It's even worse than the headline makes it sound. These are 17-year veterans, one of whom said responding to priority calls stresses him out, while the other is a trainer.
According to a case summary published late last month by the civilian-run Office of Police Accountability, it took the two officers over 20 minutes to arrive, only to report “everything looks fine” and initially write the incident off as a disturbance.
Shortly thereafter, a man showed up at Harborview Medical Center with a gunshot wound to his arm, suffered in the shooting the officers didn’t investigate, according to the case summary.
OPA found the two officers had violated professionalism standards and failed in their job to protect the community. Chief Adrian Diaz agreed with the findings, giving both officers nine-hour suspensions, which were first reported by DivestSPD, a digital site associated with the Seattle Democratic Socialists of America.
The OPA removes the names of disciplined officers from its published case summaries.
One of them, a 17-year SPD veteran, said he was relying on his experience to determine when a priority call is actually a priority. In this incident, he told OPA investigators, he was sure the victim would be gone when police arrived, which turned out to be the case.
Moreover, he said that a lights-and-siren response “heightens my stress level” and can become a public-safety issue for other drivers on the road.
“We showed up. We didn’t find a scene. We didn’t find any shell casings,” he told investigators.
The other officer, also a 17-year veteran and a training officer, speculated that they had stopped at the rank-and-file union headquarters to have dinner, take a break, get snacks or use the restroom.
He acknowledged that a “typical response” to a priority one call is: “Drop the meal, drop the report, and go.”
“[The officer] did not recall why he did not do that for this call,” the OPA case summary explains.
The Idaho Senate voted Thursday 27-8 to advance a bill that defines “domestic terrorism” as requiring the involvement of foreign groups. According to the bill, if there’s no foreign involvement, then there can be no domestic terrorism.
I'm not sure I can agree that ignoring the Constitution is good for democracy. Especially when it comes to disqualifying insurrectionists. But hopefully you're right about the outcome.
I don't disagree. I'm just saying that a lot of parents would be very against the change because they and their employers are not prepared to deal with it.
That's our local PD, folks. Seattle Police Department currently trying to get out of a consent decree that they even acknowledge they haven't met the requirements of.
The early schedule is to benefit parents so that they can get to work on time after their kid gets to school or leaves for school. It doesn't do the kids any favors.
When the power goes out, I'm very glad I have winter camping gear. I can easily dress up all cozily, put myself in a sleeping bag or under a quilt, and I'm pretty good to go.