FRUSTRATION + INTOLERANCE + TERRORISM = FEAR.

(The following email is published on these (and other) web sites. Please publish this email in any way you can. I need help in Seattle.).

Dear National Urban League,
Dear Mr. Hugh B. Price,

Please help me, to set a precedent.

[{ .(Please,,,,,,,,,, here is all the information, for anyone (you) to publish this anywhere. Please help!! I am trying to get this around the world, - (and let people take the action), --with the phone numbers and email address's-- ((of those who should be working on this in Seattle Washington)) to let them know how this makes you feel, or not.). }]

[{( Please help!!! Make a phone call, send an email;;; SEATTLE NEEDS HELP! PLEASE --- Help battle the drug war - intolerance, - and racism, in SEATTLE law enforcement and the Seattle police! )}]

kennspace@hotmail.com

Space 2001 PO BOX 85503 SEA WA 98145-1503

From : "kenn dzaman" <kennspace@hotmail.com
Reply-To : kennspace@hotmail.com
To : sgonsalves@capecodonline.com, cjintel@juno.com, nbrodeur@seattletimes.com, leonardpitts@mindspring.com, ray@MichealMoore.com, editor@seattlepress.com, info@freespeechseattle.org, tracyjohnson@seattlepi.com, robertjamieson@seattlepi.com, dannyboy259@home.com, randerson@seattleweekly.com, gparrish@seattleweekly.com, publiceducation@aclu-wa.org, legal@aclu-wa.org, senator_murray@murray.senate.gov, maria@cantwell.senate.gov, jay.inslee@mail.house.gov, City.Action@ci.seattle.wa.us, lwvseattle@aol.com, mark.sidran@ci.seattle.wa.us, jim.compton@ci.seattle.wa.us, richard.conlin@ci.seattle.wa.us, jan.drago@ci.seattle.wa.us, nick.licata@ci.seattle.wa.us, richard.mciver@ci.seattle.wa.us, judy.nicastro@ci.seattle.wa.us, margaret.pageler@ci.seattle.wa.us, peter.steinbrueck@ci.seattle.wa.us, heidi.wills@ci.seattle.wa.us, ron.sims@metrokc.gov
CC : kennspace@hotmail.com

Subject :

CULT-URAL ROAD RAGE

From : "kenn dzaman" <kennspace@hotmail.com
To : sgonsalves@capecodonline.com, cjintel@juno.com, nbrodeur@seattletimes.com, leonardpitts@mindspring.com, ray@MichealMoore.com, editor@seattlepress.com, info@freespeechseattle.org, tracyjohnson@seattlepi.com, robertjamieson@seattlepi.com, dannyboy259@home.com, randerson@seattleweekly.com, gparrish@seattleweekly.com, publiceducation@aclu-wa.org, legal@aclu-wa.org, senator_murray@murray.senate.gov, maria@cantwell.senate.gov, jay.inslee@mail.house.gov, City.Action@ci.seattle.wa.us, lwvseattle@aol.com, mark.sidran@ci.seattle.wa.us, jim.compton@ci.seattle.wa.us, richard.conlin@ci.seattle.wa.us, jan.drago@ci.seattle.wa.us, nick.licata@ci.seattle.wa.us, richard.mciver@ci.seattle.wa.us, judy.nicastro@ci.seattle.wa.us, margaret.pageler@ci.seattle.wa.us, peter.steinbrueck@ci.seattle.wa.us, heidi.wills@ci.seattle.wa.us, ron.sims@metrokc.gov
CC : kennspace@hotmail.com

Date : Fri, 10 Aug 2001 20:29:54 +0000

THIS IS MY LAST EMAIL TO MOST OF YOU;
THANK YOUR CREATOR OF FEELING, --

Racism in the (good ole) USA

I can see like a bullet
right through the heart
of the USA
like an accident in slow motion

and move the dirt out of town

Police who shoot have no 'extra' rights, say lawyers
By Mike Carter
Seattle Times staff reporter
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis/web/vortex/

Attorneys who represent police officers involved in shootings say there is a common assumption that the officers are somehow afforded more rights than civilians who pull a trigger.

It's untrue, they say, and unfair.

"The rights are the same," said Chris Vick, a Renton attorney who represents the Bellevue Police Guild and Officer Mike Hetle, who is on leave after shooting and killing a man in an apartment parking lot Wednesday.

Officers have the right to remain silent and not incriminate themselves. And they have the right to an attorney.

They also have the right not to lose their jobs and that's where the protection of a 34-year-old U.S. Supreme Court ruling comes into play.

Because Hetle shot someone while on duty, the Bellevue Police Department can demand that he give a "true and involuntary" statement and tell what happened to determine whether he violated any department policies or procedures.

But forcing him to make that statement with the threat of his job in the balance could circumvent Hetle's Fifth Amendent protection against self-incrimination.

To protect those rights, the Supreme Court, in a 1967 case known as Garrity vs. New Jersey, said such compelled statements cannot be used for any purpose other than an employment-related action, such as a suspension. In essence, that means the officer's statement cannot be used against him in other proceedings, such as a criminal action. An officer can refuse to speak, but risks discipline ? even firing ? by doing so, Vick said.

(see web site for complete article)...)..

From: "kenn dzaman" <kennspace@hotmail.com Reply-To: kennspace@hotmail.com To: mcarter@seattletimes.com, RobertJamieson@seattlepi.com,
sgonsalves@capecodonline.com, cjintel@juno.com,
nbrodeur@seattletimes.com,
leonardpitts@mindspring.com, editor@seattlepress.com,
info@freespeechseattle.org, tracyjohnson@seattlepi.com CC: kennspace@hotmail.com
Subject: Fwd:
Racism and the Responsibility of the Local Police

Your article incenses me.
I have worked on this case for a month.
The amount of intolerance I have been shown in doing this - has been absolutely ridiculous.You can report whatever you want in your paper, you are a "reporter"; well I tell you what,,, you make some phone calls, and after you actually have some experience in trying to charge police with crimes, please, get back to me with some true and honest reporting of experience.
Not what someone else, for the police department; is telling you.

From : Mike Carter <mcarter@seattletimes.com
To : 'kennspace@hotmail.com'" <kennspace@hotmail.com
Subject : RE: Date : Fri, 10 Aug 2001 11:17:04 -0700
<kennspace@hotmail.com; Fri, 10 Aug 2001 11:17:08 -0700 (PDT)

From mcarter@seattletimes.com Fri, 10 Aug 2001 11:20:24 -0700

You keep saying "this case." I wrote about the shooting in
bellevue today
before yesterday, not the Seattle PD's shooting errors. And I
know Joel Connelly only in passing. He works for the P-I, not the Times.

-----Original Message-----
From: kenn dzaman [mailto:kennspace@hotmail.com]
Sent: Friday, August 10, 2001 11:12 AM
To: mcarter@seattletimes.com; sgonsalves@capecodonline.com;
cjintel@juno.com; nbrodeur@seattletimes.com;
leonardpitts@mindspring.com; ray@MichealMoore.com;
editor@seattlepress.com; info@freespeechseattle.org;
tracyjohnson@seattlepi.com; robertjamieson@seattlepi.com;
dannyboy259@home.com; randerson@seattleweekly.com;
gparrish@seattleweekly.com; publiceducation@aclu-wa.org;
legal@aclu-wa.org; senator_murray@murray.senate.gov;
maria@cantwell.senate.gov; jay.inslee@mail.house.gov;
City.Action@ci.seattle.wa.us; lwvseattle@aol.com;
mark.sidran@ci.seattle.wa.us; jim.compton@ci.seattle.wa.us;
richard.conlin@ci.seattle.wa.us; jan.drago@ci.seattle.wa.us;
nick.licata@ci.seattle.wa.us; richard.mciver@ci.seattle.wa.us;
judy.nicastro@ci.seattle.wa.us;
margaret.pageler@ci.seattle.wa.us;
peter.steinbrueck@ci.seattle.wa.us;
heidi.wills@ci.seattle.wa.us;
ron.sims@metrokc.gov Cc: kennspace@hotmail.com Subject:

Thank you for your reply.
I am very mad.
I am mad that the Seattle police department shot 20 to 39 shots at each other, due to an internal error that almost killed people, and it could have killed me.
If you feel the Seattle police knew what they were doing when they shot these bullets at each other, that is even scarier than me being mad.

I am mad, because as I work on this case, I feel very much racism (intolerance).
Let me repeat that;
I have spent many hours working on understanding what has happened in this case; and in even trying to figure that out, being the naive little white boy I am; I am appalled at the racism so predominately displayed by the Seattle government.

Thanks for communicating!

From : Anthony Espinosa <aespinosa@seattletimes.com
To : "'kennspace@hotmail.com'" <kennspace@hotmail.com
Subject : About your recent web ad...(also print)
Date : Fri, 10 Aug 2001 07:37:50 -0700
<kennspace@hotmail.com; Fri, 10 Aug 2001 07:37:52 -0700 (PDT)

Thank you for your order!! Your ad has been processed and will be reviewed for acceptability and credit status prior to appearing in The Seattle Times, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and on NWclassifieds. If your ad requires prepayment prior to publishing, you will be contacted by a customer service representative.

A Call to Seattle RESIDENTS - WITNESS'S NEEDED; To Seattle Police officers - crashing into Seattle police officer's, and shooting 20 to 39(?) bullets at Seattle Police officers; July 10th, 2001; 1:32 AM; [Just North of - the crest of the hill - at east Roanoke St and Harvard Ave East - (on Capitol Hill).]. If you live in the area and have felt, (or feel), any "endangerment" (or fear) due to this event; (or if you feel you have any information you would like to witness); Please contact: WITNESS, PO Box 85503, SEA WA, 98145-1503
[Email: kennspace@hotmail.com]

Your order number is 924939. The ad is scheduled to print starting 08/12/2001, for 7 days, ending 08/18/2001, printing in classification 102-Announcements. The price of the ad is $176.25 for 14 lines.The Seattle Times, representing the Seattle Post-Intelligencer

FRUSTRATION + INTOLERANCE + TERRORISM = FEAR.

(Too best research the Seattle police shooting 39(?) shots at each other; Go to the Seattle Post Intelligencer and the Seattle Times web sites and search: "Zachary Davis" (The Seattle police department "mascot" that stole the Seattle police car for patrols and repeated it for weeks (or longer??)? Did the Seattle Police department think they were hiding something from the residents of Seattle, or were they trying to cover and hide an internal error, or did the Seattle police department not feel at risk, until they almost killed each other?)

SEATTLE TIMES
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/

Results for search of "zachary davis"
Your search found 10 records. Matches 1 through 10.
Local News: Friday, July 13, 2001

Fake officer safety risk; stays in jail
King County prosecutors have filed charges of taking a motor vehicle without permission and eluding police, both felonies, against Zachary Davis, 18, the son of a slain Seattle police officer.

Editorials & Opinion: Friday, July 13, 2001

Letters to the editor
A sampling of readers' letters, faxes and e-mail.

Local News: Thursday, July 12, 2001

Timeline
Davis is arrested after returning the stolen patrol car to the North Precinct. He is wearing parts of a police uniform, including a bullet-proof vest. ...

Local News: Thursday, July 12, 2001

Thief slipped onto I-5, out of cops' sight
If it wasn't so potentially deadly, Tuesday's police crash and shootout by cops chasing a stolen patrol car would sound like an overused slapstick-comedy routine: Two guys throw punches at a third, but he ducks just in time for the flying fists to hit the wrong jaws.

Local News: Wednesday, July 11, 2001

Mistaken identity: Cops fire at cops
The 18-year-old son of a slain Seattle policeman was in jail yesterday and three patrolmen were placed on desk duty after the teen stole a police car and then fled from officers who ended up mistaking each other for the suspect, crashing their cars and firing more than 20 bullets at each other.

Local News: Wednesday, July 11, 2001

Officers helped, trusted son of slain colleague
Seattle police Lt. Roy Wedlund was jangled awake early yesterday morning by the kind of phone call any parent would dread. At first, the North Precinct commander didn't understand the officer's hurried voice on the other end of the line.

Local News: Tuesday, July 10, 2001

Officers chasing stolen police car exchange gunfire - with each other
Seattle police officers, mistaking one another for the person who had stolen a police car, fired more than 20 shots at each other in North Seattle early today.

From: paul david richmond
Subject: Filing Civil and Criminal Charges against the Seattle Police
Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 14:46:33 -0700 (PDT)

It was predictable really

The recent episode where a few cops tried to ram each other off the road and then emptied a few dozen live rounds at each other without a scoring a hit is indicative of some of the very real problems that pollute the promise of decent quality policing.
The underlying causes, that are curable, is that we have hired to many police too
quickly and equipped them with weapons that they do not need.

As with police forces around the country we are the victims of the 1995 Federal Crime Bill. This was the law that sponsored putting 100,000 new cops on the street. The result was in the words of Philadelphia Chief Ed Timoney "we hired too many too quickly." Standards dropped for hiring. There were insufficient resources for adequate training. This is why as the SPD prepared for the WTO Ministerial, fully one third of the department had been officers for two years or less. The underlying cause for this was the mass hires that took place in the aftermath of the civil unrest of the 1960's and early 1970's. It was during this time that there was a rush to hire new officers. Even liberals like Robert Kennedy promoted a "troops to cops" proposal that reached a new fruition in 1995. And so what we were left to deal with 25 years later was a mass of retirements and vacancies. Hence the rash of new hires. What exacerbated the damage done by these new hires was a rise in armaments. Fueled by fears of "Crack Cocaine," police moved away from smaller capacity firearms, such as revolvers, that typically carried six bullets, to firearms that carried several times that amount, often of higher caliber and hence deadlier. The old training method with the revolvers was fire two shots and evaluate. The post-Crack method is to fire until the threat is gone. The threat of "Crack" receded. The level of armament and new methods of training remained. What has not been fundamentally questioned is whether rehires were necessary. Even the most optimistic surveys do not show there is a substantial reduction in crime when more officers are placed on the street. (There is a rise in the number of the arrests. There is an overtaxing of the jails. But there is no drop in crime.) And the most cursory look at the annual reports of our own police department's annual reports demonstrate that the dollar cost of stopping this crime, exceeds many times the actual dollar value of the damage of the crime.

The fundamental question is, are the police a microscopic, local example of the support of bloating we have come to accept in looking at in government and military budgets - budgets where a project is put in place as a possible responsible for a
specific need, but then never reduced, only maintained at its expanded levels or even further expanded? The answer seems an obvious yes. And with the higher capacity
firearms, the answer is the same - high capacity semi-automatic weapons are not a reasonable response to the current policing needs.

The solution to this is to slow down, even halt the number of hires in our own police force, at least till the time we have balanced out the requirements of training. And for the high-capacity semi-automatic weapons, they should be phased out in favor of more appropriate weapons.

Ironically, in Seattle, our current police chief, in his position with the Department of Justice, played a leadership role in placing these 100,000 new cops on the street. It would be a wonderful thing if this same chief could be a leader in providing some of these same police adequate training.

Paul Richmond
July 16, 2001
Paul Richmond has worked for over a decade as a reporter covering issues of police misconduct. He is the main author of the National Lawyers Guild Report on the WTO and NW Regional Vice President of the National Lawyers Guild

Dear CLEAR (NW Justice) - (Coordinated Legal Education, Advice and Referral Service),
(1-888-201-1014) (webmaster@nwjustice.org) (questions@wsba.org)

Dear Mothers Against Violence In America,
(206-323-2303) (mavia@aol.com)

Dear American Civil Liberties Union,
(206-624-2180) (legislative@aclu-wa.org, publiceducation@aclu-wa.org, legislative@aclu-wa.org)

(I am also calling the King county lawyer referral service.).
(206-623-2551)

Please help me to find a good attorney.
The case I am trying to press is explained in the following email.
I will be calling the numbers above in the next 24 hours to (hopefully) discuss this case with someone in your office. (All the phone calls I have been making are getting hard, I would really like to set up an appointment and sit in an attorney's office, and discuss this (with someone in person). Thank you.

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman

From: "kenn dzaman" <kennspace@hotmail.com
Reply-To: kennspace@hotmail.com
To: sgonsalves@capecodonline.com, cjintel@juno.com, nbrodeur@seattletimes.com, leonardpitts@mindspring.com, ray@MichealMoore.com, editor@seattlepress.com, info@freespeechseattle.org, tracyjohnson@seattlepi.com, robertjamieson@seattlepi.com, dannyboy259@home.com, randerson@seattleweekly.com, gparrish@seattleweekly.com, publiceducation@aclu-wa.org, legal@aclu-wa.org, senator_murray@murray.senate.gov, maria@cantwell.senate.gov, jay.inslee@mail.house.gov, City.Action@ci.seattle.wa.us, lwvseattle@aol.com, mark.sidran@ci.seattle.wa.us, jim.compton@ci.seattle.wa.us, richard.conlin@ci.seattle.wa.us, jan.drago@ci.seattle.wa.us, nick.licata@ci.seattle.wa.us, richard.mciver@ci.seattle.wa.us, judy.nicastro@ci.seattle.wa.us, margaret.pageler@ci.seattle.wa.us, peter.steinbrueck@ci.seattle.wa.us, heidi.wills@ci.seattle.wa.us, ron.sims@metrokc.gov
CC: kennspace@hotmail.com

Subject: Intolerance in Seattle, racism in the Seattle Police Department.
Date: Thu, 09 Aug 2001 19:56:18 +0000

Dear Concerned Human Being, August 9th, 2001

I have now consulted with four attorney's in Seattle, and have not found one who can handle this case at this time.

After all the emails I have sent out in the last month, all the phone calls I have made, - I have gotten such very little response;

my fingers are not even warmed up yet!

(I have many calls out, and I will keep making them.).
Kenn

Dear Concerned Human Being,

Where is the - "community and public" responsibility??

INTOLERANCE: In Seattle.

(It is what I felt all day today as I tried to find out what to do about the Seattle police being charged with breaking the law..).

How easy it is to have "others" arrested and put in jail, when "others" break laws. I am finding, - when the Seattle police break laws, (from my experience so far), it doesn't sound like the Seattle police are put in jail or charged with crimes (they have committed on duty). (And there is nowhere to "realistically" report it, without personally filing suit against the police, and having personal evidence against them...What about "community" evidence??? Is it not what Seattle police officers use in arresting "suspects"??? (At least I feel it is the way it is "supposed" to be,, -- the laws passed by the community, suspects may have broken them, so they are arrested??? (As long as the witnesses don't remain silent).....).

I am also feeling that I am being presented with the -"cultural"- feeling, that taking police to court for breaking laws; is somehow, - a "cultural taboo" and should not be discussed. I am feeling more and more intolerance towards me, the closer I get to "charging" and "pressing" this case and filing these charges against the Seattle police department; - In my personal - and public life, - people only want me to stop.

I am wondering if I am just crazy at this point, and maybe all I need to do is move to Canada, and I will be happier. After all, I am Canadian and moved here in 1968 with my American father, and I have always felt Canada is more civil. (Towards drugs and medicine, - and the laws about how handguns are treated in human civilization..,, Maybe I have over-stayed my welcome in the USA?.?.. I should just listen to the people and my family - who have told me: "Just go to Canada and shut up";, but somehow, I just do not feel that is the right decision.)...

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman

From : "kenn dzaman" <kennspace@hotmail.com
Reply-To : kennspace@hotmail.com
To : sgonsalves@capecodonline.com, cjintel@juno.com, nbrodeur@seattletimes.com, leonardpitts@mindspring.com, editor@seattlepress.com, info@freespeechseattle.org, tracyjohnson@seattlepi.com, robertjamieson@seattlepi.com
CC : kennspace@hotmail.com, colorlines@arc.org, counterpunch@counterpunch.org, indypress@indypress.org, Ipadirector@indypress.org, Paper@indypress.org, Members@indypress.org, Diversity@indypress.org, Library@indypress.org, Admin@indypress.org, Ipany@indypress.org, Techassist@indypress.org, Tracie@bigtoppubs.com, Bigtopsc@surfnetusa.com, Lauren@bigtoppubs.com, Kathleen@bigtoppubs.com, Ln@bigtoppubs.com, ets@scn.org, letters@denver-rmn.com, feedback@thewire.ap.org

Subject : Local Police and The CHARGE of Racism.
Date : Wed, 08 Aug 2001 22:44:00 +0000

Dear Sean Gonsalves, Carl Jeffers, Nicole Brodeur, and Leonard
Pitts Jr.,

Dear Mr. Carl Jeffers, August 8th, 2001

I have consulted with two attorneys in Seattle (who have told me to get a good attorney); on this case, and who are too busy too handle it. (I have calls into others ...).. I need to hire a good attorney to help me with the filing of charges against the Seattle police department. (Explained in detail in this email - please try to pull out the good information out of my ranting. I need help so I can slow down -
so I can be better understood. If you could give me a recommendation or refferal of an attorney -- I would really appreciate it. I will keep calling other attorney's, but I need help.

Dear American Prospect,
ColorLines,
CounterPunch,
ETS!,
Seattle Press Editor,
and others interested in the Seattle police -: law and racism,
in the United States,

I called the King county prosecutors office today of Norm Melang, and they could not help me except to give me other numbers to call. (206-296-9000) I called the Seattle city attorneys office of Mark Sidran, and I was given other numbers to call. (206-684-8200) I called the Seattle city council (206-684-8888) and I talked with the receptionist who forwarded me to council-member Peter Steinbrueck's office (206-684-8804); Who forwarded me to council-member Jim Compton's office (206-684-8802); Who forwarded me to the Seattle police departments internal investigation division.
I made the mistake of calling the Seattle police; They did not want to listen to me at all, and reassured me that the Seattle police department is looking into Seattle police officers trying to mistakenly kill each other - with their firearms review board
(I guess to figure out how -not- to miss next time, -and waste so many bullets..??..).(206-684-8797).. .

The Seattle police internal investigation unit forwarded me to
their media department;; And that lady officer I talked to got
rather mad at me that I would even think that the Seattle police
had broken laws.
I am not sure who I will call tomorrow, but I will be on the
phone again...

Please help stop this so obvious racism in the enforcement of
our laws in Seattle Washington.

Sincerely,
Kenneth G. Dzaman

Local Police-Responsibility and the CHARGE of Racism

Who is responsible for this racism?

I feel if the Seattle police (or the Renton police), feel they are above reproach or the law, they are wrong. (Dead wrong - with drugged execution... - (I am glad the Seattle
police, - are not always that good of marksman; of course, they probably weren't looking when they fired these 20 to 80 bullets at each other, --and were possibly firing from behind their cars - or something,,,,,I mean; -- I don't know what kind of
identification process, or fear, or threat, the Seattle police use in drawing their weapons and shooting; - But they were shooting at fellow Seattle police officers, - so something tells me; It isn't working... .).

[Opinion]
Letters to the Editor
Seattle Post Intelligencer
Wednesday, August 8, 2001
http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/opinion/34309_ltrs8.shtml RENTON

Officers' bad behavior takes city backward

It was absolutely heart-wrenching and disgusting to hear on the news and read in the newspapers about inhumane treatment of the elderly gentleman, Calvin Brown, and his friend, Rose Anne Jacobs, by the white Renton police officers. The citizens of
Renton, as well as elsewhere, should be outraged.

The African American couple said at no time did the officers ask questions or offer an explanation for their actions, nor did they have the decency to apologize. Nothing reported in the media even hinted that this couple resisted or refused to comply
with an order.

Everywhere I look in this city, I see the efforts and progress being made to give Renton a fresh new look and keep it ahead of the curve. Since it takes only a few bad apples to spoil the barrel, the four officers need to be removed from the mix before
they ruin the beauty and integrity of the city.

Beatrice Clark
Renton

Capital punishment perpetuates violence

On Aug. 28 at 3 a.m., most of us will be sound asleep while James Elledge is scheduled to be executed at the Walla Walla State Penitentiary. Intimate participants in the execution will be employees of the prison system. I cannot even begin to
imagine what it must be like for them to go to work that day. I think I would call in sick.

Having worked for more than 15 years as an advocate for survivors of domestic and sexual violence and hearing their horrific stories, compassion for offenders does not come easy for me. However, I still believe if we continue to execute human beings, we are perpetuating violence in our society and asking individual human beings like those who work in the prison system to participate in an act that must crush the soul to its very core. I agree with Henry Schwarzchild, former member of the board of directors of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, who said,
"We must refuse as citizens to be made into willing co-conspirators with a violent crime."

Sandi Thompson-Royer
Spokane

Wednesday, August 08, 2001 - 12:00 a.m. Pacific

http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis/web/vortex/
Guest columnist
Racial insensitivity carries a high price

By Carl Jeffers
Special to The Times
One year ago in Renton, a 70-year-old black man and his 56-year-old female companion were pulled over by four white police officers, ordered out of their car at gunpoint, handcuffed and placed face down on the pavement. Police assert they were looking for "suspects in a drive-by shooting." The only problem is that the reports already received by the police indicated the suspects were "black teens driving a little sports car." But what we had here were two elderly citizens driving a large, four-door Buick!

The couple wanted an apology from the city of Renton and its police department and public officials. In good faith, they waited a year before taking any other action. We have now learned that during the interim, Renton City Attorney Larry Warren essentially drew a line in the sand, defending the police action as totally justified as part of an effort to "try to catch dangerous drive-by shooters." Consequently, he has refused to issue an official apology, or for that matter recommend that the city's mayor issue one. In addition, no apology has been forthcoming from the police department itself.

Now, the couple has filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Renton and at least four police officers for charges including civil-rights violations, assault and false arrest. At the heart of this entire incident is the specter of racial profiling at
its most insidious level.

I am appalled by this incident and the failure of the police and the city to at least issue an apology once it was clear that a mistake had been made. I don't know whether in fact the couple would not have filed suit if an apology had been issued, but what I am sure of is that regardless, an apology should have been issued.

I don't have to be shy about criticizing police officers and city attorneys when I think they are wrong or have engaged in racial profiling and insensitivity. I can be that outspoken because I often stand alone in my criticism of African-American leaders when I feel they go too far or lack justification in immediately charging racial profiling or racism in so many cases involving the police. Indeed, I have often tried to highlight how many police officers really do try to enforce the law fairly
and judiciously regardless of who the people are they are interacting with, and we need to be more mindful of that.

But in this situation, I find no loopholes to justify the manner in which this incident has developed. What's more, this incident only discourages and frustrates those of us who seek to always bring a sense of reason and calm to our approach to race and
other topical issues.

In my judgment, this incident may or may not be all about racial profiling. Sometimes, good old-fashioned plain stupidity can be the greater culprit. I feel poor training and lack of proper sensitivity training is often more significant than issues of
race and prejudice in explaining why so many distressing incidents of this type take place between the minority community and the police.

But stupidity clearly has played a major role here, and I am upset about that. I can tell you quite emphatically that if I heard that my mother and father were treated to this insufferable conduct, I would have been furious, and I would not have waited a year to take action.

The reports clearly indicated that the perpetrators were young teens in a "little sports car." With a couple in their 50s and 70s, the "young teens" issue speaks for itself. And even though Buick might like us to think so, they don't make large,
four-door models that are confused with "little sports cars." At least for that, an apology should have been issued.

But even if this isn't outright racial profiling, it is at least racial insensitivity, and here's why. Everyone reading this knows as well as I do that if there were clear reports of a drive-by shooting involving young teens, and the suspects were
identified as being "white," no policeman in America would have pulled over a 70-year-old white man and a 56-year-old white woman and handcuffed them as "suspects" in the alleged crime ? for consumer fraud, an insurance scam, or illegal Bingo ... maybe ... but for a drive-by shooting ... Never! And it should never happen to an African-American couple under these circumstances either.

The city attorney of Renton is quoted as saying this incident is not even "anywhere in the realm of racial profiling." What this incident is not "anywhere in the realm of" is the appropriate manner in which it should have been handled, both at the time of
the incident itself as well as in the post-incident activity, continuing for almost a year afterwards.

The city attorney should have issued a formal apology, not because the police were or were not justified in their actions ? I'll give him the benefit of the doubt (of which there is a great deal) on that ? but because no matter what the justification was, the facts proved the officers made a mistake, and we apologize for mistakes. Can't we have some common sense on all sides of these types of issues?

City Attorney Warren has drawn his line in the sand and, I would assume with the mayor's concurrence, has apparently refused to apologize. Fine. He's wrong. And he and the city of Renton may have consequences and a price to pay for that refusal. I'll leave that to the adjudication process to determine as the lawsuits go forward.

But as the Renton city attorney, and therefore as a leader and representative of that city ? and as part of the leadership of the entire Seattle community, a community walking a tightrope in the area of race relations ? Warren and the leadership he
represents have failed miserably. For that failure, all of the people of Seattle continue to pay too high a price.

Carl Jeffers is president of Intel Marketing Associates and CJS
InfoConsulting, franchise consulting and information-services
firms. Contact him at cjintel@juno.com.

reader.representative@mail.tribnet.com
CC: kennspace@hotmail.com Subject: RE: The CHARGE of Racism.
Date: Wed, 08 Aug 2001 19:28:25 +0000

Dear Reader Representative for The Tacoma News Tribune,

Thank you for your reply..
Please, if the Tacoma News Tribune has the extra time to do their own report - on Seattle police firing 20 to 80? shots at fellow Seattle police officers; (and trying to kill each other while repeating an internal error, that put Seattle residents in danger); Seattle needs the help. The Seattle media is ignoring
this incident, and reporting it as an internal problem in the Seattle police department; and the Seattle police department is the only agency researching this incident.
Where is the outside objectivity? This is more than just an internal error by the Seattle police department. One of those stray bullets could have gone through my head! (Or one of my friends, we live close to this area where the "shooting
incident" occurred. I feel if two people "mistakenly" in the heat of passion and
stress, try to kill each other and fire a whole bunch of bullets, it is more than a "domestic" dispute, laws have been broken.

This scares me to see, and I am moving, but before I do, I will see this in the press, and those Seattle police officers who fired all those bullets, and the Seattle police department that created the mistake; held accountable.
I would think that the Tacoma News Tribune would be interested in such a story. And if you are not, could you please tell me

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman

Please check it out.
You do not have to share my views that I feel it was criminal
and is racism, but I do feel it has not been explained enough,
and it is creating fear and distrust in Seattle.

From: Reader Representative
<reader.representative@mail.tribnet.com To: "'kennspace@hotmail.com'"
<kennspace@hotmail.com
Subject: RE: The CHARGE of Racism.
Date: Wed, 8 Aug 2001 10:33:48 -0700
<kennspace@hotmail.com ; Wed, 8 Aug 2001 10:34:00 -0700
From reader.representative@mail.tribnet.com Wed, 08 Aug 2001

Ken,
the TNT attempts to cover all issues fairly and
accurately; I can't speak to why the other Seattle-area papers cover events the
way they do, but we certainly appreciate you reading our paper. Have a great
day.
----------

Subject: The CHARGE of Racism. ; Wed, 8 Aug 2001

Dear Tacoma News Tribune Reader representative, Mr. Frank
Hughes,

I feel the Tacoma News Tribune (usually) does a way better job of reporting and explaining racial issues, than the Seattle PI or the Seattle Times (or the Seattle Stranger - or the Seattle Weekly).
Why? Why do you mention the National Urban League and the UN's racial issues, yet Seattle press almost says nothing? Seattle is having big problems, yet the Seattle mainstream media has chosen ignorance on reporting the facts. - The people of Seattle, - do not even know how many shots the Seattle police department fired at fellow Seattle police officers, - or for how long the Seattle police were in armed combat??? (It rests in the Seattle press somewhere between 20 and 39 shots, or more; and between 1 and 2 minutes - before another Seattle police officer arrived and ordered them to stop shooting......This was all created; -from a repeated Seattle police department internal error, - that put the people of Seattle at negligent risk (and the Seattle police).).

The Seattle police department broke laws, and the Seattle police department is not being held accountable for their actions.
Why is this happening?
Is the Seattle police force racist?
I would say yes, especially if the Seattle police
department is not held accountable to the same laws as the people of Seattle.
You have reported on the disparities in the criminal justice system. Does it apply to the police?? Or just to the other "races" and the courts? The Tacoma News Tribune has reported that; "civility may be best shield" - when it comes to national missile defense; Now how about the local law? Are the Seattle police above the law? (And if the Seattle police are "above the law", I would call that: "Racism".).

Please help correct this racism being so predominately displayed in Seattle.

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman

(After seeing this article by syndicated columnist Sean Gonsalves in the Seattle Post Intelligencer on August 8th, 2001; titled; "Try a different approach to drugs",,, I could not find it on the web anywhere..
....now this is the only place I can find it????)??

http://www.capecodonline.com/cctimes/edits/seang.htm
Pardon nonviolent drug dealers
August 7, 2001
"What specific programs would you propose to cause the have-nots to improve their situation?" - an interested reader asks out in Seattle.

The so-called war on drugs is a good jumping off point because it is at that juncture where race, gender and class relations get entangled in a massive web of fear and loathing, strangling the spirit of liberty and egalitarianism woven into the very fabric of this country.

We are in the midst of an epidemic. Fueled by a widespread (overwhelmingly white) demand for <http://www.capecodonline.com/cctimes/edits/images/seanlogo.jpg illicit drugs, the U.S. prison population has reached the unprecedented mark of two million inmates, making the incarceration rate in America number one in the industrialized world. Add to that the many, many more drug users and dealers who are not locked up and you have a full-blown drug crisis.

I will lay aside the well-established correlation between low socioeconomic status and what is commonly called "street crime," and point out the inescapable fact that (criminal motive notwithstanding) relying on incarceration to control the drug crisis has severe social costs; not the least of which is the acceleration of community breakdown already afflicting the poor and vulnerable.

In a campaign speech called "Armies of Compassion," President Bush - being the soother of racial tensions that he is - noted that the prison population has tripled over the last 15 years. This incarceration orgy, he said in one of the biggest understatements of the new millennium, poses "a problem." With so many people in jail, there are now 1.3 million children in America with one or both of their parents behind bars.

Nothing less than an expansion of social consciousness will do. It's a tall order. And there is only so much you can convey in a single column. So let me get to it, realizing that anything short of a tome will not adequately address the complex issues raised here. At the very least, this will be one tiny testimony, a thumbnail sketch, of an alternative vision.

I propose that we grant a one-time pardon to imprisoned drug dealers who have not been convicted of serious violent felonies on the condition that they complete a long-term drug treatment program (if appropriate) and also graduate from a highly structured business apprenticeship under the close supervision of probation officers.

This would have to be a tremendous collaborative effort between federal and state government, and private business interests - in which business executives mentor pardoned drug dealers.

At the end of the apprenticeship the ex-dealer would have one of three options. 1.) Apply for a guaranteed, government-funded, no- or low-interest loan to try his hand at legal entrepreneurship; 2.) Prove he (or she) has a job, which would ideally be a job tied to the business organization that provided the apprenticeship; or 3.) Go directly to jail. Do not pass 'Go.' Do not collect the pardon.

On the street-end of things, black (and white) churches and mosques could set up a network of - call them, I don't know - Cain is Able Sanctuaries, where drug dealers who wish to "get out the game" and enter the apprenticeship program can do so without fear of being arrested and prosecuted.

These human redemption centers would have to be open for a limited-time only, of course, so as to not completely undermine the rule of law.

At the same time, we would have to strengthen community-policing efforts - ranging from building police substations in areas where there are high crime rates to forming neighborhood watch groups. This would be done in conjunction with a new focus on big-time drug traffickers, not small-time peddlers, which would require people like Ollie North and the late William Casey to stop chumming it up with the likes of Manuel Noriega and other international drug lords.

Decriminalizing marijuana use while maintaining criminal sanctions for hard-core drugs like cocaine and heroin might also be a facet of this initiative.

Prisons would, no doubt, need to be restructured so that, for starters, violent offenders are held in separate institutions than nonviolent offenders. This would be accompanied by a renewed emphasis on treatment for inmates with addiction problems and job training.

Prisoners would be responsible to feed themselves through agricultural and farm work. Other in-prison employment could be created where inmates would have to pay for room and board (on some sliding income-based scale) as well as pay restitution to their victims.

Those who opted not to partake in that program would not be released from jail until they could demonstrate to a citizen-elected parole board they were ready to re-enter society as a proverbial productive citizen.

Anything is possible. The Chicago Cubs are in first place in the NL central division and the Red Sox have a shot at the AL pennant this year. OK, well, maybe that's a little extreme but as Kierkegaard said: Hope is the passion for what is possible. Are you hopeful? I am.

Sean Gonsalves is a Cape Cod Times staff writer and syndicated columinist. He can be reached via email: sgonsalves@capecodonline.com

From: "kenn dzaman" <kennspace@hotmail.com Reply-To: kennspace@hotmail.com
To: sgonsalves@capecodonline.com
CC: kennspace@hotmail.com Subject:
Fwd: Local Police-Responsibility, and the CHARGE of Racism.
Date: Tue, 07 Aug 2001 19:45:24 +0000

Dear Sean Gonsalves,

Thank you for your article! I feel you are really on the right track...
I have been staying up with the Seattle writers, and I have seen a change in the asking for accountability and responsibility in the Seattle police force, but it is still not being done. So I am still pressing this case against the Seattle Police Department, and I will give you my attorneys name when we file charges in the next two weeks. Please, I hope you will stay on top of this important national issue of drugs, police abuse, and charges of racism.
Seattle (along with many other big cities) needs help.

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman

Copyright © 2001 The Seattle Times Company
Local News : Tuesday, August 07, 2001
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis/web/vortex/
Nicole Brodeur / Times staff columnist

'Poster boy' for violence resists role
By Nicole Brodeur
Seattle Times staff columnist

EPHRATA ? I hold the charging papers against the glass with one hand and the jailhouse receiver to my ear with the other while Aaron Slaughter reads the ledger of sins stacked against him:

Did intentionally assault a human being, with a deadly weapon, to wit; brass knuckles during the Mardi Gras melee in Pioneer Square. Admitted to assaulting two other attendees. Admitted he had consumed a bottle of Southern Comfort prior to attending this event. Stated he was in a "drunken rage." Was captured on film. Charged with second-degree assault and rioting.

For a man who is 6 feet 3 inches, 260 pounds and the latest poster boy for racial violence, Slaughter speaks in a surprisingly soft voice.

But in the months since his arrest, Slaughter's belief that we are a racist society has hardened. And so, thanks to him, have some of our worst stereotypes.

Slaughter, 20, is in the Grant County Jail on suspicion of attempted robbery. He was arrested with another young man during some campground brawls after a hip-hop concert at the Gorge Amphitheatre on July 21.

Slaughter denies involvement in that incident. He thinks he's here because of society's spite rather than anything he did. If he made a mistake, it was being in the wrong place with the wrong person at the wrong time.

And being who we think he is.

"I'm Aaron Slaughter ... a guy who enjoys sunny days in Seattle."

Nicole Brodeur's column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Reach her at 206-464-2334; or at nbrodeur@seattletimes.com. She liked that Aaron Slaughter.
(for complete article see web link.).

From: "kenn dzaman" <kennspace@hotmail.com Reply-To: kennspace@hotmail.com To: nbrodeur@seattletimes.com CC: kennspace@hotmail.com Subject: Local Police-Responsibility, and the CHARGE of
Racism.
Date: Tue, 07 Aug 2001 19:34:36 +0000

Dear Nicole Brodeur,

Thank you.
It is nice to see a black person reported on as a human being.
I hope you read Sean Gonsalves article: "Try a different approach to drugs", I feel he is on the right track. Whether it is legal -or illegal- drugs in this country, the attitude towards them is one of intolerance. (Like a six pack of beer, or Prozac, keep it in a paper bag please....).

I am finding it rather amazing, that the Seattle police department, after breaking laws; is not being held accountable for the laws they broke. (Oh, thats right, all they do is "enforce" them.).
The Seattle mainstream press has done very, very, little to even report on this event; The Seattle people do not even know the number of shots fired between officers, or for how long they shot at each other???? If you feel (or the Seattle Times) that the Seattle police are above the law; then I do not feel you (the Seattle Times) are in
touch with this culture. The Seattle police tried to kill each other and broke many laws.

Funny, how nothing is being done to see these officers charged with crimes, do you think it is because people are scared of the police?

Or is this just racism?

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman

Dear American Prospect,

Please take a look at this (rather long - but hopefully interesting) Email.
I feel it needs to be discussed, because the Seattle mainstream press is not confronting
or discussing the real problems, or the Seattle police officers who have
committed crimes.

Thank you,
Kenn Dzaman

http://www.seattlepress.com/9207-1.article Seattle Press
Jun 22, 2001 --
Executing McVeigh is Government-Sponsored Terrorism
(Any Police State Execution.).

"I'm sad because there is good in (him) and because this begins our country's involvement again in the cycle of violence."
-Inmate Minister Ashmore talking of his meeting with Timothy McVeigh.

"Our government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or ill, it teaches
the people by its example." -Justice Brandeis

I do not support or believe in the United States Federal Government any longer. I do not support a government, or a culture, that has the power to execute it's own citizens. I do not believe that executing a human being is justice in any form, it is terrorism and murder. I do not support a government that has the power to create this cultural terrorism and execution of human life. When the United States people stop executing human beings and creating this terrorism, I will support the United States government; until then, I do not support the United States government and I will help change it. (I am not a martyr, terrorist, or savior; I am human.)

Human execution is a human perversion that is both cultural and individual, even if it is your self. Any human who enjoys or desires to create the execution and death of another human being (or themselves) is a terrorist. Thank you, United States, for making my decision so easy (even though it's action is so hard); I do not support terrorism, execution, war, or murder, therefore I do not support the United States government. Executing a human being is terrorism and it is what the United States is creating. I do not support terrorism. The United States military kills people all over the world all the time. We are witnessing this killing and terrorism being created in the United States where the military machine is being created. It will be the people of the United States who dismantle this terrorism we are creating - one way or the other; Either through peaceful and conscious evolution, or through perversion, execution, and terrorism. We need to stop this terrorism of executing human beings before it kills us all. If you do not see and feel this terrorism now, you will. Please help stop terrorism from being created by feeling it now, before it takes someone else "by surprise"; it could be someone you know. Please help stop humans from killing humans, it is terrifying, and it creates terrorists.

Officer to be a focus of inquest

Judge rules that jurors also will hear of Roberts' previous run-in with patrolman dragged by car

Saturday, August 4, 2001
http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/local/33955_roberts04.shtmlBy TRACY JOHNSON
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Inquest jurors will hear about Aaron Roberts' past run-in with Seattle Police Officer Greg Neubert, and they will hear evidence that Roberts had "peak levels" of three drugs in his system the night he was killed.

A judge made several key decisions yesterday about what jurors will be allowed to consider in October, when they will try to sort out what exactly happened the night Roberts was killed by police.

Neubert's partner shot the 37-year-old man May 31 following a traffic stop in the Central District. Police say Roberts grabbed Neubert's arm and drove, dragging him. Officer Craig Price scrambled to the passenger door and fired.

Attorneys for Roberts' family contend Neubert forced his way into the car. At their urging yesterday, King County District Judge Barbara Linde agreed to make Neubert a focus of the inquest even though he wasn't the one who fired the fatal shot.

P-I reporter Tracy Johnson can be reached at 206-467-5942 or tracyjohnson@seattlepi.com
(for complete article see web link.).

From: "kenn dzaman" <kennspace@hotmail.com Reply-To: kennspace@hotmail.com To: tracyjohnson@seattlepi.com CC: kennspace@hotmail.com Subject: Fwd:
Local Police-Responsibility, and the
CHARGE of Racism.
Date: Sat, 04 Aug 2001 16:08:23 +0000

Thank you for clearing up some facts on this case in
the media.
I hope you will continue to dig for them.

Thank you,
Kenn Dzaman

(Tracey Johnson (finally) cleared up some facts in the
Seattle mainstream press, on Aaron Roberts Death. Her article in the
Seattle PI: "Officer to be a focus of inquest"..).(Seattle Police
have never lost an inquest.).
The Seattle mainstream media has not cleared up any of
the facts surrounding the incident of Seattle police firing 39(?)
shots at fellow police officers. People in Seattle do not even know how
many shots were actually fired???)?).

http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis/web/vortex/
Nicole Brodeur / Times staff columnist
Throwing pills at all our worries
What a drag it is getting old.

But at least you can afford good restaurants.

And that is where, one recent evening, the talk with friends turned to drugs. Not the ones we took in high school and college. Not the ones ruining kids today. But the ones in our purses, in our systems, right that minute.

The tally: one Xanax, one Prozac. One friend struggled with the name of an antidepressant ? sorry, "mood enhancer" ? that she was sampling like a new conditioner.

A strained laugh passed around the table like a breadbasket. A couple of us went quiet. Then, comforted by the safety in numbers, we chalked it all up to hectic lives and jumped back into the chat.

Reach Nicole Brodeur at 206-464-2334 or nbrodeur@seattletimes.com. She wonders what Woody takes.
Copyright © 2001 The Seattle Times Company
(for complete article see web link.).

Dear Nicole Brodeur,

I feel it is great that you can sit around at lunch and
laugh about your cultures drug use. I wish I felt I could do the same thing, but after
having guns pointed at my head and peeing my pants, I don't find it funny.
I smoke marijuana as my "mood enhancer" as you so
responsibly put it. Well fine for some -who feel their drug use is
"recreational" and not actually helping them function and create the life they
would like to have, then I too, would call it a "mood enhancer".

Your intolerance is showing.

(Mrs. Nicole Brodeur wrote an article Aug. 3rd, 2001;
titled:
"Throwing pills at all our worries".).

[Robert Jamieson]
Power and the police: A balance is needed
http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/jamieson/33772_robert03.shtmlFriday, August 3, 2001

[Photo] By ROBERT L. JAMIESON Jr.
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNIST

How refreshing to hear that Seattle police now have a license to keep law and order.

Silly me. All along I was thinking that was their job -- to keep knuckleheads in check.

But a police review of the Mardi Gras violence, unveiled this week, said that "a more aggressive, pro-active approach to crowd management will yield the best results."

So much for stating the obvious.

The report, though, did offer vindication for many officers who watched Fat Tuesday thugs pummel people, grope women and fire off guns.

Those officers wanted to step in but, for reasons as clear as split-pea soup, they were told to stand down. In giving those orders, their bosses failed them -- and us.

Until this week's release of the report, the pftttttttttt noise coming from the Seattle Police Department was the sound of morale flying out the window.

The Mardi Gras review -- an unusually frank and honest introspection -- is a good place to begin restoring confidence in-house.

It also is a good springboard for rebuilding the public's trust of the Police Department.

But there is a flip side.

If police have more freedom to manhandle violent crowds -- and they should -- then the public ought to be given even more ways to seek redress in cases where the line separating good policing and bad policing is crossed.

One check that could provide more balance is in limbo.

The Police Department has proposed a review board in the Office of Professional Accountability.

The board -- an approved panel of citizens -- would provide further oversight of internal complaint investigations against officers.

But the review board has been stymied as the city and the Seattle Police Officers Guild wrangle over complex issues about the scope of enforcement and the adjudication process.

An arbitration hearing on those issues is set for late September.

The creation of a civilian-led review board would assuage public concerns on issues of police brutality, but some community members feel that more could be done.

They want an independent civilian review board with no ties to the Police Department.

No matter how the bickering over the board plays out, the need for more citizen oversight is clear.

So is this: Civilian review boards are not panaceas. In other cities those panels have, by turns, succeeded and failed.

But given our recent, bruising events, a civilian review board is sorely needed here.

Of course, other avenues do exist for reporting police abuse, including the mayor's office, the courts and the FBI.

A review board is important, if only on a symbolic level, because even though most Seattle officers do their jobs well, the abuse of citizens by police is not some cockamamie fiction.

Just ask Jonathan Moore.

During the 1999 meeting of the World Trade Organization, he went downtown to peacefully protest what he calls "the undemocratic nature of decisions affecting people across the world," as well as Mayor Paul Schell's move to suspend the right to assemble in order to dissuade protests.

Moore was joined by protesters sitting on a sidewalk, where they were rounded up by police, put on a bus and taken to a detention center.

At the center, Moore refused to get off the bus so he could be arraigned for failure to disperse and pedestrian interference.

That's when a police officer -- wearing latex gloves, safety goggles and an outfit with a Seattle police patch -- grabbed his left arm and wrenched it like someone wringing out wet laundry.

Moore was detained for several days. After his release, he went to a hospital. X-rays showed that his left arm had been broken.

Moore sued the police in federal court and settled for about $30,000; the charges against him were dropped.

"The real problem is police accountability," Moore said. "What happened to me was an excessive use of force."

Use of force and policing go hand and hand, often making for tough calls.

As Mike Edwards, head of the guild, explained, in some situations "you can't just have officers there standing around."

Harriett Walden of Mothers for Police Accountability understands this, but given the new police directive, she adds, "I want to know what this 'more aggression' will look like."

We all do -- from rank-and-file officers to citizens.

Let's hope police can strike the right balance.

Let's hope they can use appropriate force when it is called for and not confuse that power with a license to harm.

P-I columnist Robert L. Jamieson Jr. can be reached at 206-448-8125 or robertjamieson@seattlepi.com

From: "kenn dzaman" <kennspace@hotmail.com Reply-To: kennspace@hotmail.com To: robertjamieson@seattlepi.com CC: kennspace@hotmail.com
Subject: Local Police-Responsibility, and the CHARGE of Racism.
Date: Fri, 03 Aug 2001 21:55:26 +0000

Dear Mr Robert Jamieson Jr.,

Thank you for your article. I sent this out to Mr. Joel Connelly and my Family -
I hope it can be of some help to the people of Seattle,
I feel you are also calling for the same responsibility I am.
I am just "mad" about it, so it is harder to hear me.

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman

(Mr. Jamieson wrote an article in the Seattle Times Aug. 3rd, 2001; titled: "The power and the police: A balance is needed" ..(He (in)directly called for people to report abuse to the FBI, the mayors office, and the courts.).

In The Northwest: Despite Cascade Curtain, state is joined at the hip
http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/connelly/34696_joel10.shtml
Friday, August 10, 2001

[Photo] By JOEL CONNELLY
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNIST

Washington vistas from the 8,000-foot col above Cooney Lake in the eastern Cascades are vast, from Mount Baker to Mount Rainier to the Columbia River and the Waterville Plateau far below.

But despite straining eyes and using field glasses, I could not spot the "Cascade Curtain" that allegedly divides Western Washington from Eastern Washington.

Nor was any curtain visible at the lovely mountain tarn. Outlanders from San Francisco, Portland and Seattle chatted with outfitters from the Methow Valley. I was kissed on the cheek by a friendly packhorse that smartly identified a sweaty backpacker as a salt source.

The Cascade Curtain very definitely exists in the mind, however. A few days of hiking in the home district of House co-Speaker Clyde Ballard gave time to reflect on its causes.

It was Ballard who scuttled a transportation package to relieve Puget Sound gridlock, insisting that any additional gas taxes be put to a public vote. I'm happy to report, however, that in Clyde's district the state Department of Transportation is doing major repair work on the U.S. 2-U.S. 97 bridge over the Columbia River.
.......
Eastern Washington hasn't had a governor in Olympia since Clarence Martin left office 60 years ago. Two-thirds of a century have passed since C.C. Dill of Spokane served in the U.S. Senate.

.....
Jealousy: The high-tech boom of Western Washington, and phenomenal growth of such Mountain West cities as Boise, has to a considerable extent bypassed Eastern Washington.

Alas, truth-telling has rarely been these folks' strong point.

P-I columnist Joel Connelly can be reached at 206-448-8160 or joelconnelly@seattlepi.com
(for complete article see web link.).

Dear Mr. Joel Connelly,

I feel sad that I am moving from Seattle, but I am a part of the
problem, so I will leave. You may not be interested in this personal story. That
is okay, I am sure you will hearing about (at least part of it) from other
sources.

I grew up in Littleton Colorado and I know all about the creation of rage in the local culture. I am moving from Seattle because I feel that same rage being created in Seattle now. Seattle people can wait - until your kids start blowing up your high schools; I am leaving. I left Littleton twenty years ago just before the guns and bombs started to be built by kids in schools. (I was a kid at that time, I wanted to build one myself - so I moved.). I was moved out of a culture and "disenfranchised" from my family, because I found a medication that makes me lose my depression and gain an appetite; marijuana. (I have tried a dozen "legally" prescribed drugs over the years -prescribed through "therapy" from "therapists" (the-rapist) that tried to kill me with my love for marijuana. I feel a lot of those therapists would have rather seen me kill myself, than have me make them feel the terror they were trying to brainwash my soul with - through this "drug war" - that has caused guns to be pointed at my head, cause I like pot.).

I am through with Seattle, but I am going to do all I can to stop this rage from being created. I could see and feel it happening in Littleton, and I ran away because that is what the people wanted. I am not running this time. I cannot mentally or physically afford to; not after the Columbine tragedy.

I hope you have the time to possibly get the personal feeling I am sharing; a few others in the national media have, - and I feel these issue's (in Seattle) will be being talked about Nationally in the coming months. I will be filing charges in the next two weeks (I need an attorney) in every way I can. As a resident, concerned citizen, and a human being; that has witnessed Seattle police department abuse and negligence, --first hand-- - not through others. I resided in the WTO riot zone, it was my home (Glen Hotel-across from Beneroya hall -rm 213); tell me - were you there?. I wish I had not lived there, and that can be corrected by me, I have moved from downtown, but I realize now, that is not far enough away..

The US "Drug War"(consumption intolerance) creates racism and abuse, and destroys families, (and high schools.) But then again, you may be just like my father, and feel it is all my fault or can easily not listen, because I use marijuana (or do something else you don't want to discuss.)..]

The rage is real Mr. Connelly, and Seattle can hold it inside and let it cook as long as they want to, I am here to tell you this; then I am moving. I have got enough negative response from what I feel is a needed action - in my personal life and Seattle -- to know, - it is time for me to go. Seattle does not want to fix their problems, that would just be - "too hard". I am an easy one to ignore Mr. Connelly, but that would be your, and my families problem, not mine. I am not trying to be anything but human, if you feel I am trying to be anything else, please, call me -
full of passionate intensity.

You can stop listening now.

Kenn
(Mr. Connelly wrote an article in the Seattle Times - that discounted anyone
with passionate intensity.).

[Opinion]
Letters to the Editor
Sunday, August 12, 2001
CONNELLY COLUMN

Leaders build consensus while problems smolder
Joel Connelly pines for the good old days before the WTO (Aug. 3 P-I). According to Connelly, an inclusive consensus-building process for getting things done prevailed during the previous 30 years. Recently, he argues, the process has been corrupted by an authoritarian right and a far left that regards such consensus-building as a ruse for downtown interests to get their way.

The truth is that consensus-building was often a euphemism for inaction except when pressure for action came from the right places. There is some merit in the argument that Seattle leadership falls all over itself to satisfy corporate interests. This is a city that takes years to build a few downtown toilets for fear that corporations might be offended by the class of people they might attract.

Police-community relations and accountability are serious problems across the nation. They were not just ginned up by people Connelly sneeringly refers to as Rev. Jeffrey's boycotts and demands and a fair number of "white Marxists."

The problem is not that extremists of the left and right have taken over; they have not. The problem is that there has been a failure in civic leadership in the community. The WTO and other recent debacles were in large part the result of deficient city training, discipline and management over the past 30 years.

City leadership occupied itself with "consensus-building" while letting serious problems smolder for decades.

Malcolm D. McPhee Seattle

Dear Concerned Human Being,

I am writing this letter to Seattle Residents, hoping it will quell fears, (I feel being created) -on the Streets of Seattle. I have no intention to cause harm to the City of
Seattle, so I hope you will share as much of this information as you can, with as many people as you can, before it is seen elsewhere.

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman

Dear Rocky Mountain News,

I have sent this Email to every member of The US House
of Representatives and the US senate. I have sent this Email to all members of the Seattle City Council; the Mayor of Seattle; and local, and national media.
The writing in this Email is based on my feelings; -of events I have experienced and witnessed in Seattle. I do not feel there is a great need that I am quoted. I am not saying by any means; to not feel free in publishing, and disseminating, anything I have sent you, in any way; but anyone else can also. I feel I can be the best, and the strongest influence, if this "battle" is not focused on me; I do drugs. I only smoke marijuana, and I am never in possession of enough to get in "real" trouble; non-the-less, I am very easily, "slandered". (I do not have any marijuana at this time, and for a little while at least; I quit.). (I have a "crazy" time without marijuana.).

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman

National Press Release: Local Police-Responsibility,
and the CHARGE of Racism
Date : Wed, 01 Aug 2001 22:17:21 +0000

Dear Concerned Human Beings, Writers, Editors, Lawyers,
and "others",

[{(This email is being distributed, and publicized; as a public document. This Email is not anyone's intellectual property. This Email is all feeling, and is for free public distribution.)}]
Aug. 1, 2001

(To those who have helped me -thank you-, to those who have ignored me; this is a courtesy call. My goal is to help eliminate violence against human beings (police and others) and to save lives. I feel when communication mistakes are worked out, it makes everyone feel safer -and more peaceful, -allowing for more happiness.).
As of this morning, August 1, 2001; I have confirmation from three sources, this story will be mentioned and appearing Nationally in US papers - over the next seven to ten days. (It's about time! - I Emailed this to -well- over a thousand people and
"organizations" over the last two weeks! Plus everyone in government I can find.).
(Two syndicated columnists are interested in helping Seattle, and so is one very large big city Newspaper. They are going to report their version of the facts, and how it makes them feel; not me. (Although some of the stuff I wrote will also be printed...).). I intend to press this case until I see charges filed against the Seattle Police Department, and the government people (and agencies) that are controlling it. The United States is making a fool of itself by not being able to discuss, and take responsibility for it's racial "issues".("US Pushes to Refocus Racism Conference"; In the August 1, 2001 New
York Times.).

National Press-Responsibility, -And The CHARGE of Racism.

The New York Times is doing the United States, and the city of Seattle, a great disservice.
The New York Times is creating fear in Seattle, and being ignorant.
The New York Times should be ashamed of it's reporting on the Seattle Police Chief, Gil Kerlikowske, on July 30, 2001; It is a slap in the face to Seattle.
The New York Times could report on other facts, -on Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske's performance; But like the Seattle media, The New York Times has chosen ignorance.
(I would call The New York Times and the local Seattle media racist, except The New York Times and the local Seattle media would not here it.).

Sincerely,
Kenn Dzaman____________________________________
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Local Police-Responsibility, -And The CHARGE of Racism.

[The connection is not being made in the Seattle press;
But the connection is,
and has,
been made on the streets of Seattle.]

[This is a simple and yet such a hard, -connection to make; and the Seattle media has chosen ignorance:

1.). The Seattle Police got off for WTO abuse for "not remembering", and even though it is on video, the Seattle Police officers do not have identifiable differences on the video, and can remain "anonymous"-without punishment or retribution. (Even though Seattle paid thousands of dollars in fines, to the people abused -by "unidentified" Seattle Police officers (captured on video tape.)..

2.). Through Seattle Police Department negligence, and the Seattle Police Departments known repetition of an internal "unidentified" and "hidden" crime, the Seattle Police almost "mistakenly" killed each other. If the Seattle Police are creating internal mistakes and mistakenly shooting at "innocent" people (Seattle Police officers), chances are, they have done it before.

3.). The Seattle Police Department videotaped a murder at the Mardi Gras riots, without offering assistance. The Seattle Police Guild - (Rank-and-file Seattle police officers) discussed calling for a "no-confidence" vote concerning the leadership of Chief Gil Kerlikowske following the Fat Tuesday riot in which one man was
killed.

4.). From witnesses, and the facts published, it is hard to tell who the aggressor was, in Aaron Roberts's death (assault-murder).

These facts are known "anonymous" "street facts"...]

Anonymous facts...kill people.
-----__________________------------------------
________________________________________________
"We cannot teach children that there is nothing that is wrong or dishonorable and that nothing is worth standing up for. The abuse and lies of elected officials made public in recent times cannot be accepted because they are claimed to be merely personal or commonplace. These acts are disgraceful examples for our children and, if condoned, destructive of our society."

From the article July 27th, 2001; in the Seattle Times:
"Promoting civility on the streets of Seattle".
by Patrick Fitzsimons; Seattle Police chief from 1979
to 1994.
_______________________________________________----
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Even after this has been in the Seattle Times, there is still no action being reported on, or taken, by the Seattle media, or government..

If the former Seattle Police Chief is asking for help, so am I.

This is the New York Times article from;
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/07/30/national/30POLI.html

NY times - "City police work is losing its appeal and its veterans"

(Seattle Police are in the New York Times. - This article really says a lot about the state of our nations police moral, -a lot of them (I feel) are tired of, (being in the "middle") of, the drug war; and killing "innocent" people.

I find it very strange that the Seattle Police Department is mentioned on the front page of the New York Times (today July 30, 2001); and the only thing mentioned about the Seattle police chief - is how hard and thankless his job is, and what a great lifesaver he is....

What about the current charge of racial profiling against the Seattle Police department?
What about 39 shots fired as Seattle Police officers tried to kill Seattle Police officers??
What about Aaron Roberts's questionable death???
What about the Seattle Police video taping a murder at the Mardi Gras riots????
What about the Seattle Police Guild's close decision (not) to call for a vote of "No Confidence in The Seattle Police Chief"?????

In The New York Times - Nationally, he saves drug addicts - on the street... You, can decide what he is doing -locally - on the street.

This is absolutely - crazy, frustrating, fearful, and terroristic; - to read what the New York Times said about the Seattle police chief, - with what has been, and is happening in Seattle. It is also negligence of responsibility - of fair or honest reporting by the New York Times, and totally distorts the perception of the problems - in the Seattle police department (and those who command it). It is quite obvious the New York Times is on the Seattle Police Departments side and they want to see Aaron Roberts family, and anyone else asking for Seattle Police department accountability in Seattle Police officers shooting their guns; to be labeled "combative". (After all, Seattle does have such a great life saving chief, - who is very over-worked and under-appreciated; How could you ask for him to be responsible for
anything?...)...

What about the abuse at WTO?...(The present Seattle police chief wasn't there for that one. ---That -- Seattle police chief lost his job -- after he flat out told the mayor of Seattle - (Paul Schell--- a long time before WTO happened); the Seattle police department was not ready, and was -under-trained- for the WTO Conference and planned protests... so he lost his job because the WTO protest was so screwed
up????.?).?

(And it was screwed up. I resided in a low income apartment in the riot zone; it is apart of why I am so fearful of Seattle Police...).

I am trying to communicate a personal idea of how I feel, and why I must pursue a case of reckless and negligent endangerment, against the Seattle Police department:- I am afraid, and I would like to see that fear reduced, and positive things happen. 1.). I am pressing for: -"Seattle Police play acting Arrest Forums"; - with Seattle Police Officers in local Gyms, to educate the public and the Seattle Police - on when life threats are created in arrest, (and other Seattle police public communication risks can be realistically explored and experienced), and reduced.

2.). I am pressing for: - Seattle Police car markings, and numbers; for precinct and police, - public identification-accountability.

3.). I am pressing for: - Seattle Police officer uniform and riot gear
identification (numbering). (The Seattle Police and the Seattle people are on the
same team, and I want to know who the player's are when penalties, or
trophies, need to be awarded.).

4.). I am pressing for: The communication with the public, and Seattle Police department's inter-departmental communication, be improved upon. The responsible and accountable people in the chain of command for the Seattle Police department need to be held accountable for their actions and communication practices. The Seattle Police department needs to defend their communication errors from charges of negligent and reckless endangerment, in a court of law. This in the hopes it
can be improved upon, and held to the same standards as the public, (at a minimum). I really feel (what seems like) a real threat to my existence, and I need to figure it out. I am worried for many I know in Seattle, (and everyone else I don't know). I really want (and need) - to find the most productive and positive way - to approach and pursue, the elimination and reduction of Seattle Police and Seattle people's risk -
of abuse, injury, or death. It creates terrorism and fear in people, and that is dangerous.

I am in need of consulting Seattle people, -on criminal and civil charges, - being brought against the Seattle Police Department, and those who run it. I want to create the public pressure - in the Seattle city council, and the Washington State Prosecutors office, - to pursue criminal and civil charges against the Seattle Police Department, and those who run it. I want to see the Seattle Police Department, and those who run it, held accountable for the continued miss-communication and
negligence - that is creating an atmosphere of fear in Seattle; and putting the Seattle police department, and the people of Seattle at risk.
I am referring to many incidents, but I am concentrating on one; The Seattle Police exchanging 39(?) bullets, - and trying to kill fellow Seattle Police officers. (Residents-criminals - "mascot"?). The Seattle Police Department knew of the risk, of having an armed (shotgun locked in the Seattle police car) "unidentified" Seattle police ""officer"" (criminal), driving (patrolling) the streets of Seattle. This mistake was repeated. While the Seattle Police department knew the risk of an unidentified person -with an "armed police car" (shotgun locked in car)- "patrolling" the streets of Seattle; this information was not made public. As a result of this incident, the people of Seattle (Seattle police included) were put in negligent danger - and risk. ((What is the "atmosphere" at the Seattle police department, if something like this is allowed to happen in silence? And everyone in Seattle (Seattle police included), is put at risk because of this silence?))

(1). I am going to try and get as much publicity for this case as I can. I will take any assistance from others who feel they can offer help. (Petitions, forums, phone calls, letters, setting and following precedents, tackling continuing problems; etc....--
Basically; anything that will create public pressure -and education- of this "event", and it's connection to continuing miss-communication in the Seattle Police Department, and the government in charge of the Seattle Police Department.).

(2). I would like to see the Seattle City Council and the Washington State Prosecutors Office, -immediately press for: The Seattle Police Department - to add car markings - as to precinct and car; - and to correct the mistake of Seattle police car "anonymity"; (and offer more public-police safety-accountability.). (There would
also be very little chance of a stolen police car being "mistaken" for a
real one, and less chance of "unidentified" -armed Seattle Police cars-
being stolen and allowed to "patrol".).

(3). I would like to see the Seattle City Council, and the Washington State prosecutors office; immediately press for identifying numbers on all Seattle police officers backs, and shoulders, and identifying numbers on all riot gear. (If a Seattle Police Officer forgets they may have kicked someone or pepper sprayed someone, and it is recorded on video from across the street, they will be identifiable -
even with their lack of memory power to recall the incident (especially under stress.).(Numbers could be anon. and changed daily.).

The sad, juvenile, and satirical way the Seattle mainstream media has
reported the event of Seattle police officers exchanging 39 shots at each other, and mistakenly trying to kill each other, (and putting all of Seattle at negligent and reckless risk, without any call for public responsibility or accountability;); is sick and makes me feel ill with fear. If we sit back and allow this fear to be created, it will eventually kill someone. The Seattle mainstream media is helping to create this fear, so I would like to see these charges brought about in the most high profile way as to garnish as much media attention as possible.

Also: I do have concerns with the Seattle police department not being certified, and I want to find out what accreditations, and professional affiliations, the Seattle Police department does have.

I would also like to see the Seattle police department's policy of (public - individual, communication and arrest) "force matrix" rules (of engagement); so the public and the Seattle police, - can both be educated, as to what is life threatening (to a Seattle police officer-resident.).

I have scary notions when it comes to the police - and our culture and society; and I want to put my own fears to rest. I do not believe that an intelligent white supremacist moves into the woods of Idaho and becomes a hermit anarchist; I feel the "intelligent" white supremacist, becomes a United States police officer or a soldier. My goal in pressing these charges is to quell my own fears of racism,
and hopefully save peoples lives.

The United States Federal Government has declared war on it's own citizens; and it is killing Seattle police officers -and other- "innocent" people. I feel the drug war, declared by the United States Federal Government, - on the people of Seattle, is negligently creating violence and death on the streets of Seattle. I feel this "war" --is the root cause-- to why we can't all just -get along- in the city of Seattle. This is a first step in correcting this continuing mistake. There are charges of racism against the Seattle police department; I am going to repeat the charges of racism against the Seattle police department. It is not just minorities; it is the people of Seattle being killed by this continued police intolerance, abuse, and brutality against drugs (people). It is time for the residents of Seattle to stop this war, before more innocent people die, and the atmosphere of fear and violence escalates in Seattle, as it has elsewhere in the United States.

"I feel" - if the Seattle police department is not held accountable for their exchange of bullets; no one is.

I do not feel the city of Seattle is focusing on the foundation causing the problem of street violence and racism between the Seattle police department and the public; it is the Federal drug war. The United States federal drug war is killing people in
Seattle, and setting up a barrier between the Seattle people and the Seattle police department. ((The Seattle Police (pretty much) have their own "culture and society". So much so, - that they made a police officers son, who has been continually devastated by police "culture"; -- a "mascot".). It is time to change our policies, and stop putting the people (and Seattle police officers) (of the city of Seattle); at such known negligent risk, created by our Federal governments drug war (intolerance.). As long as the Seattle Police Department is at war with the people they are supposed to protect, we are all in danger.

Ignorance of racism, negligence, and other miss-communications by the Seattle police department (and the mainstream media), is creating an atmosphere of fear and distrust in the city of Seattle.

I feel; that until the Seattle Police Department is held accountable for their actions; the fear and distrust of the Seattle Police Department, (being predominately created through a federally declared "drug war" on it's citizens), will create more human violence and death in Seattle.

People - in Seattle right now who are criticizing the Seattle Police Department, (or are asking for Seattle Police accountability-responsibility), are being labeled
combative. (Lawyer Douglas Wilson did not label himself combative, it is
the way he is being portrayed by the press. Why is Douglas Wilson
"combative" and Lisa Marchese "tenacious"? Because the police departments
lawyer (Lisa Marchese) released Aaron Roberts state as "a crazed drugged person" on the public record, before Mr. Wilson released his version of facts. ). (It is basically a "justified killing" of Aaron, because Aaron Roberts did drugs sometime the month of his killing; (this has been reported in the Seattle press; and it may, or may not have, - altered him.). Yet, - the police were not tested for anything, because their blood is still in their bodies. -- To call Mr. Wilson "combative", for releasing information that the Seattle Police Officer was beating Aaron Roberts up and possibly started the confrontation, I feel is exactly the same defense the Seattle Police department will be using in court - against Aaron...).

(Thank you Seattle Weekly - Rick Anderson, and Geov Parrish; and Fred Quarnstrom (guest columnist) (Seattle dentist).).

The Seattle Weekly;
AUGUST 9th, 2001 (This story is gut wrenching (with autopsy photo.) careful if you visit the web site,,,, kinda graphic...)..).

http://www.seattleweekly.com/features/0132/news-anderson.shtml
Changing story
New information emerges as lawyers debate the death of Aaron Roberts.
BY RICK ANDERSON

AARON ROBERTS , killed the night of May 31 by a Seattle police officer, so feared being arrested and shot by the cops that he kept an armored vest in his closet, says his attorney.

But Roberts, 37, may have writ his own obituary the night he died by ingesting or shooting up three illegal drugs, including enough heroin to kill a lesser man, says the cop's attorney.

Those conflicting portraits--an African-American man who may have been unjustifiably shot almost in the manner he feared, or one who put himself in harm's way with a mix of drugs and an irrational reaction to a traffic stop--could be reconciled at a coroner's inquest. Meanwhile community ferment over the shooting continues (see "Preaching Revolution Now").

Last week, at a pre-inquest hearing, Judge Barbara Linde made key decisions about the inquest that resulted in a major victory for Roberts' family.

It is now clear that neither Roberts nor the officer who killed him, Craig Price, will be the Oct. 1 inquest's focus, if the Roberts family has its way.

To Roberts' relatives, the officer responsible for the death of their loved one is nine-year veteran Greg Neubert. He repeatedly shouted for his fellow white police officer to shoot as Neubert was allegedly being carried along a Central District street by the car of Roberts.

Douglas Wilson, the Roberts family's attorney, called Neubert dishonest--"he's been a liar for years"--and sought court orders to prove it by probing the cop's psychological state, service record, and court record.

In a major victory for the family, Judge Linde ruled Friday that Neubert could be a designated "party" to the inquest (the cops' attorneys had argued the law designates only the actual shooter--in this case, Price--as the hearing's centerpiece). But Linde also ruled against the request to review Neubert's mental state and past court testimony. To Wilson's protests, she also decided that the inquest jury could hear about Roberts' alleged use of drugs.

"There are still so many conflicts," says Wilson, "and so few answers."

randerson@seattleweekly.com
(see web link for complete article:.).

The Seattle Weekly;
AUGUST 9th, 2001;

http://www.seattleweekly.com/features/0132/news-parrish.shtml
Published August 9 - 15, 2001
Seattle can't learn
BY GEOV PARRISH

LAST WEEK , at least 60 reporters and other wielders of symbolic megaphones crowded into the mayor's conference room to hear Paul Schell and various task force representatives unveil the city's assessment of what needs to be done to avoid repeating last February's ugly Mardi Gras riots. After the presentations, the questioning was pointed. It echoed the aggressiveness of the Seattle Police Department's Mardi Gras after-action report, released the previous night: Shouldn't event organizers be held responsible for violence? What about stiffer sanctions against law-breakers? And so on.

The city wants Mardi Gras to morph into something silly called February Fest, as though what we all pine for is another Bumbershoot or block party when it's 45 degrees, dark, and raining. Between the police and the task forces, we didn't learn much. We knew that, just like with the WTO, the SPD would decide that it should attack citizens with less provocation next time. We knew that the city would discover that good planning is better than bad planning(!). And so on.

To be fair, within the scopes that the various task forces considered, they covered a lot of ground. But they all boiled down to the very liberal Seattle conviction that we need more government involvement when the public wants to get together, and, when youth are troubled, we need to throw lots of money at new programs for them.

This was both predictable and irrelevant. The Mardi Gras violence would never have become a lasting public issue--would have been indistinguishable from any of a half-dozen other rowdy civic affairs--had cops not held back even when violent crimes were being committed right in front of them. Any discussion of "preventing it from happening again" begins and ends there; the rest is window dressing that may make the event better, safer, and more inclusive in the future, but its absence isn't what cost Kris Kime his life.

gparrish@seattleweekly.com
(for complete article see web site.).

SEATTLE POST INTELLIGENCER
[Opinion]
Exposure fosters racial understanding

Friday, August 10, 2001

http://seattlep-i.nwsource.com/opinion/34641_raceop.shtml
By FRED QUARNSTROM
GUEST COLUMNIST

Seattleites do not burn crosses or walk around in white sheets. If we did, it certainly would be easier to recognize and confront the problem.

Most of us are prejudiced, regardless of our race. It is natural to feel more comfortable with your own. It creates problems when we do not recognize our prejudices and allow them to result in discrimination. Most discrimination is difficult to address or even to recognize because it is subtle. I may make you uncomfortable. I hope I will make you search your souls and do some introspective thinking and questioning.

I grew up in a small town in the Yakima Valley, where being Democrat was about as different as was allowed. We had no prejudice. However, we had no "minorities" (this was 1957). There was one black family and one Asian family in our town.

To quote Booker T. Washington, "You can't hold a person down without staying down with them."

Fred Quarnstrom is a dentist who lives in Southeast Seattle.
(for complete article see web link.).

[I grew up in Littleton Colorado, - close to the Columbine Tragedy location. I really do know, and grew up with - a lot of rage -- in the local culture. It is obvious to me, after over twenty years (I graduated in 1979 from Arapahoe High school in
Littleton, I moved from Littleton the next day)--- it has not changed. I dropped out of sports in junior high in Littleton, because the guys were such jerks to "others". I feel this "threat" in all of Seattle now, (I am going to move, but it will take me some time); (It is worse in different areas of Seattle.). (I will be working on relieving the fear and violence in Seattle for a long time (as well as Littleton.).

((I feel; Life feels a threat to life's existence, even if it is your self. So if the culture around you is a threat to you, or life (life's existence), you will feel it. The more the culture around you, ignores those feelings in you, the more insanity and terrorism
is created by you, in the culture ( and in your self). A mistake of any kind can only be created for so long, before someone rages about it... ).))]

Human beings must always defend themselves from their
own communication mistakes (like a drug addict who wants to quit the
addiction before it kills them). The Seattle police department especially
needs to defend themselves from their communication mistakes, these
mistakes - obviously can kill anonymously and mistakenly.
The Seattle police department's (possible) creation of racism and
negligence, can be figured out, and eliminated. We, the citizens of Seattle, are this responsibility, - unless we choose not to be. The Seattle Police Department does not have any more problems in its operations than the people of Seattle are creating. I

feel terrified for the people in Seattle; they are having very little reaction to its police operations - and continuing miss-communications. - I feel, - due to fear, -and Seattle Police "anonymity", in Seattle Police officers not being responsible for their actions in a federal "drug war". I have personally experienced much meanness, and abuse,
- from Seattle Police officers; especially in recent years. The Seattle Police Department, I feel - due to the Federal Drug War, is a terrorist and abusive "organization" that needs more local control, and needs to explain it's internal communication mistakes that may (or may not) of already killed people.

Sincerely,
Kenneth George Dzaman
PO Box 85503
Seattle Washington 98145-1503
Email: kennspace@hotmail.com

TO BE EQUAL COLUMN 25
ftp://ftp.nul.org/pub/tbe/tbe200125.txt
New Evidence of Racial Profiling's Harm

By Hugh B. Price
President
National Urban League

"If you're black, most likely you will get stopped. You can't do anything about it. That's just the way it is."

These were the sentiments a 24-year-old African-American housepainter in New Haven, Connecticut expressed recently to Washington Post pollsters who had asked him whether he had ever been stopped by the police for no clear reason.

Indeed he had, he said, recounting an incident that had occurred when he was out riding his bicycle: A police officer pulled him over, then "He asked where I was headed, and I told him. He searched me, and didn't find anything and then he let me go."

A relatively painless encounter, many people might say; what's the harm?

The harm, of course, is that stopping and frisking people without reasonable cause-solely on the basis of their race or ethnicity-is a moral disgrace as well as a violation of individuals' civil rights.

The harm is that it is a cancerous practice that erodes the respect law-abiding citizens should have for law enforcement officers and institutions.

The harm is that some people, citizens of the United States of America, have the experience to prove that police violation of their civil rights is as much "just the way it is" in modern-day America as was the much-broader racism people of color endured well into the 1960s.

A survey the Washington Post published on June 21 is the latest evidence of how widespread this destructive police practice is.

(see web link for continuation).

TO BE EQUAL COLUMN 26
ftp://ftp.nul.org/pub/tbe/tbe200126.txt
Reducing the Problem of Racial Profiling

By Hugh B. Price
President
National Urban League

In a recent column I discussed a new Washington Post survey which underscored the breadth of police racial profiling-the stopping and searching of people of color based primarily on the fact that they are people of color-and, implicitly, why it's such a flashpoint of race relations today.

The poll, commissioned by the Post, the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, and Harvard University, found that 52 percent of black men and 25 percent of black women said they had been stopped by police officers solely because they were black.

It also determined that 20 percent of Hispanic Americans and 11 percent of Asian Americans said they had experienced similar treatment (4 percent of whites also said they had experienced such treatment).

I said then that those astonishing percentages are powerful evidence that racial profiling is being "too easily tolerated," and that more needs to be done to eliminate it.
(see web link for continuation)..

Crime and Justice in Black America
By Christopher E. Stone
Director, Vera Institute for Criminal Justice
http://www.nul.org/stonessay.html
ABSTRACT

Black Americans face a paradox when it comes to crime and justice. Black Americans suffer disproportionately from most crime, yet when blacks and whites join forces to fight crime, the injustices felt in black communities at the hands of the criminal justice system are often either ignored or discounted by the larger population.

Escaping this paradox requires candor about the scope of the crime problem in Black America. There is good news here, as serious crime is falling in most major cities; but the levels of black victimization and black crime are still high. This chapter documents the extent of the crime and explores possible reasons for the recent declines within black communities.

Escaping the paradox also requires clarity about the injustices in the present system. At an individual level, the perceived prevalence by blacks of injustices within the criminal justice system has led to mistrust and has compromised Black America?s confidence in the system?s capacity to protect and mete out justice. At the level of policy, criminal justice is becoming much more harsh. There is evidence which strongly suggests that this is politically possible only because the policies, even when applied in a color-blind fashion, will apply principally to black Americans.

Understanding the scope of the twin problems of crime and injustice allows us to identity and support programs and policies that attempt to address both.

(This next article also appeared in the Tacoma News Tribune titled;
"Racism probe asked for legal system".
It did not appear in Seattle mainstream press - and very very little was said about it. Can't find it on web almost at all...).

President of Urban League Calls for Review of Inequity
By ROBIN TONER [W] ASHINGTON, July 29 ;

The head of the National Urban League called on the Bush administration today to conduct a comprehensive review of the "pervasive racism" in the criminal justice system, from racial profiling to the number of blacks on death row. Hugh B. Price, president of the Urban League, said at the group's annual conference, "Tonight, I say to President Bush what I once said to President Clinton: race relations won't improve in America until racism in the criminal justice system subsides." Mr. Price praised Mr. Bush and Attorney General John Ashcroft for expressing concern about the issue but asserted, "It's time they
move beyond empathy to aggressive corrective action."

Justice Gone Amok
Article by Bob Herbert
http://robtshepherd.tripod.com/copout.html
The gruesome problems in the criminal justice system that have been overlooked for so many years are starting to burst into public view, and the system is breaking down in some parts of the country.

In Los Angeles an enormous scandal is unfolding. Dozens of people are known to have been framed by the police and some innocent people reportedly were shot. A criminal probe of the department has uncovered a wide range of offenses committed by police officers, including drug dealing, tampering with evidence, witness intimidation, perjury and assault.

(see web links for complete articles..).

Racial and Ethnic Bias in the Courts
Bibliography
Updated April 1997
Part II: Materials Identified From Various Journals, Newsletters, and Texts
(Compiled by the Information Service of the National Center for State Courts)
http://www.ncsc.dni.us/is/Bib2_2.htm
(Good).

[Northwest]
Police guild mulls taking no-confidence vote in chief
Thursday, March 29, 2001
By LEWIS KAMB
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER
TUKWILA -- Rank-and-file Seattle police officers last
night discussed calling for a "no-confidence" vote concerning the
leadership of Chief Gil Kerlikowske following the Fat Tuesday riot in which one
man was killed.
At the Police Officers Guild monthly meeting, more than
150 members took a vote to determine whether a "no-confidence" vote
would be held in the future. Some officers leaving the meeting said such a
vote would likely be held after the guild explored other actions,
including asking for an outside investigation of the decisions made during the
Mardi Gras mayhem.

[Violence at Mardi Gras]
Previous coverage
Fat Tuesday photos

Kristopher Kime, a 20-year-old former Evergreen High School soccer standout, was killed early Feb. 28 as violence erupted in Pioneer Square. He was trying to help a woman to her feet when attacked. A 17-year-old boy has been charged with second-degree murder for allegedly delivering the punches that killed Kimes.
Some officers have complained they were held back for too long after the violence started. Kerlikowske has defended the decision not to move in earlier, saying such an action could have incited more violence.

arch/ive/ief (2000 - 2005)