Cop Reassigned After Arresting 69yo For Using Golf Club Cane

[orangeblossom]

This case really makes me angry.  This now 70yo man, had never  been arrested, and even said at 70yo that he'd never been arrested, and that's quite the feat for a black man.

www.cbsnews.com/news/seattle-police-officer-reassigned-after-questionable-arrest-comments/ (link has a video and screenshot of the FB comments)


SEATTLE -- A police officer is under investigation after video surfaced of her arresting a 69-year-old man who refused to drop a golf club he was carrying on a city sidewalk.



CBS affiliate KIRO reported Seattle Police Chief Kathleen O'Toole apologized for the incident and said the officer was being removed from patrol duty until an investigation was complete.



A video of the July encounter was recorded by the patrol car's dashboard camera and released by the Seattle Police Department on Wednesday.





The video showed officer Cynthia Whitlatch pulling her cruiser up to a corner where the man, William Wingate, was standing, and yelling at him to drop the golf club.



She told him he had swung it at her, and that audio and video recordings from her cruiser would back up her allegations.



Wingate appeared surprised, seemed to have trouble hearing the officer, and then insisted he had done no such thing. He said he had used the golf club as a cane for 20 years.



Wingate was eventually convicted of unlawfully using a weapon under a plea deal in which the charge would be dismissed if he had no other offenses for two years.



No recordings surfaced to bolster Whitlach's version of events, and after a state lawmaker questioned the arrest, the city attorney's office took another look. Prosecutors dismissed the conviction, and the police department apologized for the arrest and returned his golf club. The department said this week the officer had "received counseling" from her supervisor -- which O'Toole initially deemed an appropriate resolution.



But then the chief became aware of troubling Facebook posts made by Whitlatch about a month after the arrest -- at a time when protests in Ferguson, Missouri, had gripped the nation's attention. The weekly newspaper The Stranger reported that Whitlatch said she was tired of "black peoples (sic) paranoia" and wrote of "chronic black racism that far exceeds any white racism in this country."



Whitlatch is white; Wingate is black.



In a written statement Thursday, O'Toole said she was "shocked and disappointed" on Wednesday to read Whitlatch's comments. She reassigned the officer to desk duty, where she would have no interaction with the public, pending a review of her cases, and asked the Office of Professional Accountability to launch an independent investigation.



"We are working to reform the Seattle Police Department, and behavior of this nature seriously undermines our efforts," O'Toole said. "I was hired because of my track record for reform and my commitment to bias-free policing. I knew this would be a difficult job, but days like this make me even more determined."



The Seattle Police Officers Guild did not immediately return a message seeking comment on Whitlatch's behalf.



The Seattle Police Department has made several changes prompted by a Justice Department investigation that found signs of biased policing, as well as evidence that officers are too quick to use force, especially in low-level situations.



Wingate has filed a $750,000 claim against the police department.

[ttt]

Oh come on. Officers should be using force against olds with shopping carts in the middle of the aisles, not golf clubs.

[dawnzersong]

BlueBayou

[epphd]

Hey, you don't KNOW Seattle LYFE. We've got, like 32 blah people here so we know what's up

This LEO is an idiot. First off, old people wave canes and shit all the time. My MIL stands on the street and waves shit at cars going more than 6 miles per hour - it's not brandishing a weapon it's being old ffs.

Methinks, though, that it wouldn't be the story it is if she did not abuse her position of power by spouting off this utter bullshit.

[UMaineTeach]

Jan 30, 2015 20:22:45 GMT -5 epphd said:

This LEO is an idiot. First off, old people wave canes and shit all the time. My MIL stands on the street and waves shit at cars going more than 6 miles per hour - it's not brandishing a weapon it's being old ffs.

There's a woman in town who walks around with a cane whacking the dandelions growing by the sidewalk. She's pretty accurate, no stride break.

H needs a cane sometimes when his foot is having a flare up. He's not a man who talks a great deal with his hands, but get that cane in his hand and look out, pointing with it, gesturing, swinging it around.

[pig's eye]

Jan 30, 2015 19:24:50 GMT -5 orangeblossom said:

This case really makes me angry.  This now 70yo man, had never  been arrested, and even said at 70yo that he'd never been arrested, and that's quite the feat for a black man.





Me too. Did you see that they sent a black LEO out to apologize to him. Like that makes it okay? And why wouldn't they send her? You know, the one who was a dick, out to apologize?

(Sorry for the formatting. It's not letting me quote you and type outside of the quote.)

[NewOrleans]

Insane bitch. Why, why was this necessary? That poor guy!

[orangeblossom]

Jan 31, 2015 11:20:05 GMT -5 pig's eye said:

Jan 30, 2015 19:24:50 GMT -5 orangeblossom said:

This case really makes me angry.  This now 70yo man, had never  been arrested, and even said at 70yo that he'd never been arrested, and that's quite the feat for a black man.





Me too. Did you see that they sent a black LEO out to apologize to him. Like that makes it okay? And why wouldn't they send her? You know, the one who was a dick, out to apologize?

(Sorry for the formatting. It's not letting me quote you and type outside of the quote.)

No, I didn't see that. She wouldn't have apologized anyway. I saw somewhere she's out in medical leave for PTSD.

[pig's eye]

Jan 31, 2015 11:25:14 GMT -5 orangeblossom said:

Jan 31, 2015 11:20:05 GMT -5 pig's eye said:

No, I didn't see that. She wouldn't have apologized anyway. I saw somewhere she's out in medical leave for PTSD.

www.dailykos.com/story/2015/01/28/1360784/-Seattle-Police-apologize-for-wrongful-arrest-of-African-American-senior-citizen-walking-w-golf-club

Also, an ex-girlfriend backs up the claims that this LEO is racist:


slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2015/01/29/ex-tukwila-cop-says-spd-officer-cynthia-whitlatch-is-a-racist-who-once-stole-marijuana-from-police-evidence

[WOT?*]

My hands and arms were shaking by about 3:40 with rage at that officer. PTSD my ass. It's defensive and protection from getting fired. Fucking bitch giving SPD and the good cops a bad rep.  The SPD apologized because she never will.

ETA: back from the Baltimore story and watching this again.  He can't even get into the van.  I am sure the officer that put him into the van is a very nice person but damn, he's being treated with such a lack of courtesy for the situation.  He needs a stepstool to get in and the officer just kicks it at/toward him and can't even bend down to move it into place.  Kick kick kick.  At least he tries to see that he's comfortable and in the best seat for transport. (?)  I think my rage at this situation is getting the better of me.  I'm pretty sure that's an unreasonable expectation but damn he never should have been in the situation to begin with and to be treated as a criminal...

My heart hurts. 

And another ETA:  This is not my city dammit.  Straighten this shit out.  This happened just blocks from my husband's office.  Fuck her.  And of course this bitch is one of the officers who filed a complaint about the use of force policies.

ETA yet again:  "I'm afraid to walk down that street" (paraphrased)  "I brought up Wingate's fears about police to the the SPD spokesperson and he told me that Wingate should *not* feel those fearful concerns when he is walking anywhere with his golf club." (not paraphrased.)  OF COURSE HE SHOULDN'T!  He should never have been arrested in the first place, and never would have had CAUSE for those fears.  The Police Department caused his fears, when he was a reasonably secure and contented individual before then.  70 years of living incident-free.  70 years.  And now he's afraid to walk down the street, not because of a mugging by a criminal but because of a mugging by the police.  I just can't today. I hope he gets a "McDonald's" judgment if and when this rolls to trial.

The officer received "counseling."  Yeah, whatever that is supposed to accomplish.  IMO, that's less than a PIP in an office setting.

I hope Chief O'Toole can get this department turned around.  And with this I'm done.

[IIOY]

Jan 30, 2015 19:57:52 GMT -5 ttt said:

Oh come on. Officers should be using force against olds with shopping carts in the middle of the aisles, not golf clubs.

YAAAAS!  Also, the fogeys who pull slowly into a lane in front of speedy oncoming traffic and think they make it all better by giving the asshole wave in the rearview mirror as everyone honks at them and slams on their breaks.


 at epphd and fogeys waving shit at passing cars.

[WOT?*]

slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2015/01/28/seattle-police-jailed-elderly-man-for-walking-in-seattle-while-black

I don't normally like The Stranger because I have a (very, very, very) personal bias but there are times they do good investigative work.

That moment from the video, when Wingate had trouble getting into the paddywagon on his own, said former Democratic Washington State representative Dawn Mason, "was awful. That one touched my soul." She took an interest in the case after a neighbor told her what happened.

"The man is 69 years old," she said, speaking with me on Tuesday by phone. "Seventy years of beating the odds of never having been arrested—a black man. Served in the military for 20 years. Worked with the police, because you do that as a bus driver." (Wingate turned 70 in September of last year.)

"And here he is standing on the corner," she continued. "He ends up handcuffed and put in a police wagon and put in jail overnight... The system failed this man. He never should have been stopped. Once he got to the precinct, reason should have prevailed."

and

On September 19, however, municipal judge Fred Bonner dismissed the case following an outcry led by Mason.

"Instead of doing the usual," Mason said, "[where you] have a demonstration and you go and storm the precinct... I just took some white women into the precinct with me."

They were two women, she said, who'd been active in social justice circles, "who know they have privilege and know they can make a difference."

THAT is white privilege and that is how you use white privilege. I just with it wasn't necessary.