For more than a year, a feud has been raging at the King County Sheriff’s Office over a captain’s anti-Trump Facebook post, with dueling complaints and internal investigations. On one side is Jamie Deer, one of the few openly trans officers in the country, and on the other is the King County Police Officers’ Guild, which represents deputies and sergeants.

In February 2025, Deer wrote a post on his personal Facebook, telling all Trump supporters to leave his friends list: “If you support this transphobic, homophobic, racist, misogynistic POS, then our differences are too much for me to tolerate.”

It was the kind of unremarkable post liberals make thousands of times daily on social media. Still, the guild sent out an email, calling it a “double standard,” claiming that if Deer were a conservative, he would be placed on administrative leave.

The email found its way into the hands of local right-wing radio goblin Jason Rantz, who transformed it into the culture war grievance du jour.

Rantz railed against the “hypocrisy,” pointing out that a detective had been fired for “posting memes critical of BLM riots.” (The meme in question was an image of a truck running over protesters, captioned “All Lives Splatter,” and it was posted in response to Seattle protester Summer Taylor being struck and killed on I-5).

Deputy Clark Matthews filed a complaint against Deer over the Facebook post. During an interview for that investigation, he claimed Deer “stormed out” of the roll call room after Matthews misgendered him in 2018 and then angrily berated Matthews in the parking lot. He said that Deer “cursed [him] out” and told him he could be fired for misgendering someone.

When Deer learned about this, he filed his own complaint alleging that Matthews had fabricated nearly everything about that incident. While they both agreed that Matthews had misgendered Deer at the roll call, Deer disputes that he ran out of the meeting or yelled at Matthews about his pronouns. The other officers in attendance didn’t specifically recall that meeting or remember Deer ever storming out of any meeting

Deer said he sent a text politely informing Matthews of his pronouns, and that it was never an issue after that. He also noted that Matthews didn’t file a complaint about that alleged incident for nearly seven years.

In the end, the allegations of dishonesty against Matthews were ruled inconclusive. Investigators could not definitively prove that he had lied because the text messages were long past the retention date, and witnesses could not recall what happened years ago.

Hey, before you go…

A major shakeup in the police department of a tiny, affluent Seattle suburb was resolved quietly at the end of May, when Clyde Hill Police Chief Kyle Kolling agreed to retire rather than face a humiliating public termination for official corruption.

The city released almost no details about Kolling’s departure, but today, DivestSPD acquired the full report compiled by an outside investigator. It found that Kolling killed an internal investigation into an officer and committed a range of other misconduct, including accepting expensive wine and cigars, deleting “flirtatious” texts with a domestic violence victim, and claiming pay for hours he did not work.

Last October, the Clyde Hill Police Department opened an investigation into Officer Cameron Hanson. The day after the first interview was scheduled, Kolling had a call with a police union representative. The next day, Kolling instructed Commander Dawn Hanson to “stand down” and informed her that the allegations would be handled informally.

Kolling then ordered evidence seized from Officer Hanson to be returned without properly documenting it or following established procedures. The allegations against Officer Hanson were later formally investigated and sustained, but the report does not specify what they were.

Cigars, Wine, and Gift Cards

Kolling visited the home of a community member on multiple occasions and was seen transporting large crates of wine in a department vehicle more than a “dozen times,” according to the report. Another witness reported that Kolling never paid or discussed payment with that person.

The investigator wrote: “The consistency of these accounts, along with the routine manner in which the conduct was described, indicates that these interactions were not viewed as isolated events but had become normalized over time within the work environment.”

Moreover, Kolling “actively solicited” gifts. A witness told investigators that he contacted them about when he could get more wine. He even asked for specific varieties and brands. Kolling claimed that he paid for some of the wine, but there was no evidence.

He was also given pricey cigars. These contacts occurred while Kolling was on duty, and he was seen on several occasions leaving the person’s house smelling of cigar smoke.

A private citizen also donated gift cards to Kolling to distribute to his officers. He didn’t. Kolling admitted that his handling of the gift cards was “improper.” When he left the position, gift cards were found in his desk.

Deleted Texts With DV Victim

Kolling also destroyed records of “flirty” communications he had with the subject of a domestic violence protective order. He met the woman at the hotel bar during a law enforcement conference and later learned that she was a Clyde Hill resident with an order against a former partner.

Though Kolling destroyed the texts from his work phone, forensic investigators recovered messages described as “increasingly personal and inappropriate remarks.” Some samples include texts like, “I’m trying to flirt with you” and “Not to be creepy, but, how amazing of a mom you are is attractive.”

Kolling also offered to personally intervene in her case, texting “I’m hoping you will be if you ever need support at court, I have your back.” And Kolling violated state law by using police databases for personal purposes.

Time Theft

Aside from his social calls on the clock for wine pickups and cigar breaks, Kolling was “routinely absent from the office during normal working hours, frequently leaving early, and being unavailable when he would be expected to be on duty and accessible.”

The report notes that issues with the department’s timekeeping practices prevented the investigation from fully accounting for Kolling’s work hours, but investigator found at least one instance where he claimed an entire workday and did not work at all.

Hey, before you go…

Former Police Guild President Runs for Office

Late last month, a judge gave former Seattle police guild president Mike Solan the go-ahead to run for Pierce County Council even though he did not meet the basic requirements. Solan registered to vote in Pierce County only two months before he filed. The county charter says candidates must be registered for at least a year. If he wins, he won’t be the only Seattle cop in Pierce County politics. Previously, Captain Keith Swank quit the department before he could be fired for racist and transphobic Twitter posts. He almost moved to Florida but decided to go for county sheriff after he claimed God spoke to him in a hot tub. Swank has continuously lobbied to overturn state sanctuary laws so that he can partner with ICE. Pierce County is also home to the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, the region’s only ICE detention center. Similarly, Solan has been seen meeting with the “architect of family separation,” Tom Homan.

Unlawful Flock Stop Ends in Brain Damage

A King County Sheriff’s Deputy in Covington detained the wrong man based on a Flock camera hit and hospitalized him with a traumatic brain injury after performing a suplex on him. The King County Office of Law Enforcement Oversight (OLEO) found that Deputy John Welch didn’t have reasonable suspicion or probable cause to detain the man. The Flock notification for a stolen vehicle contained no description of the driver or passengers. Welch’s other justification for the stop — that the man gave him a suspicious look — wasn’t supported by the video evidence. And if it were, it still would not justify a detention. OLEO cited Washington Supreme Court case law, which found that startled reactions or nervousness aren’t sufficient to justify a detention. According to the deflock map, Covington has 10 mapped ALPR cameras, at least four of which are operated by the Covington Police Department (the King County Sheriff’s Office contracts with Covington), two by Home Depot, and the rest are either traffic cameras and/or unknown operators.

Council Public Safety Hawks Want New SCORE Contract, Stadium Cameras On

At this week’s Seattle City Council Public Safety Committee, Chair Bob Kettle called for the city to resume its contract with the deadly SCORE jail, and councilmember Rob Saka pushed for the city to activate its CCTV cameras ahead of the FIFA World Cup. The contract with SCORE was scrapped in the last budget cycle. It’s no longer being used now that the King County Jail accepts misdemeanor bookings. The previous SCORE contract was approved shortly after the facility marked its seventh in-custody death in 18 months. Kettle is soft-launching new excuses to bring it back. Saka engaged in goofy theatrics for 12 minutes, urging Mayor Wilson to turn on the stadium CCTVs, citing his presence at the Boston Marathon bombing as well as his military background. The stadium cameras have been installed despite the so-called “pause,” with the stipulation that they will remain deactivated unless there’s an undefined “credible threat.”

Since that committee meeting, Seattle Times’ reported that Kettle sent a letter to Mayor Wilson suggesting the so-called pause of the surveillance expansion isn’t legal, alleging that “proper steps” weren’t taken. All but one of the existing 310 CCTV cameras are running, the entire SDOT camera network is operational, and an undisclosed number of private cameras are still streaming into the Real-Time Crime Center. Meanwhile, Kettle, Saka, and Rivera are huffing and puffing about a brief “pause” in the use of a few cameras, representing only a tiny fraction of that sprawling panopticon, which is already plenty damaging.

Inquest Into the Fatal 2021 Shooting of Derek Hayden Begins

On Monday, King County began its inquest into the fatal shooting of Seattle University student Derek Hayden in 2021. Hayden was experiencing a mental health crisis when he was shot by Seattle police officers Cassidy Butler and Willard Jared at the waterfront. While the Office of Police Accountability found the shooting itself justified, both were later suspended for violating the department’s de-escalation policy. Port of Seattle police and SPD officers had been tailing Hayden, who had a knife, from a distance, but Jared and Butler drove to within 20 feet of him, got out of their vehicle, and opened fire in less than 10 seconds. Hayden’s family was awarded $1.5 million. Testimony on the first day of the inquest included port police and Seattle officers, such as West Precinct Officer Tanner Jay, who was twice the subject of investigations into dishonesty allegations that just stopped just shy of sustained findings. The inquest is a non-criminal, fact-finding process, and it will last until Friday. You can follow the proceedings remotely here.

Beyond the Puget Sound…

Spokane 3 Found Guilty

A jury found the Spokane 3 guilty of federal conspiracy charges stemming from an anti-ICE protest there last June that was followed by police raids. Like the prosecution of the Prairieland and Stop Cop City defendants, this is yet another canary in the coalmine for the criminalization of dissent and the escalation of repression under President Trump’s NSPM-7.

Detention Center Hunger Strikes

This past week, a hunger strike at NWDC faced retaliation again, and at least 500 are involved in hunger strikes at five other detention facilities across the country, including Delaney Hall in NJ, where protests happening in tandem outside have faced massive force from state troopers and federal agents.

OII Investigating Its First Nonfatal Police Shooting

The Washington State Office of Independent Investigations (OII) is—for the first time—investigating a non-fatal police shooting by Vancouver Police Officer Alexander Zaferis that occurred on May 28. "The person shot in this case was reported to have life-threatening injuries. This prompted the OII response and current investigation. It is the first non-fatal use of force OII has investigated since it began responding to such incidents in December 2024.

Hey, before you go…

How many punches to the head are too many? That’s the question that the Office of Police Accountability tried to answer in its investigation of a violent incident at Cal Anderson Park last May, when Seattle Police Sergeant David Adams rushed a protest medic, threw him to the ground, and punched him in the head over and over.

The OPA found initially that the first four punches were acceptable, while the last four were not. However, the so-called accountability agency had a come-to-Jesus moment after talking to Adams’ chain of command.

The incident occurred during SPD’s mass arrest of trans and queer people protesting a fundamentalist concert in the park themed “Don’t Mess With Our Kids” on May 24. Adams was part of SPD’s anti-protest unit, which deployed into the park to arrest two people for misdemeanor property destruction — namely, releasing some balloons and tampering with a bubble machine.

This escalated the crowd, and when officers lost sight of the two, they began arresting everyone wearing black bloc in a chaotic melee. Bodycam footage shows Adams run up behind officers making arrests, then trip over a bike. Adams spotted the protest medic standing about 10 to 15 feet away and charged at him (See our previous reporting for a more complete description of the incident).

No obstruction, no assault, no weapon

The OPA found that Adams had probable cause to arrest the man for obstruction at this point, but we dispute this finding. Disobeying an order is a key component of an obstruction charge. Adams told the OPA that the man “continued approaching despite being ordered to stay back.” The video contradicts this.

While the audio on Adams’ camera was off shortly before the arrest, an officer was standing near him. Nothing resembling an order can be heard on his bodycam. The man did not physically interfere with the arrest. He was merely standing there giving the double middle finger. There were many others in the vicinity who were as close or closer to the arrest than he was.

When Adams ran up on the man, he put his hands up defensively. Adams claimed that the man was swinging at him or trying to grab his helmet. That raised the offense from a questionable obstruction charge to an equally dubious felony assault, and the justifications for all of Adams’ subsequent actions flow from that. In other words, it wouldn’t be proportionate to punch someone in the face over a misdemeanor or physical resistance, but it would be acceptable for a felony assault.

Adams said that he punched the man to “loosen” him up so he could get his hands behind his back, but that’s not “necessary” force — that’s expedient. Justifying the punches, Adams explained that the man “could have accessed a weapon during the altercation,” but his hands were visible the entire time.

After the first four punches, the man covered his head with both hands, and Adams punched him four more times. In its first draft, OPA found that the last four were unjustified. By this point, the level of resistance had dropped, another officer was there to help, and the situation had stabilized so that there was less urgency to get him in handcuffs, the OPA argued.

However, the OPA walked its findings back after Adams’ chain of command maintained that he was still an active threat at that point. In particular, they noted that Adams dropped his pepper-spray can, and it was underneath the medic. They painted an implausible scenario that the man, who was prone with two officers grabbing each arm, would somehow be able to grab it, turn over, and spray them in the face.

The OPA found this “compelling,” and amended its findings.

Sloppy or Malicious

Lastly, the OPA determined that another allegation, which was captured on camera, did not happen at all and was not captured on camera. This occurred shortly after the arrest, when the man was cuffed on the ground. Adams ordered the man to turn over on his belly, and he cursed at Adams.

Adams is shown on his bodycam going up to the man and pushing the handcuffs up his back until the man screams in pain. Any actions that cause pain are considered reportable force, and force on handcuffed prisoners is prohibited except in extreme circumstances.

The report reads:

This allegation is unfounded. NE#1 did not twist CP#1’s handcuffs or press them into CP#1’s back as alleged. Rather, BWV showed CP#1 unwilling to stand or walk, requiring NE#1 and WO#1 to use de minimis force3 to raise CP#1. NE#1 pulled the back of CP#1’s shirt upward, causing CP#1 to rise, and then escorted him away by holding onto his arm. Overall, NE#1 did not use any reportable force while CP#1 was handcuffed

This sentence — “NE#1 pulled the back of CP#1’s shirt upward, causing CP#1 to rise, and then escorted him away by holding onto his arm” — is apparently a reference to a segment of the video that takes place three minutes after the prohibited use of force:

The OPA investigator, Det. Travis Jordon, either did not watch the entire video or he maliciously cherry-picked the segment to exonerate his coworker and fellow police guild member. The Office of the Inspector General approved this allegation for expedited review, meaning the OPA could issue findings based on bodycam footage alone.

It reflects a disturbing trend in the so-called police accountability system. Fewer cases are being fully investigated. In 2022, 37 percent of misconduct underwent a full investigation. By 2025, that proportion had fallen to 23 percent, with growing numbers of cases being classified as “expedited,” “supervisor action,” and “contact log.”

Hey, before you go…

A King County deputy gave a man a traumatic brain injury during an unlawful stop initiated based on a hit from Flock Safety cameras, according to a disciplinary report.

Responding to a notification from a Flock camera, Deputy John Welch located a van matching the description parked at the Rocket gas station in Covington. Welch went inside the convenience store after confirming that the van was reported stolen.

He found two men using the ATM inside. Welch wrote in his report that the men eyed him “wearily [sic] ” and ducked down, but the store’s surveillance video showed them standing upright the entire time. The clerk also said that the men weren’t behaving strangely.

Welch called out to one of the men and told him to walk toward the deputy with his hands in the air. The man turned and began to run. Deputy Welch chased the man, yelling, “Stop! You’re under arrest!” The man tripped and fell to his knees near the checkout counter.

Deputy Welch jumped onto the man’s back. The two struggled until the man eventually broke free and stood up. Welch grabbed him around his waist and threw him back, causing him to strike his head on the floor.

The man began convulsing, vomiting, and making wheezing noises. The paramedics advised Welch to take him to the hospital for evaluation before sending him to jail. He was taken to urgent care and then to Tacoma General Hospital, where he was diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury.

No basis for the stop

The King County Office of Law Enforcement Oversight found that Welch did not have reasonable suspicion, much less probable cause, to detain the man. The Flock notification contained no description of the driver or passengers. Five minutes had passed between the Flock camera photographing the van and Welch’s arrival.

A silver car was parked in the lot, and the OLEO determined that it was “just as likely that [the two men] could have arrived in the silver car or on foot as in the stolen van.”

Welch’s other justification for the stop — the suspicious look — wasn’t supported by the video evidence. And if it were, it still would not justify a detention. OLEO cited Washington Supreme Court case law, which found that startled reactions or nervousness aren’t sufficient to justify a detention.

The OLEO also determined that Welch’s force was excessive. Given that the stop itself was unlawful, Welch was not entitled to use force at all. Welch also rushed into the encounter instead of waiting for another deputy, who was en route. The “amount of force he did use was likely unnecessary because it was the result of poor critical decision-making,” according to the report.

Hey, before you go…

Summer is almost here. Though the weather has cooled recently, protests are heating up, with actions at City Hall as well as some more demonstrations across Lake Washington in Seattle’s wicked stepsister, Bellevue. This week’s theme is protests (and the criminalization thereof).

Supercommuters getting super OT

King County Sheriff “super commuters” are traveling all the way from Idaho, and they’re logging tons of overtime. A clique of “super commuters” from Idaho in King County's metro bike patrol was bullying Sergeant David Hoag, so he got payback by filing a complaint, alleging, among other things, that the ringleader, rival Sergeant Dusty Davis, had racked up massive amounts of overtime. CAD logs showed that Davis didn't take a single call on some shifts that were as long as 22 hours. Hoag also told internal investigators Davis once bragged about torturing women prisoners when he was in the army—Davis denied this but admitted to being “exterior security” at a detention camp.

Review of May 24 Protest Response Gets Rowdy

May 12, 2026

The Seattle City Council Public Safety Committee held a review of the brutal Seattle police response to Cal Anderson in May 2025, when SPD violently arrested 24 community members on behalf of an anti-trans hate rally. The Office of the Inspector General gave a presentation about the Sentinel Event Review (SER), but only after public commenters pointed out that victims were excluded from this “accountability” process. The committee responded by calling multiple recesses over "disruptions" before finally shutting the hearing down and going remote. Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck said she was present at that protest and had chest pain for a week due to exposure to SPD pepper spray.

When Councilmember Dionne Foster asked about Lt. Matthew Didier’s “fuck people up” remarks, the OIG said the process was about systemic issues, not individuals, adding that it was said already “late in the day after several arrests.” Deputy Chief Yvonne Underwood noted that SPD needs to find “different verbiage” for “agitators” and “bad actors” instead of using “antifa” and “black bloc”. Most of the other recommendations were variations on “more training”. The phrase “police legitimacy” came up several times. We wouldn't want an obscene overreaction over a few balloons to “delegitimize” the police in the eyes of the public. Balloons (or candles, rocks, and sticks on the ground) are super serious police business!

You Must Be Thetan Level III to Ride

The viral Scientology ‘speed runs’ have reached Seattle. A social media trend emerged out of LA this spring where groups of people try to run as far through the organization's mysterious buildings (compounds?) without getting caught. The videos have goofy sound effects, and sometimes people wear costumes. It’s all pretty silly, but the trend has even reached as far as Prague and Amsterdam. Now, Scientology is trying to pursue hate crime charges over this trend. Over the weekend, there were arrests at the Scientology building near Seattle Center allegedly related to one of these speed runs, and they are apparently pressuring local prosecutors to press hate crime charges — probably because this trend is affecting recruiting for this predatory organization.

It’s Now Illegal to Make Bellevue War Criminals Uncomfortable

May 19, 2026

The Bellevue City Council approved a protest buffer zone for “targeted residential protest" for Rep. Adam Smith and his support of the US-backed Israeli genocide of Palestine. Following protests against Rep. Smith at his Bellevue Home by Seattle Against War (SAW), the Bellevue City Council voted through protest buffer zones basically on his behalf. This would cover four or more people, with or without signs/amplifiers, and makes it a gross misdemeanor - up to 364 days in jail and a $5,000 fine. The vote was 6-1 in favor, with only CM Naren Briar voting against it. On Tuesday, a small group of SAW protesters gathered in the street outside Smith's house to protest the ordinance, which goes into effect 30 days after passage. A handful of Bellevue police blocked the driveway, but there were no arrests at the time of writing.

The King County Sheriff’s Office terminated Deputy James Taylor last month for lying about sexual relationships with women he met on duty. Internal investigators were looking into allegations that Taylor forced himself on a vulnerable woman in Ballard when they discovered “inappropriate” text exchanges with six other women, according to records obtained by DivestSPD.

In the previous case, Taylor began a close relationship with a woman who was in crisis and attempting to kill herself with pills when they first met. She said Taylor later took advantage of her while she was so intoxicated that she could not consent. The county prosecutor and the sheriff’s office both stopped short of finding that Taylor had sexually assaulted the woman, but he was suspended for four days on lesser allegations.

Though Taylor maintained that the relationship was strictly platonic, the woman said his body language, texts, and speech sent different signals. She showed investigators texts where he called her by pet names like “sweetie” and “baby.” Taylor had deleted the corresponding text thread on his department-issued phone.

The investigator asked Taylor if he normally used those words in friendly conversations. Taylor said he did, so the detective searched his phone and found text exchanges with six different women. This included Taylor’s long-term girlfriend and other women he was either flirting with or having sex with while on duty.

One of the most noteworthy was Ms. L. Investigators found nudes and texts arranging for her to meet up with Taylor to have sex while he was on the clock. She said it was all consensual up until the point Taylor refused to wear a condom, but she felt pressured to go through with it.

The investigator summarized the sense of coercion Ms. L felt:

“[Ms. L] reported she followed through with that encounter because she felt obligated to do so. She reported this was because Deputy Taylor was a police officer, neighbors were unlikely to hear her protests in the event an altercation occurred, and because he had placed his duty belt (including his gun) on her bed as the sexual encounter took place, which made her uncomfortable.”

The earlier case ran into a wall on the issue of dishonesty. Though there were inconsistencies in Taylor’s story, commanders claimed that there was no “smoking gun.” This time, there was.

Taylor was evasive and played coy about the meaning of words like “pornographic” or “inappropriate. He claimed he didn’t recall Ms. L or recognize her in a photograph. It wasn’t until he was shown texts of him arranging to visit her apartment for sex that it finally dawned on him who she was. To quote the report: “In the span of 18 minutes, Deputy Taylor went from not knowing Ms. L to an admission that he had sex with her.”

This sustained finding of dishonesty was ultimately what got Taylor fired. As incredible as it might seem, Taylor might not have been dismissed for using his beat as a dating service or even for having sex on the job if he had told the truth. The other allegations mostly fall under “conduct unbecoming” and are considered less serious misconduct.

Summarizing, the Office of Law Enforcement Oversight wrote that “community members should have the right to move about their daily lives without a deputy using what is reflective of a predatory practice via the use of a smile, a polite disposition, and a badge to gain trust and accost them for his own personal enjoyment.”

Before you go…

They called him “Sergeant Hog.”

Sometimes, it was “Sergeant Biden.” Members of the King County Bicycle Emphasis Enforcement Squad, abbreviated as “BEES,” teased Sgt. David Hoag about his age, joking that he wore a diaper. They broke the lock off his locker and filled it with trash, put up mocking signs around the office, and wrapped his car in plastic wrap.

The squad had always had a juvenile prank culture—and Hoag apparently gave as well as he got—but something had changed. This was more mean-spirited. Hoag blamed the unit’s other sergeant, Dusty Davis. He believed Davis was trying to harass him into retirement.

Hoag told internal investigators that Davis once bragged about torturing women prisoners when he was in the army. Drawing an analogy, Davis allegedly said that “if you apply constant pressure, people will either break or leave.” Davis admitted to being “exterior security” at a detention camp but denied the rest.

Eventually, Hoag did leave, but he got his revenge on the way out. Before he retired, Hoag filed a complaint against Davis, containing 25 separate allegations of misconduct.

In addition to the bullying and mistreatment, Hoag accused Davis of sleeping on the job, abusing overtime, and showing favoritism to a clique of “supercommuters” within the squad, who, like Davis, lived in Idaho and traveled all the way across the state to work in King County.

Commanders and internal investigators at the sheriff’s office seemed to focus more on questions of professionalism, like whether Davis called a deputy named Ramos “Gaymos” or if he ever used the phrase “soggy biscuit.” The allegation that Davis and the other supercommuters were logging massive amounts of overtime and not working was apparently treated less seriously.

The internal affairs detective reviewed a sample of days Davis worked and found multiple days when he worked over 16 consecutive hours without taking a single call. On some days, he was seen in civilian clothes at the BEES office, when he was assigned to supervise a beat an hour’s drive away.

Davis would sign up to augment shifts that had adequate staffing, and did so as a deputy, not a sergeant. He had an underling, usually Deputy John Cotchaleovitch, approve his overtime requests.

Hoag claimed that Davis bypassed normal channels to assign more overtime to his friends, who lived out of state, including Deputy Cotchaleovitch, Deputy Cesar Molina-Sisimit, Deputy Christopher Travers, and Deputy Josiah Satterfield. All of them denied receiving special treatment.

Cotchaleovitch called the investigation a “witch hunt.”

However, Major Todd Morrell, chief of the Metro Transit Police, reviewed the squad’s overtime and found the supercommuters’ overtime use was a “country mile” beyond their peers. After the investigation began, Morrell suspended emphasis overtime in Metro, but he claimed the move was unrelated.

In the end, KCSO commanders sustained only seven out of the 25 allegations, all of which were classified as “general” or non-serious misconduct. Most of these involved Davis’ inappropriate behavior toward Hoag. Only one of the overtime allegations was sustained, and it was treated as a performance issue.

Major Marcus Williams wrote that there was “credible evidence” to support the rest of the allegations, but the “ambiguity of the General Orders Manual or the specific direction given by [Metro Transit Police] command would make it difficult to sustain the violation.”

Davis was suspended for only four days and transferred out of the Metro Transit Police. Undersheriff Jesse Anderson called Davis’ conduct “appalling” but added that he “has an opportunity to learn from this experience by changing his ways and show[ing] that he can put this behind him.”

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News in Brief

Community Calls for Probe Into Knees on Necks

April 28

Last week, Seattle police officers were accused of using banned knee-on-neck restraints on people detained at a recent protest against a Town Hall Seattle event, featuring Noa Cochva, former Miss Israel, Israeli army veteran, and Gaza genocide apologist. Community members and elected officials are calling for all officers seen using that tactic to be identified, investigated, and suspended. The Office of Police Accountability has only issued sustained findings for this behavior against one officer. Joshua McMullen was caught on camera kneeling on the neck of an arrestee during the George Floyd Protests in 2020. He was issued a written reprimand.

Diversions Down, Arrests Up

April 28

City Council heard updates on the LEAD Diversion program. At public comment, they heard from election losers Sara Nelson and Tanya Woo, as well as regular loser Andrea Suarez of We Heart Seattle. A big takeaway from that presentation was that pre-arrest diversions were down 41 percent in the last two years, while arrests were up 47 percent. SPD COO Sarah Smith, who recently replaced Brian Maxey, said at the presentation that these numbers reflected low staffing. With more officers, they’ll be “able to do more” diversions instead of prioritizing arrests, Smith claimed.

Federal Charges for Protest Affray

April 29

Protestors in St. Paul, MN, were indicted by a grand jury after a TPUSA streamer snitch-tagged Harmeet Dhillon, Andy Ngo’s former lawyer and the current chief of the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division. Now, all the other aspiring grifters out there harassing entire communities will likely be emboldened to do the same. The Civil Rights Division is also currently investigating the University of Washington for its handling of pro-Palestine protests on campus, claiming the university coddled "antisemitism." Never mind the fact that the school harshly cracked down on protestors. And speaking of aspiring grifters, retired SPD detective Glenn Kerns actually helped stir up the racist moral panic about fraud at home-based daycare centers that has impacted Somali communities across the country.

Renton Restarts (Then Re-Stops) Flock Cameras

May 4

A week after Renton announced that it would turn its Flock cameras back on, Renton’s City Council voted to pause the program again on Monday. The department’s camera program was temporarily suspended in March until the State legislature could pass a law regulating license plate readers. But the program wasn’t completely put on hold, apparently. UWCHR found that their data and that of several other Washington agencies had been shared with the feds. Renton said they didn’t know. They claim to have changed the sharing settings while keeping the cameras on.

ICYMI

Cop Shoots Wall, Does Drunken Hit-and-Run

Former Seattle Police Officer Robert West had an exemplary run last April. First, he shot the wall of the North Precinct while he was gassing up his cruiser. Later that month, he crashed his truck while drunk on White Claws, then left the scene and illegally parked across two driveways. Incredibly, he wasn’t fired, but West probably assumed he would be. He apparently lateraled to another department in Pierce County before the investigation ended. We’re still trying to confirm where. If he’s still in his probationary period, we can probably get him fired. Stay tuned!

Officer Reprimanded for Smashing Megaphone Into Protester’s Face

Last year, Christian fundamentalists rallied at City Hall, and trans rights protesters showed up to oppose them. Though the rally was unpermitted and mostly made up of folks from out of town, the Seattle Police Department was out in full force to protect them. A protester was leading the chant, “Trans rights are human rights,” through a megaphone. After she pointed it at him and said, “You’re pathetic,” Officer Jordan Wallace lost his cool and pushed the bullhorn into her face, riling up the crowd. He was reprimanded for violating the department’s de-escalation policy.

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Last April, there was a wall-involved shooting at the North Precinct. Seattle Police Officer Robert West was practicing his draw at a department gas station. On the third draw, his finger brushed the trigger, and he fired one round into the concrete.

West received a three-day suspension for negligently handling his firearm, according to a disciplinary report released Friday. The Office of Police Accountability sustained only professionalism allegations, finding that West did not violate the department’s lethal force policy.

There is no general requirement in Seattle police policy to “safely handle firearms,” the OPA found. In response to this case, the agency recommended adding the “Four Cardinal Rules” of firearm safety to the department manual, but Chief Shon Barnes declined.

West told the OPA that he occasionally practices his draw before a shift to keep his firearm skills current. When he was in the Marines, West was a range officer responsible for enforcing firearm safety, according to a source who has requested anonymity. He said that he thought practicing while waiting for his tank to fill was a “productive use of his time.”

He said that he typically places his trigger finger on the slide while drawing and believed that he had done so. West said he was surprised when the gun went off. However, the OPA investigator noted that West’s index finger “appeared to be positioned within the trigger guard area.”

It was a bad month for West. As we previously reported, West did a hit-and-run while apparently intoxicated last April, and the woman he was with accused him of domestic violence. He received a 15-day suspension.

West has left the Seattle Police Department and is rumored to have lateraled to another department in the Puget Sound area. We’ll follow up and update when we find out where he went.

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Seattle Police Officer Jordan Wallace unnecessarily escalated by pushing a megaphone into a trans rights activist’s face last May, the Office of Police Accountability found. Wallace was issued a written reprimand.

On May 27, 2025, evangelical megachurches held an unpermitted rally outside Seattle City Hall billed as the “Rattle in Seattle.” The fundamentalist groups were protesting the City for allegedly discriminating against their anti-LGBTQ+ event called “Don’t Mess With Our Kids” on the Saturday before. The City assigned more than a hundred police officers to protect the event, and they arrested 28 counterdemonstrators.

Wallace was on a line of officers facing a group of trans rights protesters. A young woman with a bullhorn was chanting, “Trans rights are human rights,” and the crowd repeated it back.

At one point, she directed the bullhorn toward Wallace and said: “You’re pathetic!” He pushed the bullhorn's tip, forcing it back into her face. She lowered the bullhorn and said, “That’s my mouth.” Wallace yelled, “Get that out of my face now,” and the crowd became agitated. He later told his sergeant, “So, she put the blowhorn within like a foot in my face, so I pushed her back with the blow hand. So, that’s what happened.”

The sergeant replied, “That’s cool. Just chill, dude.”

The OPA found that the push itself was justified and “non-reportable” force, arguing that the sound from the bullhorn was hurting Wallace’s ears, distracting him, and making it harder to do his job. Though the anonymous complaint stated that the woman’s lip was busted, the OPA wrote that it could not see any injuries in the brief moment that her unmasked face appeared in the video.

However, it sustained findings that Wallace failed to de-escalate the encounter. Wallace told the OPA that he couldn’t issue commands to point the bullhorn away from him because of the loud noise, but the agency found this unconvincing. Given the cadence of her chanting, there were several moments of quiet when Wallace had an opportunity to tell her not to point the bullhorn at him.

The contradiction in the OPA’s ruling is noteworthy. Force must be “necessary, reasonable, and proportionate” to be lawful. According to the Supreme Court, “necessary” means “no reasonably effective alternative exists.” Here, the agency acknowledges that Wallace had an alternative course of action — issuing verbal commands — but chose to use force.

According to the OPA report, Chief Shon Barnes’ disciplinary options ranged from a written reprimand to a one-day suspension. He chose the lowest option, as he has in 70 percent of cases for which we have data.

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Seattle Police Officer Robert West is somehow still on the force after crashing while drunk and leaving the scene, according to a disciplinary report released last Friday.

The Office of Police Accountability found sufficient evidence that West committed at least two gross misdemeanors — reckless endangerment and leaving the scene of a collision — but the agency recommended only a 15-day suspension.

On the morning of April 25, 2025, Bonney Lake police discovered West’s truck parked across two driveways with its emergency lights blinking. The responding officer noticed that the front-end was damaged. Empty cans of White Claw were strewn throughout the interior, and unopened cans were sitting outside. The truck matched the description of a vehicle spotted at around 4 a.m., driving erratically, running red lights, speeding, and swerving in and out of oncoming traffic.

West’s truck was parked outside the home of a woman he was seeing casually. A Washington State Patrol trooper interviewed the woman, who said she had been riding with West that night. The woman said that they were arguing, and West allegedly grabbed her by the wrist, flinging her head into the vehicle’s interior.

The woman, who wasn’t wearing a seatbelt, claimed West purposefully slammed the brakes to make her head hit the dashboard.

In his OPA interview, West said that he didn’t recall much about that night. He said that he remembers drinking, but couldn’t say how much. West supposedly could not remember getting into an argument with his passenger or striking a vehicle.

West admitted to driving his truck that night while intoxicated. However, he couldn’t explain how it was damaged.

The OPA cited West’s impaired memory as “strong evidence” that he was extremely intoxicated that night. The agency also pointed to the 911 calls about his driving and his poor parking job. In the end, the OPA found that they had more than enough evidence to prove he had broken two of the laws he was accused of violating. At the same time, the OPA argued it could not establish that he had committed DV assault.

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Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes has a light touch when it comes to misconduct. In seven out of 10 cases reviewed during his first year in office, Barnes issued punishments that were at the bottom or below the range of options suggested by the Office of Police Accountability, according to DivestSPD’s analysis of disciplinary data.

We reviewed 37 cases of officer misconduct that ended in discipline and found that Barnes opted for the lightest punishment nearly 70 percent of the time. That’s significantly higher than his predecessor, Chief Adrian Diaz, who was no strict disciplinarian. An audit by the Office of the Inspector General found that Diaz issued bottom-of-the-range discipline roughly half the time.

In some cases, Barnes meted out punishments well below the range for incidents involving serious harm to the community and public embarrassment to the department. One of the most notable was the beating of a homeless man at a bus stop in 2024.

The OPA recommended a suspension of 10 to 15 days and a demotion for one of the officers, who was caught on camera striking the man repeatedly with a billy club. Instead, Barnes issued him a one-day suspension and transferred him to the West Precinct, where he was again captured punching another homeless man and taunting the crowd.

When issuing discipline, the chief ostensibly considers the officer’s record as an aggravating factor. The officer in this case, Sergeant Nathan Patterson, has been named in police brutality civil suits with damages totaling over a million dollars and has multiple sustained complaints for unprofessionalism and excessive force.

In another case, Barnes issued a reprimand to an officer who ran a stop sign while looking down at his computer and struck a cyclist. That officer, Nana Appiah-Agyekum, had had 10 collisions in seven years, eight of which were preventable, and negligently fired off a pistol inside a homeless shelter. The OPA suggested a suspension of one to two days.

Officer David Foley submitted fraudulent timesheets and took home over $5,000 in unearned overtime pay, which is equal to felony theft. The options were a 30-day suspension or termination. Barnes chose to let Foley keep his job, but he retired before discipline was issued.

Most Severe Punishments Still Light

It’s noteworthy that when Barnes did choose to issue discipline at the highest end of the range, the misconduct often merited a much steeper punishment than the OPA prescribed.

For instance, Barnes suspended Officer Tanner Jay for three days after he grossly mishandled a theft call. The OPA also found clear evidence that Jay lied to investigators, the penalty for which is presumed to be termination. Previously, the OPA found obvious signs of dishonesty in another case involving Jay.

When Sergeant Jamin Dobson used his body-worn camera to spy on his coworker in violation of the state’s two-party consent law, Barnes issued him a six-day suspension. This is a gross misdemeanor in Washington state, punishable by up to a year in jail. Dobson was later terminated for lying during that investigation.

Guild Pressure on an Outside Hire

There are strong institutional incentives for police chiefs in Seattle to go easy on their officers. They’re often cautious about harming morale or provoking a revolt by being perceived as being unfair or disloyal to the troops. Barnes’ predecessors frequently disagreed publicly with the OPA’s findings and overturned discipline for serious misconduct.

Chief Carmen Best overruled the suggested discipline for an officer who lied during an OPA investigation into an embarrassing incident where he stalked a community member at his workplace. Even Chief Kathleen O’Toole, whose name is synonymous with reform, let three officers off the hook for firing hysterically at a bystander’s truck.

However, Barnes’ use of kid gloves points to something else. Former Mayor Bruce Harrell brought him in from Wisconsin to preside over a department riven by internal conflict at all levels. But hiring an outsider is a double-edged sword.

On the one hand, he is independent of factional struggles within the command and is only loyal to his patrons at City Hall. On the other hand, he has no allies, the rank-and-file is suspicious of him, and he must constantly prove that he will stand by his subordinates to keep a firm grasp on the department.

All of these factors leave Barnes particularly vulnerable to the machinations of the Seattle Police Officers Guild. When Chief Diaz was in office, the guild flooded the OPA with dozens of anonymous complaints — some substantive, some less than. One in particular caught traction in the press, and Diaz was forced out.

Now, the guild has its sights on Barnes, and it’s leaking out a steady stream of hit pieces through its mouthpiece, Jason Rantz. It probably won’t end well for Barnes or for us. Even if Barnes manages to thread the needle and survive for the next few years, we’ll almost certainly see a steady deterioration of police accountability in the city as discipline breaks down and a horde of poorly vetted new hires pour in.

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The image of Officer Brian Muoio standing over two protesters, pepper-spraying them as they huddled on the ground, became a symbol of the violent police response to a counterdemonstration against an anti-trans concert in Cal Anderson Park last May. It was attached to or referenced in dozens of complaints to the Office of Police Accountability about the department’s mishandling of the event.

In its 28-page report on the incident, the OPA claimed that the picture doesn’t tell the whole story. It’s said that a picture is worth a thousand words — the OPA spent nearly 8,000 attempting to explain away Muoio’s actions and those of four other officers named in the complaint.

Of course, the agency had to rely on that picture along with Muoio’s force reports and snippets of the incident captured on other officers’ bodyworn cameras because Muoio didn’t activate his camera, which was the only sustained finding.

Community Response

Earlier that afternoon, members of the Community Response Group, the anti-protest unit Muoio belongs to, had ridden into the park on bicycles and made several arrests after someone released a balloon belonging to the fundamentalist group on the edge of the concert. Officers lost sight of the original suspects and started detaining or arresting anyone wearing black bloc.

Later, they set up a short aluminum barrier between the counterprotesters and the concert. CRG officers went back into the park to arrest a woman who had knocked down the fence. According to Muoio’s force report, when he grabbed the woman’s arm, she “twisted” and tried to escape. Another woman came up and threw a paper sign in his face, Muoio claimed. When she tried to grab him, he pushed and pepper-sprayed her, then she fell.

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Muoio explained the image of him pepper-spraying the two on the ground. He claimed that both of them were “clawing and swatting” at him and “advancing” on him while they were on their knees, so he pepper-sprayed them at the “eyebrow line,” but they turned away at the last second and “turtled.”

Describing that moment in the report, the OPA wrote that the two “extended their arms,” but never explicitly states that the video corroborates Muoio’s claim that they were swatting at him. There is a relatively clear shot taken from another officer behind Muoio.

Notably, neither of the two protesters was ever charged with assaulting an officer, and their misdemeanor obstruction charges were never prosecuted. Explaining its decision not to sustain excessive force allegations, the OPA wrote that the “picture did not capture the entire altercation and the rapid speed at which the altercation unfolded.”

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Shot in the Back

In another incident shortly after this, a man threw an umbrella at the feet of CRG Lieutenant Matthew Didier, and officers arrested him. Another man walked up to within 20 feet of where they had the man pinned down. Officer Matthew Clark, armed with a pepper-ball gun, locked eyes with him. The man turned away and started running, and Clark shot him in the back five times.

In his OPA interview, Clark referred to “force science,” a pseudoscience used primarily to justify deadly shootings. Its founder, William Lewinski, often testifies in court cases, explaining that there’s a “reactionary gap.” In other words, when an officer determines that a threat exists and decides to fire, they’re effectively locked in and can’t stop in response to split-second changes in the situation.

Clark paraphrased this: “I made a decision that that person was a threat. And as I raised my pepperball and was deploying the pepperball, that person changed their mind and turned around and ran away.”

However, the video shows that Clark did not raise his gun until the man’s back was already turned, and Clark states in his force report that he aimed for the back. It’s also noteworthy that Clark never described the man as doing anything threatening — only that he was 20 feet away, which is “a distance sufficient to throw objects at [the arresting officers].“

Apparently, these explanations were enough for the OPA. The so-called accountability agency wrote that the man’s “unexpected decision to flee during that one-second window did not render [Clark] pepperball deployments excessive.” The OPA even cited his turning around as evidence that he was probably up to no good: “[He] was the only counter protester who fled as [Clark] quickly approached, suggesting he may have had criminal intent.”

Clark was given retraining, though, for failing to issue a verbal warning before he fired.

A Seattle motorcycle cop was suspended for giving a woman a bogus ticket after he nearly side-swiped her car last year, according to a recent disciplinary report. The woman told the Office of Police Accountability that Officer Daniel Espinoza merged into her lane without activating his lights or sirens, then stopped and ticketed her for failing to yield to him.

Last May, the woman and Espinoza were stopped next to each other at a red light. She was in the left lane, and he was in the right. Espinoza claimed that he was attempting to stop a truck in front of her that had pulled an illegal U-Turn earlier. His bodycam shows him entering her lane and coming within inches of her front bumper.

He told the OPA that she sped up and wouldn’t let him get in front of her, so he pulled her over for failing to yield to an emergency vehicle. Espinoza said that his emergency lights were on when he tried to merge into her lane, but the bodycam does not show him activating his lights until he pulls the woman over.

When he walked up to the car window, he immediately began bombarding the woman with questions: “What are you doing?” “How can you not see me?”

Confused at Espinoza’s hostility, she tried to answer the questions as best as she could. Then, Epinoza asked if she was on drugs or drunk, which the woman assumed was just a means to bully her because he never made her submit to a field test.

Espinoza wrote her a ticket for failing to yield and expired tabs, though she said her new tabs were clipped to her registration. He handed her the citation without any explanation. The municipal court later dismissed the citation.

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The OPA ruled that the stop was unconstitutional because Espinoza had no reasonable suspicion that the woman had broken any law when he pulled her over. Espinoza also acted unprofessionally, the OPA found, arguing that his questions about whether she had been drinking or using drugs were meant purely to insult her. He was unnecessarily hostile and abrasive, never identifying himself or explaining the basis for the stop.

Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes imposed a two-day suspension, the lowest of discipline in the recommended range. This is far from the first time Espinoza has been investigated for the same behavior.

In the last five years, he’s had four sustained complaints, including two suspensions, for unlawful stops, retaliation, and unprofessionalism. In one case, he cited a man in retaliation and stormed off after the man asked for his name and badge number. In another, Espinoza blew up when a man requested a supervisor.

He was previously suspended for doing nothing about an assault while working security off-duty and for getting arrested while trying to solicit sex from an undercover officer in Lakewood.

Espinoza makes $77.57/hr. and made $257,296 in 2024.

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Two Seattle police officers were paid for a combined total more than 80 overtime hours they did not work, according to reports the Office of Police Accountability released last Friday. Officers left before their overtime shifts ended but submitted slips saying that they had worked a complete shift.

West Precinct Officer John Shields prefiled his overtime request forms and left work anywhere from 10 minutes to over three hours early on nearly 30 shifts, according to one disciplinary report. North Precinct Officer David Foley, who retired before the investigation finished, routinely left 90 minutes to two hours before his overtime shift ended but claimed to have worked the full shift, a separate investigation found.

The OPA argued that it could not prove Shields had criminal intent to defraud the city, noting that in some instances, he worked more hours than his overtime requests showed. However, he was overpaid considerably more than he was underpaid. Shields was paid for around 42.5 unworked hours and not paid for 9.75 hours that he worked.

Shields was “at best, extremely lax or, at worst, reckless in tracking and recording his time,” the OPA wrote. There were also “discrepancies” in the start times. Shields explained he sometimes prefiled his overtime request and showed up late for an overtime shift: “When I signed up, I told the sergeant I would be there at 0400. I tried to prioritize the wellness aspect of it and just come in at – you know, when my body, like, allows me to.”

For violating the department’s timekeeping policy, Shields was suspended for 27 hours, which is 5.75 hours less than the net amount of overtime hours he was overpaid.

Shields was previously given a training referral after an anonymous complaint alleged that he was “deeply sleeping” in a parking garage. Though the OPA found he had been logged onto a call that he didn’t respond to, rendering him unavailable for three hours, it ostensibly did not have enough evidence to sustain the allegation.

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‘The way it’s always been’

While Foley was paid for only slightly more unworked hours, the OPA found more evidence of intent, so the Seattle Police Department opened a criminal investigation. The detective interviewed all of Foley’s sergeants, including Sgt. Paige Maks, who is consistently one of the department’s top overtime earners and made over half a million in 2024 (she was also suspended for sleeping in her cruiser).

Maks told the detective that she was unaware of any of her officers logging off before the times written on their overtime sheets, adding that they’re “all adults.” In the report, the detective wrote Maks “insinuated” that she trusts the officers under her supervision to submit accurate overtime slips.

In his later OPA interview, Foley claimed that Maks was shocked when she learned of the criminal investigation and that she told him it was “standard practice” to allow officers who worked overtime to augment shifts to leave early. She denied this.

Foley agreed to a voluntary interview with the detective. He told the detective that it was an “accepted practice” to leave at 7 pm and claim overtime until 9 pm. The detective summarized his statements as “ other officers do it as well, and it’s the way it’s always been.”

He said that he did this with the approval of his supervisors Sgt. Joseph Renick and Sgt. Shane Burditt. But Burditt and Renick, who were both investigated alongside Foley, denied giving him permission to leave early and claim the full shift. Still, one said he was aware that some officers log off CAD early with “permission or implied permission,” but that was 45 minutes at most.

The detective spoke to another supervisor who wasn’t named in the complaint. They said that the lieutenant at the precinct gave sergeants discretion to release their officers as early as third-watch roll call, which happens at 7 pm. Though Foley was paid over $5,000 he did not earn (potentially a first-degree felony), the detective found there was not probable cause to charge him.

Foley’s sergeants had corroborated, in part, his statements that this was an “accepted practice,” and the lack of oversight Maks described “made it possible Foley’s behavior was never corrected.” Therefore, the detective wrote that she did not have proof Foley “willfully and wrongfully intended to deprive the city of services.”

The King County prosecutor’s office did not charge Foley. The decline letter read: “This timecard discrepancy problem at [Foley’s] Precinct appears to be prevalent. However, it appears to be more of an administrative rather than a criminal matter.”

While the OPA found that Foley may have had a “technical defense” against a felony theft charge, it still sustained the allegation that he violated city and department policy. Under the collective bargaining agreement, he can only claim overtime for the hours he worked.

The OPA wrote: “While it is certainly reasonable to presume a supervisor can allow an employee to leave an overtime shift early, it is unreasonable to assume the employee could claim—or a supervisor could authorize—unworked overtime hours.”

If Foley had not resigned, he would have received a 30-day suspension, even though the OPA also sustained dishonesty allegations, the penalty for which is “presumed termination” under the police guild contract.

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The honor system

Maks and Shields’ supervisor, Sgt. Justin Bedford, both received training referrals. Like Maks, Bedford admitted to signing off on Shields’ overtime requests without scrutiny, trusting him to submit accurate slips.

Bedford said it would be impractical to monitor all his officers' entries and logins, given that he was sometimes the only supervisor and had as many as 14 officers under him at once. At the same time, Bedford admitted to signing Shields’ overtime requests for days when Bedford was absent for training and other overtime requests when he had no way of knowing how many hours officers worked.

The police department is still without a modern time-keeping system — officers don’t punch in and out on a time clock — so the only way to catch time theft is by cross-referencing building access cards and CAD logins. This is an onerous task for supervisors, leading to poor supervision and ample opportunities for abuse.

In 2024, the OPA recommended implementing an overtime-tracking system, but SPD declined, citing “citywide operational issues with Workday,” the beleaguered payroll software the city adopted that year. The police guild and several other city unions have filed unfair labor practice complaints against the City of Seattle about the software, alleging that it does not track hours or overtime properly.

Officer John Shields made $233,897, and Officer David Foley made $354,939 in 2024.

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Seattle Police Officer Benjamin Stanford, stripped of his gun by a court order in 2021, has finally been terminated, according to a notice of separation filed with the Washington Criminal Justice Training Commission. Stanford’s wife won a protective order in January of that year, alleging that he pushed her down while she was carrying their infant son.

A court-appointed psychologist evaluated Stanford and classified him as “Level 3,” signifying that he was at the highest risk to reoffend. The court ordered Stanford to surrender his weapons, and he did so on Jan. 25.

After the surrender, the Office of Police Accountability opened an investigation into his wife’s domestic violence claims. Investigators made a perfunctory attempt to contact his ex-wife. The OPA detective called once and wrote a letter that went unanswered.

Relying solely on Stanford’s version of events and police reports, the OPA issued “inconclusive” findings, even though Stanford admitted to threatening his wife at least once. He told the OPA that he said to his wife, “If I could hit you, I would, but I can't.”

The OPA found this statement “concerning,” but did not believe sustaining a professionalism allegation would be “appropriate,” citing Stanford’s explanation that she “provoked” him. The OPA wrote that the comments were made “off-duty and in reactive anger,” concluding that issuing sustained findings “would stretch its jurisdiction too far and wade too deeply into the personal lives of SPD personnel.”

Following the OPA investigation, Stanford returned to duty, but he was limited to performing administrative tasks in the Southwest Precinct.

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In the years since, the courts have repeatedly renewed the protective order and denied Stanford’s motions to modify the requirement to surrender his weapons. Although his wife moved back to Georgia, the court recognized that there are still “opportunities for conflict,” as Stanford travels to Georgia often, and a judge ruled that she has a “credible fear.”

In each of its denial orders, the court explained that Stanford had refused to take responsibility for his actions and would not take the court-ordered class parenting class called “DV Dads.” Stanford took another class from a different provider, “Parenting After DV,” in 2023 and attempted to unilaterally substitute it for the class the court required.

When the protective order was issued, Stanford denied committing domestic violence against his wife and child, calling the order “invalid” and a “miscarriage of justice.” Denying his final motion to terminate in 2025, the court argued that he never retracted those statements or admitted harm.

In other words, if Stanford had taken a class and acknowledged that he had done wrong, he would probably still be employed.

CONTENT NOTE: This post mentions child sexual abuse and incest.

A Seattle police sergeant will face no punishment for his failure to disclose to authorities that his son sexually abused his daughter, according to a recently released disciplinary report. While the Office of Police Accountability found Sergeant Tommy Caldwell violated the state’s mandatory reporting laws, a gross misdemeanor, and recommended a suspension of one to three days, Chief Shon Barnes did not issue discipline.

Nathaniel, Caldwell’s son from another marriage, confessed that he began sexually abusing his half-sister when he was 15 and she was 8. This continued until he was 23, long after he moved out of the house and into his own apartment.

The daughter told her parents about the abuse in 2022, but Caldwell said she begged him not to report it to the local police in Marysville, where the family lives. Eight months later, she “let it slip” while speaking to a counselor, who called child services.

Caldwell told the OPA that he did not know that police were required to report sexual abuse under state law and claimed to have never received training on the subject in his 12 years on the force. However, the OPA found a PowerPoint presentation on mandatory reporting from his time at the police academy.

He said that when he told his daughter that the abuse had to be reported, she “lost all composure, control, and fell down on the floor, and started screaming and crying,” Caldwell said that he then urged his daughter to tell her counselor.

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The OPA wrote that it understands “the weight of "[Caldwell’s] predicament” and that he “felt compelled to balance the needs of his children with the mandates of Washington State law and his professional obligations,” but it argued that there’s no carve-out in the law for parents who are police officers.

Furthermore, Caldwell did not notify Nathaniel’s mother, who had a minor daughter. He took his son’s word that Nathaniel had not sexually abused anyone else, and his son had access to a minor for eight months between the time Caldwell learned about the abuse and the day he was arrested.

One of the Seattle Police Department’s highest-paid sergeants was accused of abusing a pilot wellness program to shirk duty, according to a report released on Friday. Anh Koah Hoang, a field supervisor on first watch, was reportedly unreachable for around two hours, leaving an acting sergeant to assume his duties. According to employee records, Hoang had previously been counseled for multiple performance issues, including sleeping on the job.

Hoang’s supervisor, Lt. Thuc Duy Nguyen, filed a complaint with the Office of Police Accountability, claiming that Hoang violated the guidelines of a pilot “wellness hour” program he implemented.

Nguyen grants officers under his command one paid wellness hour per shift that they can use “as they see fit for their well-being.” Officers may use the wellness hour to nap, read, work out, cook, or scroll on their phones, but must remain accessible. The guidelines permit officers to log out, so they aren’t dispatched to low -priority calls, but they must keep their radios and phones on in the event of an emergency.

Hoang told the OPA that he responded to a direct request for a phone call from dispatch during his wellness hour, but he received no other calls during that time. The records OPA reviewed corroborated this account. However, the CAD logs showed that he was unavailable for service calls for two hours because he never logged out of the 30-minute meal break he took before starting his wellness hour.

Moreover, the OPA argued that taking his meal break consecutively with his wellness hour “created a significant period of time where Hoang was physically in his vehicle in the garage and not ‘directly supervising police officers.’”

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He also did not notify his lieutenant that he was taking the wellness hour, as required by the guidelines. Instead, Hoang told another officer of the same rank, fulfilling the letter of the guidelines but not the spirit.

The report also notes several performance problems in Hoang’s appraisals that were handled informally through counseling, including filing late and incomplete reports, sleeping on duty, and failing to appear to work on time without explanation.

Ultimately, the OPA did not find that Hoang violated SPD policy or Nguyen’s guidelines. He was issued a training referral.

In 2024, the last year for which we have data, Hoang made $297,797, including overtime.

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Peter Donovan was out for an early morning stroll in February when he says two Seattle police officers stopped him, ordered him to the ground at gunpoint, and knelt on his back, bruising or possibly fracturing his ribs.

North Precinct Officer John Randle and his partner were looking for an intoxicated driver who had crashed near Golden Gardens and fled the scene. Donovan was walking on the Burke-Gilman Trail close to the park’s entrance. The two officers detained Donovan because he was the only person near where the collision occurred.

When they walked up to him, shining a flashlight in his face, Donovan asked if he could take out his phone and record. Randle said that he could, but when Donovan pulled out his phone, the officer commanded him to get on his stomach and told him he was under arrest.

Donovan said he believed that they pulled their guns on him at this point, but it was difficult to tell with the flashlight shining in his eyes. Randle and his partner knelt on Donovan’s back, pressing his chest into the concrete. His phone was recording, but only captured audio. In the recording, Donovan can be heard crying out, “You’re hurting me.”

In his report, Randle explained his decision to handcuff Donovan. He said that Donovan’s fingertips were bleeding, which resembled airbag injuries he had observed in “dozens of vehicle collisions.”

However, it should be noted that while hand injuries are common in airbag deployments, they’re typically fractures, friction burns, or deep lacerations around the thumb, not light bleeding on the fingertips. Donovan explained that he bites his nails when he’s anxious.

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Randle also attempted to shore up his basis for the stop by describing Donovan as “sweating” and “pacing” when he pulled up. Donovan disputes this, saying he was walking a straight line up the trail and was not visibly sweating when he briefly appeared on the cell phone video.

After placing Donovan in the back of the police cruiser, Randle went back to the crash site and saw a circular dent on the windshield with long bits of brown hair coming from the glass, meaning the driver must have hit his head. He checked Donovan’s head and found no injuries, then released him.

Donovan went to the doctor later that day and reported pain in his rib. The doctor told him to come back if it got worse. Over the next few days, Donovan could feel the pain progressively worsen. The doctor found that his symptoms were consistent with a fractured or bruised rib. Though it didn’t appear on the X-ray, the doctor said tests frequently fail to capture hairline fractures in the rib area.

The Office of Police Accountability is currently investigating this case.