Qwest Field incident typical of the way police have widely different attitudes concerning internal and civilian abuse cases

On the front page of today’s Seattle Times is a story about two Bellevue police officers punished for conduct one would regard as “unbecoming” of an officer. A total of four officers had been investigated for their role in an alcohol-fueled dispute with fans at a Seahawks game. The officers at the game were thrown out of the stadium; one officer was demoted, another suspended for one month, one who drove his “getaway” car while intoxicated was not disciplined (because his blood alcohol level had not been tested), and the case against a female detective was dismissed. But it would seem that the only reason why the officers were punished at all—or that the this incident even made the news—was that two of the officers heckled a Seattle police officer before leaving the stadium; the fact that it was a female officer seemed to make all the difference in the world, at least to the Times. But as I’ve said before, from what I can tell, there is no apparent distinction in the behavior of most police, regardless of race or gender. 

Interestingly, Ken Schram of KOMO News Radio praised Bellevue police chief Linda Pillo for not disclosing the reasoning that the secret inquiry into the incident had for imposing relatively light or no punishments, especially for the detective; Schram rather offensively and abruptly ended his statement without giving his own rationale for police secrecy—especially in light of a case in front of the State Supreme Court in regard to a Seattle ordinance barring the disclosure of the contents of police dash-cams for three years. Of course, Schram used to co-host a show called “The Commentators” with right-wing extremist John Carlson; the problem was that their right-wing bias was often hard to distinguish. However, to appeal to the “liberal” crowd, Schram frequently praises women—that is to say white women; former Seattle school superintendent Maria Goodloe-Johnson, who just passed away, was a black woman who was crucified by the Times for what turned out to be corrupt practices she had no hand in. In a city that claims to support equal educational opportunity—it doesn’t—Goodloe-Johnson was also pilloried for supporting the purchase of a building to be used as a community center for underserved minority youth, rather than selling it to an all-white private school.

(Frankly, if anyone should be crucified, it is outgoing governor Christine Gregoire, who just signed a "landmark" gay marriage bill. I'm not referring to that, of course; it is the fact that she allowed this state's support for education and social services to crumble under her "tutelage.")

But back to the issue at hand. Was this the example of solid citizenship that our boys and girls in black and blue are supposed to be providing us? Or are they just like the rest of us—except that they are permitted to cross the line every now and then under the protection of a badge? The above case is an exception, for two reasons: One, it received some media coverage (the gender politics angle), and secondly, the actions deemed “over the line” involved disrespectful police interactions amongst themselves, not with the public. We might add a third exception, being that it didn’t involve the use of excessive or lethal force of the unnecessary variety, which the police are quite touchy about. In fact, if there is anything that police don’t like being  punished for, it is when they cross the line in the use of such force. 

But more typical of police/civilian interaction that is generally “acceptable” or “justified” is the kind that only some of us experience on a more frequent basis, and is not considered punishment “actionable.” Take for example an incident I was involved in several years ago. I had it in my mind after work one day to go to Fry’s Electronics in Renton. I took a Sound Transit bus from the airport to the Renton transit center, which obliged me to walk the remainder of the distance, which was another twenty minutes. I had not gone far when I noticed a Renton police cruiser weaving back and forth in and out of parking lots behind me, which seemed rather odd. Moments later, the same cruiser cut on the sidewalk in front of me, and out popped a white female police officer who in a rather hostile manner told me to stay put; soon two other police cruisers arrived, one behind me, the other on the side to box me in. 

One of the officers demanded to know what I was doing, and I obliged his curiosity; I then asked the officer what they were doing, and he obliged me by informing me there had just been a bank robbery (or so he claimed). I told him that I could not be the robber, because I just alighted minutes ago from a bus from work. Nevertheless, he insisted that I “fit” the description of the robber, and I told I doubted this very much. A third officer told me to empty my bag, a request I responded to by dropping it on the ground; the officer proceeded to dump its contents about. Meanwhile, in response to my doubts, a call was made to a police dispatcher to describe the suspect: A 6-foot white male, gray hair and wearing dark clothes. “See” they said, “You are wearing dark clothes”—my plainly marked work uniform. I angrily pointed out that the other parts of the description clearly disqualified me from being a “suspect,” but the officers had to continue the charade by calling for the clerk who had been robbed. Another police cruiser arrived; in the back was a short, heavy-set black female wearing glasses; moments later I found myself standing all alone with my belongings strewn about the sidewalk, without further comment or apology, as if it was all just a bad dream and I had imagined it all. 

But I hadn’t imagined it, because a couple of the local denizens across the street had seen it all, and offered me their condolences for the bad behavior of the police; the police had targeted me not because I “resembled” the description of the suspect—which I clearly didn’t—but because of my “ethnicity” there was a “good chance” I must have something to do with the crime (or any crime). And why would I—if I had just robbed a bank—allow myself to be seen walking in the afternoon sunshine? And more absurd was that four police officers had wasted time, resources and man-hours on a “suspect” who they knew didn’t even approach fit the description of the suspect; and it all started when one officer had allowed her prejudices, assumptions and stereotypes to misguide her, and her fellow officers had no “choice” but to fall in line.