Video: Cop defied orders, drove dangerously through neighborhood
Video: Cop defied orders, drove dangerously through neighborhood
With no lights or sirens, Officer Jeffrey Allen chased a car through stop signs and red lights despite a sergeant's orders and his partner urging him to stop
Ofc. Jeffrey Allen is under investigation for an unauthorized daytime pursuit through a busy West Seattle neighborhood, according to disciplinary records and videos obtained by DivestSPD.
On April 16, 2024, Allen was one of five officers dispatched to investigate a white Crown Victoria parked at an apartment complex on California Ave. with a man sleeping inside. He was still passed out when officers arrived.
They checked the VIN and found the vehicle had been reported stolen, so they formed a “hasty plan” to take the man into custody, according to the Office of Police Accountability investigator’s report. Allen placed Terminator tire deflators under the car’s tires, and the officers took cover while one attempted to contact the driver via PA.
The man woke up, backed out of the apartment parking lot, and fled up the alley. Allen pointed his gun and ordered him to stop. He did not.
Allen and his partner, Ofc. Brian Sutphin got in their cruiser and headed up the alley in the opposite direction. He activated his sirens and lights and then took a left. Allen spotted the Crown Victoria at the next street and sped through a stop sign, yielding to oncoming traffic only after he was partially in the intersection.
Shortly thereafter, Allen’s sergeant, Katrina O’Dell, called off the pursuit. Allen turned off his emergency equipment while he continued driving at a higher speed. His partner Sutphin can be heard in the in-car video repeating, “Let him go, let him go, let him go.”
The two continued following the Crown Victoria from a distance onto Admiral. Allen ran through a stop sign, slowing only for heavy oncoming traffic, while Sutphin continued to repeat, “Let him go.”
Allen followed the driver up Admiral through a red light with Sutphin in the passenger seat, saying, “Let him go, just let him go, let him go, let him go, let him go.”
They followed him through the Safeway parking lot back to California and left on Lander, where Allen passed through a red light again. Allen picked up speed to catch up with the Crown Victoria, which was now roughly a block away.
It’s unclear how fast he’s traveling, but it’s well above the 20 mph speed limit.
Sgt. O’Dell came on the radio to confirm that Allen was not “pursuing that vehicle.” Allen replied, “Negative, just making sure he is not going too far. He has two flat tires.” After parking briefly at Sutphin’s insistence, they continue to search for the car.
They stop to ask a few people in the neighborhood vague questions like “Which way did he go?” and “Where’d he turn?” Afterward, Allen floors it, hitting upwards of 50 mph on a narrow street hemmed in by parked cars without a sign of the vehicle.
Ultimately, another officer found the car abandoned, and a neighbor spotted the man running into a house. Allen and Sutphin were dispatched to his home. The landlord let them look around and gave them the man’s name. They left and cleared the call as “Assistance Rendered.”
According to court records, the man was found sleeping at the wheel of a different stolen car a little over a month later. Officers attempted a similar maneuver—a high-risk stop using PA announcements—and the man again avoided capture, hitting a car on the way out.
The OPA hasn’t issued findings in this case, but Allen has four sustained complaints. He received a 9-day suspension for escalating a dubious 2020 stop of a Black man over a noisy muffler, slamming him on the cruiser, and threatening him with arrest. Allen was also suspended six days for baiting and retaliating against a man in a mental health crisis.
He was also reprimanded for hitting a man in the throat to get him to cough up drugs and escalating an encounter with a man outside a club.
Hired in 2017 after working for three Washington State police departments, Jeffrey Allen made $148,499 last year.