Bad Apple Baseball Cards: Hosea Crumpton
Detective Crumpton conducts background checks on potential recruits to weed out the same behavior that got him suspended over and over throughout his career.
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Police misconduct comes in many forms. Some cops commit crimes, some lie, and some are just jerks. Det. Hosea Crumpton falls into the last category. While most of Crumpton’s mideeds never made headlines, he has racked up an exceptional number of suspensions for unprofessionalism in his career.
Many of these complaints concern how Crumpton — a graduate of the Seattle Police Department’s vaunted Crisis Intervention Training program — treats people with mental disorders. Crumpton’s streak of complaints is so bad that the Office of Police Accountability wrote in one investigation that, “his continued unprofessional interactions with those he comes into contact with simply cannot be tolerated.”
After repeatedly embarrassing the department, Crumpton was taken off the streets and assigned to a desk job. Now, he’s responsible for conducting background checks on potential recruits at a time when SPD is lowering its standards to hire as many cops as possible.
Let’s review Crumpton’s unprofessional behavior over the last 10 years.
2016 Unprofessional response to man in crisis
A man called SPD to report a man in crisis hitting road signs with a stick
When Crumpton arrived, he forcefully moved the man to his cruiser to check him for weapons
After letting the man go, Crumpton followed him to another street, where he called him a “crazy ass” and told him he did not want to deal with him all night.
Afterwards, Crumpton was confronted by the initial caller
Crumpton repeatedly interrupted the reporting and got into his face, causing the man to demand that Crumpton back off
Crumpton was suspended for 10 days.
2018 Illegal detention at a bus stop
Crumpton and another officer, Bryan Grozav, arrived at a bus stop with 10 men who were intoxicated but had committed no crime.
Grozav illegally detained one of the men, forcing him to sit down after drawing his Taser.
Crumpton continued to hold the men at the bus stop, telling one of them to “sit down and shut up,” while also threatening to arrest them.
Crumpton repeatedly swore at, insulted, and threatened the men.
The men were never charged with any crimes.
Crumpton was suspended for 15 days for the illegal Terry stop and unprofessional behavior.
2018 Burning out of the precinct
A neighbor of the Southwest Precinct complained about Crumpton speeding out of the parking lot fast enough to spin the tires out
Crumpton said the complainant misidentified his car, but the complainant’s description of the driver matched Crumpton.
Crumpton was given a training referral, as there was no video evidence contradicting the complaint.
2018 Failure to arrest a domestic abuser
Crumpton and two other officers responded to a DV victim who needed help getting her things from the home of a man who had assaulted her the day before.
This was the second time in one night that officers were called.
The man had threatened to destroy and burn all of the victim’s belongings before police arrived.
While Crumpton was present, the man threatened to burn the victim’s deceased grandmother's belongings.
The victim told the officers that she had been threatened by the man repeatedly.
Crumpton ended the encounter by making fun of the man for crying and telling him, “I’m going home to a woman tonight.”
Crumpton was suspended for 15 days for failing to use his discretion to arrest the man despite the danger he posed to his victim, as well as his unprofessional comments
2020 Unprofessionalism and alleged dishonesty
2020OPA-0124
Crumpton and Officer Andrei Constantin, who was later fired for social media posts, responded to a man who was allegedly trespassing.
The man asked Crumpton to show him the “No Trespassing” signs, to which Crumpton replied, “I’m gonna show you some handcuffs if you don’t leave.”
Crumpton said, “Nobody wants to talk to you,” after the man went to speak with another person.
When the man turned to leave, both officers laughed at him and made jokes that he was an “Antifa member with his mask off.”
The officers turned off their bodycams, though they remained at the scene to watch the man.
Crumpton alleged that the man made threats to beat him and kill his family.
The footage had no sound during the second encounter because the bodycam was in “pre-buffer mode.”
The man claimed that he never made threats and was arrested for no reason.
Crumpton was suspended for 30 hours for his unprofessionalism and for failing to record the encounter.