At issue were "buy-busts," in which undercover police officers arrange drug deals and then arrest the dealers and facilitators. Police--and some residents--say buy-busts get dealers off the streets. But Licata, along with representatives from the Defender Association and the King County Bar Association, argued that buy-busts are ineffective and unfairly target minorities.
Fifty-six percent of those arrested for drug-related offenses in Seattle are African American, though African Americans only make up an estimated seven percent of Seattle's drug users and 8.3 percent of Seattle's population, according to a 2001 study from Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government. The report, which quotes former Seattle Police Chief Norm Stamper, said Seattle's buy-bust program, which focuses on the easy-to-infiltrate--and minority-dominated--street-level drug trade, contributes to this disparity.
These findings, which inspired Licata's interest in buy-busts, have also led to a legal challenge. In April 2001, Kay-C Lee of the Defender Association filed a legal brief against the program, claiming that buy-busts selectively target racial minorities. The court agreed to hear her motion in a trial set to begin in January 2003. Fifteen of the 19 defendants are African Americans, which prosecutor Keith Scully admits is an "absolutely typical" sample of buy-bust arrestees.
Lee hopes a victory will not only free her clients, but also encourage the Seattle Police Department to abandon buy-bust procedures.
"We want the SPD to switch to strategies that are more effective and that cause less collateral damage," Lee said. Her 19 clients, who were arrested for selling a total of six grams of crack cocaine, are hardly drug kingpins, but they face sentences totaling 170 years.
"Buy-busts don't work," Licata said after the meeting, pointing out that street-level drug activity continues to flourish in Seattle. The SPD should shift resources from undercover officers to putting more uniformed officers on the street, he argued.
The 20 residents gathered at Licata's summit, on the fifth-floor veranda of the Newmark Building--a condominium complex a stone's throw from the infamously seedy intersection of Second and Pike--were polite but cautious. "I think we're unwilling to take a tool away from the police," said Ed Marquand, president of the Downtown Residents Association.
Residents worried that doing away with buy-busts would increase the daily harassment they face at the hands of panhandling drug addicts.
