South precinct sergeant: 'Gotta hit those people of color the hardest'
Named in several suits, Nathan Patterson previously joked about breaking a baton on someone's back. OPA recently found he used excessive force against a homeless man.
Bodyworn cameras are meant to document stops, arrests, use of force, and other police contacts with the public, but sometimes they capture a little slice of a cop’s life—including things they may not want others to see.
When Seattle police Sergeant Nathan Patterson left his bodycam running for over two and a half hours, it recorded him talking to other officers, muttering to himself, doodling, quoting lines from a movie, singing, and using the restroom.
Later, Patterson climbed into a police van alone. When he turned it on, Patterson heard a radio ad for a nurses and caregivers union that included the line, “Suspending retirement contributions to shore up profit margins and dole out millions to highly paid executives will hit people of color the hardest…”
Patterson started riffing on that, “Gotta hit those people of color the hardest. We gotta hit those people of color.”
The Office of Police Accountability report noted that when Patterson made the comments, his voice “noticeably changed pitch and inflection from his baseline speaking pitch.”
‘No Recollection’
SPD General Counsel Rebecca Boatright discovered the “inappropriate audio” and forwarded it to the OPA. The footage is from July 31, 2020, but Boatright did not file the complaint until last year.
It’s unclear from the OPA report how she came across this recording, which was unrelated to any police activity. Boatright was also the SPD official who forwarded the video of former police guild Vice-President Daniel Auderer laughing and joking about Jaahnavi Kandula’s death to the OPA. In that instance, a public records officer flagged the comments.
In his OPA interview, Patterson said he “didn’t have any recollection” of hearing the union ad, adding that he “was just parroting what was said on the commercial.”
Patterson went on to say that “this is all very Orwellian.” He said that everything is recorded and “subject to the government use of technologies to single out things that they’ve said in years past,” which seems to be a reference to an AI bodycam analysis software SPD discontinued in 2023.
The OPA issued “inconclusive” findings on the bias allegations against Patterson, citing the “elevated standard of review” for so-called stigmatizing offenses under the police association’s contract.
Explaining its findings, the OPA wrote:
OPA recognizes that, to many, this decision may be deeply unsatisfying. To some, [Patterson]’s comments may appear clearly unprofessional or biased. To others, they may appear “obvious” that [Patterson] was talking to himself in a stream-of-conscious manner and that his words were essentially meaningless ramblings, signifying nothing more than a passing thought.
Violent History
While the OPA argued that Patterson’s comments could reasonably be interpreted as “meaningless ramblings,” they’re disturbing in light of his lengthy record of excessive force against people of all colors. Most recently, Patterson was caught on video last year beating an apparently homeless man repeatedly with a baton at a bus stop in South Seattle. The OPA sustained findings for use of force in that case, but the chief still hasn’t issued final discipline.
In 2020, Patterson punched a man several times during the George Floyd protests. That incident was also captured on video:
Patterson received light discipline—a written reprimand—for punching the man between “six and eight times” in the torso.
Patterns and Practices
He has been named in multiple high-profile lawsuits throughout his career, including one brought by Naita Saechao, a 52-year-old man officers somehow mistook for a 20-year-old stabbing suspect at a party.
The officers startled Saechao awake while he was intoxicated and passed out on the bed. Not realizing what was happening, Saechao kicked and struggled with the officers. Patterson hit him several times in the side with a flashlight while three other officers punched and Tasered him. An internal investigation cleared the four officers of wrongdoing, but the city settled with Saechao for $90,000.
The Department of Justice cited this case as an example of unconstitutional force against minorities in the investigation that led to the consent decree.
Patterson was also named in a lawsuit over the violent bust-up of a party in Columbia City in 2011. After being refused entry to the backyard, Patterson and multiple officers swarmed in. The lawsuit alleges that he punched the plaintiff while he was on the ground, handcuffed. That suit was settled for $195,000.
A year later, he smirked and bragged about breaking his nightstick on someone at that party while speaking to demonstrators outside the Northwest African-American Museum.
In 2006, when he was still a rookie, Patterson was one of several officers who beat, kicked, and Tasered Eric Garcia-Arcos, breaking his nose, skull, jaw and teeth. They wrongfully accused him of felony assault on an officer. The city settled with Garcia-Arcos for $85,000. Patterson also shot and killed a Black man with Alzheimer’s dementia, who had called the police for help in 2012.
Altogether, suits naming Patterson have cost the city more than $1 million. Hired in 2005, Sgt. Nathan Patterson made $155,765.