On the 15th the OPA released their 2020 Annual Report.

CW: mention of police brutally, CW: Police getting away with things

You can read along with my thread here:
https://www.seattle.gov/Documents/Departments/OPA/Reports/2020-Annual-Report.pdf

What is the OPA?
OPA is one of Seattle Police's (un)accountability measures. You can submit complaints about individual cops to them and they can either sustain or more likely, not sustain the complaint. Even sustained complaints rarely result in actual punishment for cops

[some cutsey graphics and other BS, the OPA's themes of 2020 were flexibility, focus and transparency]
some other reminders about the accountability system - OPA, CPC (Community Police Commission) and OIG (Office of Inspector General) work together as "accountability partners"

i know this isnt the point but i fucking hate OPA trying to hide behind cute graphics and flat dieting illustrations.
no, your cop is not cute and no amount of graphic design hides that you are part of the harm SPD does in this city

ok so pg. 5 we get a reminder that while leadership positions are held by civilians, there are 9 sworn officer investigators compared to 2 civilian ones. It says they were hired in 2020 - unsure if it means all investigators were cops before that.

also a reminder that the cop investigators rotate out every few years, with them going back on patrol. any investigations by them is spd investigating themselves.

pg. 6 - SPOG contract says that officers have to be interviewed in person and they didnt wave that during covid, leading to the delay on 98 investigations.
wtf
how is this not a bigger story?

opa got 19,000 complaints due to the protest stuff
19,000
and it apparently caused them problems, and they had to push back the dates of investigations. (or they used it as an excuse to delay)

They also brag about their youtube channel - I've watched the 3 videos and they show body camera videos from various cops, along with a explanation of how the OPA works
CW for police violence, brutality and footage from June protests. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPvinIUku-If5fXudC0zJPw

(just realized it 1am, will pick up in the morning)

OK I'm back. also forgot to mention before - the youtube channel gives us some cop's view of protests, via Body Worn Video (BWV). This might be useful from a strategic perspective, but massive CW

OPA turned those 19,000 complaints in 773 cases.
They did that by having a former OPA directed offer pro bono machine learning help. Former OPA director currently works at Microsoft now. This seems kinda fishy

40% of sworn officers got at least one complained
40%

*complaint
also noting you can file a OPA complaint against a civilian employee of SPD, which I didnt know till today

"According to SPD Human Resources, SPD began 2020 with 1,980 sworn employees and ended it with 1,844"

Shocking no one, use of force went way up compared to last year

The next part goes into details about the complaint process. I'm going to really briefly summarize as I know most people arent interested in the details, but if you are I highly recommend startong on page 15. Its not super technical reading, but is pretty rage inducing at times

1) classification
OPA classifies complaint after 30 day investigation.
We already see ways officers can avoid accountability - here it be classified as a contact log (not a violation), supervisors action (minor violation) or investigation.

A investigation can be classified as a "expedited investigation" where they can base their findings on the preliminary investigation.
BUT the fuck up part is that it means that OPA can't punish the officer because they didnt interview them (union contract rules)

[thread paused while i investigate the implications of this further]

ok so I have to partially redact that original statement - it seems like expedited investigations are always cases where allegations are non sustained. But this is quickly becoming a black hole and Im going to spend some more time getting a better answer

Picking this back up again - looking into the expedited investigations is going to take some time and I want to keep working on this thread

Steps of a OPA investigation
1) intake / classification
2) full investigation - reviews footage, interview officers, etc
3) certifications & finding - Office of Inspector General has to certified all OPA cases. also given to officers chain of command for review
4) case closing

OPA investigations must be completed by 180 days from when when they receive the complaint. also OPA uses a preponderance of evidence stranded and the OPA director, Meyerburg currently, reviews and issues a memo to the chain of comand.

The official language is that he "recommends" a finding, but idk if that is just official language or a actual recommendation they can choose to ignore

Types of findings:
sustained or non sustained.
non sustained findings include:
unfounded
lawful and proper - officer did thing, but thing did not break the rules
Inconclusive
Training referral - broke rule but not intentionall
Management action - broke rules, but training was bad

note that these same excuses, like not meaning to break the law do not apply to people SPD arrests.

A chart.
This one is misleading - the chart shows every individual allegation (1042 of them) but than the 18% stat they say is per investigation (369 of them), with many investigations having multiple allegations...

Only one allegation per investigation need to be sustained; non sustained and training referral; or non sustained and management action for that investigation to be counted in the 18% stat.
The percentage of allegations sustained out of all allegations (114/1042) is 10.94%

So discipline.
The report say the chief of police decides the discipline. I asked around and its a bit more complicated than that - there is a meeting with a lot of people but the chief makes the final decision.

They can decide between no discipline, oral reprimand, written reprimand, suspension (up to 30 days), termination or other.

Out of the 72 times a employee got a sustained case, only 19 resulted in a suspension or termination. Another 9 officers resigned

That leaves 38 cases where they were only given a oral or written warning! and one with no discipline at all! This is even after going though this whole process.

(7 cases are still pending)

you might be wondering did I just say there was 114 sustained findings?
well this taking all the times a employee was in a cases that where at least one allegation against them was sustained.
I think
This is incredibly confusing, Im guessing by design

And from here an employee can *still* appeal. 8 officers appealed their cases in 2020 and all of the appeals are still open.
This was a big drop from last year's 27 appeals, all but one of them are still open.

Next section!
Policy and Programs
The first program they mention is the Unsubstantiated Misconduct Screening, started in 2018
This is for claims of misconduct they say are "clearly refuted by evidence" to be looked into by the chain of command, not OPA

The two reasons for this?
1) SPD employee moral was low b/c they were doing full investigations into every claims, aka their job
Officers were finding this "procedurally unjust"
2) OPA was wasting time looking into these claims

They tried this with 187 cases last year, 36 of them were passed on to to OPA.
They go on to say that this program "has helped build a collaborative rather than adversarial relationship between OPA and supervisors which ultimately helps OPA effectuate positive change and growth"

I dont this the OPA should have a collaborative relationship with SPD.
You cant hold anyone accountable, much less a police department like SPD, with a collaborative relationship

This is OPA saying the quiet part out loud again, that they aren't there for accountability, but are there to launder SPD's reputation.
They are the ones actively preventing accountability
And they had the fucking audacity to add a illustration of a raised fist right next to this

Fuck you OPA

As much as I want this thread to be over, I someone have 8 pages left of this report
OPA also gives management action recommendations (MAR) and policy recommendations. They gave 15 last year and SPD listened to 9

Legislative Affairs
They got drafted 23 policy proposals, claiming to work with community groups, protest leaders (probably boots), think tanks and police officers. These were state level

Other OPA Functions (last section)
talking about their community engagement, which includes a "Joint Officer-Involved Shooting Protocol" to help them respond to families and community after a officer kills someone
This was immediately followed by a "Know your Rights Campaign"