Woodcarver's shooting by Seattle Police officer ruled not justified in preliminary finding

[foxfeet]

By Steve Miletich and Jennifer Sullivan

Seattle Times staff reporters


Seattle Police Chief John Diaz and a department review board have reached a preliminary finding that an officer's fatal shooting of a woodcarver on Aug. 30 was not justified, according to sources familiar with the case.

Diaz and the Firearms Review Board will make a final determination after a court inquest into the shooting is completed.

After reaching the preliminary finding that the shooting was not justified, the officer, Ian Birk, was ordered by Deputy Chief Clark Kimerer, who oversees the review board, to surrender his gun and badge, according to the sources.

Birk, 27, who joined the department in July 2008, remains on routine paid leave.

Full article:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2013160320_shooting15m.html

[MadHound]

1. Wonder if those who were defending the police on this one will realize the error of their ways.

Probably not, they'll probably avoid this thread like the plague.

[foxfeet]

3. The finding is preliminary.

I'm kinda sort of optimistic that the review process is kinda sort of working, at least in this one case. Let's see where this goes.

[KT2000]

2. Thank goodness

It would have been unbearable to think it was in any way justified. I am just glad there does not appear to be a coverup on this.

[suffragette]

4. K&R

[Hannah Bell]

5. knr

[Citizen Worker]

6. The inquest process is a complete sham. It exists only to placate public outrage. The police

officers will be carefully lead through a range of questions by the prosecuting attorney. If the victim's family is represented by counsel he/she will not be permitted to cross examine the witnesses. Only the six jurors will be allowed to ask questons and they are limited to the number, usually 2 or 3. I sat through a coroner's inquest and recognized immediately that it was a sham as did one of the more astute jurors, who at the end of the proceeding said, "if you just want us to rubber stamp what the police say happened why don't we just do it and we can all go home and quit wasting our time."

When the inquest finds that officer acted out of fear for his or public safety he will be admonished for having violated some obscure departmental procedure, management will "reluctantly" reinstate him and he might get a few days off without pay, which he will appeal and after a year or so an arbitrator will find in the officer's favor and he'll be compensated for the loss in pay and we'll all have forgotten about it. Mission accomplished!

[ThomCat]

7. +1

No organization with power allows any method or process to exist that can police them until they have cooped it so that it only seems to police them.

This is a perfect example. Just like Civilian Review Boards. They only give the appearance of policing the police, while actually giving police departments freedom to do whatever the hell they want with complete immunity from oversight.