Reply #61: There were *many* witnesses, & the police dept has already changed its tune

[Hannah Bell]

& gone to mend fences with the NA community. I happen to know a little of the inside baseball on this one, & there's no danger I'll be apologizing for anything.

Pocket knives are *legal*. The man was threatening *no one*.

Seattle police Tuesday offered different details of Monday's fatal shooting of a homeless man by a patrol officer, with commanders saying they now don't know if the man advanced toward the officer with a knife as police originally reported.

"Amber Maurina, 28, said she was driving home Monday afternoon from a doctor's appointment and was stopped at a red light at Boren and Howell. She said she was facing north on Boren and saw the officer stop his patrol car, which was facing south on Boren, and get out.

Maurina said a tall, scruffy-looking man was standing with his back to her. She said she never saw the man's hands but thought he might be urinating or fumbling around in a fanny pack. Maurina said she watched the officer approach the man and saw him mouthing something to the man, who did not appear to respond.

"His body stance did not look threatening at all," she said of the man. "I could only see the gentleman's back, and he didn't look aggressive at all. He didn't even look up at the officer."

The officer approached the man, but was still "at least two car-lengths" away, Maurina said, when she heard the officer say, "Hey, hey, hey," followed by gunshots."

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2012769201_copshooting01m.html?prmid=obinsite


The shooting has confronted Diaz with his greatest crisis since he was elevated from interim to permanent chief last month, coming on the heels of highly publicized cases in which a white male officer punched a young black woman in a jaywalking incident and two officers kicked a prone Latino man, with one using ethnically inflammatory language.

In last week's shooting, John T. Williams, 50, was shot by Officer Ian Birk at a busy intersection near downtown, prompting witnesses and Williams' friends to question whether the well-known public inebriate, who was carrying a small knife and a piece of wood, posed any threat to the officer.

His death prompted more protests Wednesday, including a sharply worded letter from the American Civil Liberties Union urging the department to change its attitude toward the use of force.

"Too often, officers have overreacted or escalated incidents when the subject is an individual of color, disabled, homeless or, otherwise 'different,' " ACLU Director Kathleen Taylor wrote in an open letter Wednesday to Diaz, Mayor Mike McGinn and the City Council. "This mindset must change," she wrote. "The pattern of violence must stop."

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2012839756_policeshooting09m.html?prmid=obinsite