Meanwhile, it has been SEVENTEEN weeks today since Seattle Police shot & killed Terry Caver, a Black man, on Elliott Ave in Lower Queen Anne. Seattle PD has STILL not given any updates on the investigation into the officers who killed him.

Terry Caver was clearly having a behavioral health crisis. Instead of sending the crisis team, 5 officers pointing guns surrounded a schizophrenic man & shot him without any attempt at de-escalation.

Washington state voted in favor of I-940, 59.6% to 40.4%, which mandates that police not investigate themselves. AND THEN state legislators and Seattle city lobbyists quietly decided to exempt Seattle PD.

Instead, SPD's Force Investigation Team "investigates" their buddies. Then they will present their findings to the Force Review Board, made of up fellow officers. For all we know, they have already been let off.

We need the mayor & city council to end the exemption from independent investigations. The city needs to fund effective mental health care & compassionate responders so we don't kill another Terry Caver.

[email protected]
[email protected]

Also please ask the Office the Inspector General for Public Safety and the Community Police Commission to make sure the loophole on independent investigations is closed.
[email protected]
[email protected]

The Office of Police Accountability (OPA) is semi-independent, but investigates only for policy violations. But they did not start an investigation for 13 weeks because the complaint was buried in email according to what they told a reporter.

Tell the OPA we need urgency & transparency on the investigation into Terry Caver's killers. No more delays. Even though the result won't be criminal accountability, officers who can't or won't de-escalate should not be policing Seattle. [email protected]

Seattle PD has put more effort into finding protesters who photographed them than they have into investigating the officers who killed Terry Caver or Shaun Fuhr (which happened less than a month earlier).

Seattle is failing Terry Caver.

I fucking HATE doing this thread every week. I so wish the city government were taking this killing seriously. Every police killing should cause us to stop everything we're doing and figure out where we went wrong.