Earlier this month, the Seattle Times published a piece about Seattle Police Chief Sue Rahr overturning or modifying disciplinary recommendations in four recent Office of Police Accountability (OPA) investigations involving Seattle cops. In most of the cases, Rahr argued that unless OPA discovered serious misconduct, it should recommend corrective, rather than punitive officer discipline. Meanwhile, Seattle Police Department (SPD) leadership recently celebrated its renewed ability to jail low-level non-violent offenders. by Ashley Nerbovig Earlier this month, the Seattle Times published a piece about Seattle Police Chief Sue Rahr overturning or modifying disciplinary recommendations in four recent Office of Police Accountability (OPA) investigations involving Seattle cops. In most of the cases, Rahr argued that unless OPA discovered serious misconduct, it should recommend corrective, rather than punitive officer discipline. Meanwhile, Seattle Police Department (SPD) leadership recently celebrated its renewed ability to jail low-level non-violent offenders.  As the City expands the powers of officers to crack down on Seattle’s poorest and most vulnerable populations, Rahr has taken the hypocritical stance that taking a similar approach with SPD officers, most of whom earn six-figure salaries, would be counterproductive in changing behavior. The Seattle Times article referenced four cases Rahr took issue with, including some of the findings in the case involving former SPD Officer Daniel Auderer’s laughing and making light of the death of Jaahnavi Kandula, who SPD Officer Kevin Dave hit and killed in January 2023. The OPA determined that Auderer’s comment, which suggested Kandula’s age meant she had limited value, amounted to bias against her based on age. Rahr disagreed, arguing that making a derogatory comment about someone's age cannot rise to the same level of misbehavior as calling someone a slur or mocking their disability. The SPD policy manual states that no officer shall make any prejudiced or derogatory comment regarding a person's characteristics, including their age.  The other incidents of Rahr overturning discipline involved less high profile cases. In one case, an officer claimed he accidentally tased a woman, who was lying on the ground in handcuffs. Officers had responded to a call about an unarmed woman wandering naked in the middle of an intersection, covered in blood, disoriented, and possibly in crisis. She asked them to call her mom, they said they would but she needed to drop to her knees. The woman took three steps toward the officers, then one of them tasered her causing her to slump over. As the officers finished putting the woman in handcuffs, the officer’s taser zapped again, causing the woman’s body to jerk and her to shout, “Ow! Please stop!” The officer with the Taser said sorry and another officer said, “Fucking hell dude.” That tasering lasted about a second. In the OPA’s investigation into the incident, the officer explained he wasn’t used to the new Taser model and that led to the accidental discharge. OPA sustained the policy violation against him because he undeniably tased the woman while she lay in handcuffs, which violated department policy. Rahr overturned the OPA’s finding and argued that in the six months it took for the OPA to investigate this case, the officer had no other use-of-force violations. She acknowledged that the officer had tased a woman in handcuffs, and that SPD policy did not require OPA to establish the officer's intent in order to find a policy violation, but she still argued he should not have his record marred by this incident. In another case Rahr overturned, two officers failed to activate their in-car video (ICV) when approaching a person they suspected of trespassing in an alley. Both officers did activate their body-worn cameras. The case summary said the officers drove up to the person in the alley, parked, the officer in the driver’s seat exited the car, and the person allegedly punched the officer almost immediately. The body-worn camera footage only captured a struggle due to how close the man was to the officer. After officers arrested the man, he was taken to the hospital for a broken nose. The OPA sustained two policy violations against the officers. However, Rahr overturned the OPA’s findings meaning they wouldn’t be on the officer’s internal personnel file. Rahr argued that neither officer intentionally left the ICV turned off. She emphasized that, except in serious cases, officer discipline should be corrective rather than punitive. Under the SPD policy manual, failing to activate the ICV constitutes a serious policy violation. The final case involved a failure to Mirandize a person after placing them in handcuffs and beginning to question them. It took 23 minutes before he was informed of his rights. Failure to Mirandize someone before questioning them violates their constitutional rights, and SPD’s policy manual categorizes it as a serious breach of policy. Despite this, Rahr overturned the sustained finding and said it was important to her that this officer, who had worked for the department for ten years with only one written reprimand in that entire time, be "rehabilitated, not punished and demoralized.” Rahr’s strategy for dealing with the residents of Seattle seems to be in direct opposition to her rehabilitative stance toward her officers. Since the lifting of the booking restrictions, her department has increasingly sought to punish people for a host of minor infractions by incarcerating them. On November 9, SPD jailed a woman in crisis who hit a man on his shoulder with a water bottle. When officers questioned her about the incident she appeared to not understand the question, and then she said she soiled herself before continuing “to talk incoherently,” according to the police report. She remains in jail and she’s now awaiting a mental health competency evaluation. The officers made no mention in their police report of attempting to divert her from jail before putting a person in crisis into a jail cell, a situation which can be incredibly punishing and demoralizing, to borrow words from Rahr’s description of OPA discipline. In another case from November 6, Rahr’s officers arrested a man for stealing a Pepsi valued at $3.19 from an AMPM after the store had formally trespassed him. The man spent eight days in jail for that charge, before the court released him and ordered he undergo a competency evaluation. The police report made no mention of officers attempting to contact a prebooking diversion program, which could have been a more appropriate course of action given the circumstances. Just two days later, Rahr’s officers arrested a woman for stealing two pillows and a blanket from a store. Despite the woman returning the items to officers, they arrested her because the shop owner wanted to press charges. The woman sat in jail for a full day before the court released her. The Seattle City Attorney’s Office later filed misdemeanor theft charges against her. Like the officers who violated SPD policy with their behavior, all of the individuals arrested in these cases allegedly broke the law. Arguably, both the criminal and policy violations could all be considered minor, aside from Auderer’s case. But at the end of the OPA investigations, Rahr’s officers faced at most a black mark on their personnel file, but even with that they maintained their housing, their jobs, and their freedom. None of that can be guaranteed for the people her officers arrested for stealing blankets or a soda. And yet, Rahr believes arresting these people to be the best course of action. For her officers, Rahr advocates for leniency, and even admonishes OPA Director Gino Betts for following the department’s own policies. While she refers to the incidents in these OPA cases as minor, the SPD policy manual considers every single one of them serious in nature. In some ways, a difference of opinion between Rahr and Betts isn’t “per se” a cause for concern, said Lisa Daugaard, Co-Executive Director of Purpose Dignity Action and one of the first co-chairs of the Seattle Community Police Commission. Betts makes a recommendation, then the case moves to the chief, who makes a disciplinary decision only after a due process hearing with the officer involved. The hearing may add context or the officer may demonstrate a genuine intent to correct the issues, which could lead the chief to support counseling over formal discipline. From Daugaard's perspective, what is crucial is that these processes remain transparent and that Rahr shares her reasoning for her decisions with City leaders, which she did. However, if Rahr had her way, her officers would face fewer black marks on their files and the public would have less transparency into their behavior. Rahr argued in her letters for more cases to be handled through supervisor actions, an opaque process that allows SPD supervisors to investigate and counsel officers without the OPA publicly posting anything about it. Often the only insight into misconduct handled behind the curtain of supervisor action comes when it's mentioned in a separate OPA case. Given that, OPA surveys show that 60% of respondents believe nothing would be done about police misconduct, and with 93% of people rating police accountability very important for the City, Rahr needs to reconsider undercutting the institution that works to transparently communicate the results of police misconduct investigations to the public. Rahr did not immediately respond to a request for comment. If cops believe the best way to handle people with mental illness and drug addiction is through enhanced punishments within the public criminal justice system, then they need to accept the same philosophy when it comes to police misconduct. Accountability and rehabilitation should apply equitably, regardless of whether the individual involved is an officer or a member of the public.