduled to solicit public comment on their proposal beginning in August and continuing through September and October. They must submit their final redistricting plan to the County by November 15 at the latest. This plan could have a substantial impact on the City Council elections in November 2023.
King County News
The King County Sheriff’s Office has announced a new community advisory board, as well as two new divisions: a community programs division and a special operations division. Details about the community advisory board are still thin on the ground.
A judge ordered Pierce County Sheriff Ed Troyer to post $100,000 bail pending his trial on false reporting charges, citing evidence of Troyer’s continued harassment of a Black newspaper carrier.
The King County Auditor’s Office released two reports earlier this month examining the King County Sheriff’s Office (KCSO) enforcement of traffic laws and racial disparities in arrests and use of force.
But another large part of making 2023 work will likely be asking the council to free up money earmarked for specific causes — like the Jumpstart tax — to cover general expenditures.
You may recall that JumpStart tax revenue expenditures were a major source of conflict in last year’s budget, with then-Mayor Durkan allocating them away from the Council’s spending plan, and the Council yanking the money back to be spent as originally intended. With such a large revenue shortfall, however, we could see a different outcome in this budget season.
Carolyn Bick continues their excellent reporting into problems at Seattle’s Office of Police Accountability (OPA) and Office of the Inspector General (OIG):
The Emerald has obtained multiple documents that show that former Office of Police Accountability (OPA) Dir. Andrew Myerberg appears to have withheld key information from the Office of Inspector General — the OPA’s accountability partner agency tasked with certifying OPA investigations — by submitting a case for certification and later adding information to the case report. In doing so, and in drawing conclusions from said information, Myerberg appears to have subverted not only the OPA’s own rules and procedures but also the City’s 2017 Accountability Ordinance.
Washington State News
It sounds like the $1.5m settlement paid out to the Nazi-sympathizing police officer in Kent might be drawing attention to the realities of some of the problems with police accountability in Washington State. Depending on how elections go this fall, we could see a renewed effort during the next session of the state legislature to address some of the problems with officer discipline. One potential vehicle for this, SB 5677, which you may remember me discussing at the beginning of the year, “would require municipalities to establish procedures that meet a set of minimum standards for receiving complaints and conducting investigations regarding “serious misconduct” by police officers.”
Dawit Kelete is accused of hitting two protesters, killing one of them, after driving around roadway barricades and taking an offramp onto Interstate 5 on July 4, 2020.
Prosecutors are seeking to require Pierce County Sheriff Ed Troyer to post $10,000 in bail as a condition of release pending a trial on false reporting charges.
