Will Laudanski was riding his bicycle down East Pine Street in 2005 when a car slammed him into a maple tree. A former paramedic from New York City and a veteran airborne ranger in the Gulf War, he suffered injuries to his shoulder, knees, and worst of all, his head—resulting in painful migraines.
“They started coming every day,” Laudanski says. “The severe ones can last three days. I can’t eat. I vomit to the point of puking up blood. And several times I’ve been taken to the hospital.” Standard pharmaceuticals don’t work, cost $100 a pill, or are the sort of “antipsychotics that leave you there drooling,” he says.
Later that year, a doctor suggested Laudanksi try smoking marijuana occasionally. “I was able to drop the migraines down to one or two a month,” he says. Sometimes marijuana “can stop a migraine in its tracks with no side effects.”
A law approved by voters in 1998 makes marijuana grown and used under a physician’s care legal in Washington State, and in 2008, the state’s Department of Health decreed that a patient who has 15 or fewer plants is complying with that law. And in 2003, Seattle voters passed a law that says that the Seattle Police Department (SPD) must make marijuana intended for personal use the lowest priority for investigations and enforcement.
So Laudanski, 50, was in full compliance with state and city rules by growing two small pot plants—each about 14 inches tall—in the apartment he moved into in September in Leschi. “This place is so quiet, I found out one of my cats has a wheeze,” he says.
That quiet broke on the night of October 25, when Laudanksi heard a fleet of footsteps stomping up the stairs outside his second-floor unit.
“At approximately 2142 hours we arrived at the target location,” SPD officer Ryan Keith writes in an incident report. He and a team of officers had “donned raid equipment.” Their gear included pistols on every officer, a battering ram, and, according to Laudanski, at least two submachine guns. “I heard and observed Officer Nadell knock loudly on this door and shout ‘Seattle Police with a search warrant, open the door,'” the report by Officer Keith continues. “After a reasonable amount of time, I heard Sgt. Garth Green give a verbal ‘Breach command.'”
Laudanski had just stepped out of his bathroom. “I was tying my robe,” he says. “I said, ‘I am opening the door,’ but before I could get my hand to door, they busted it open and then rushed me. There were muzzles in my face. I was trying to comply. Then they pushed me down to the ground and just basically got me positioned in a corner of the kitchen with my face on the floor.”
Six to nine officers fanned across the apartment. Facedown next to a litter box, Laudanski told police that he was an authorized medical-marijuana patient and directed them to his physician’s authorization in the other room. He “had paperwork in this room declaring his marijuana grow was for medical purposes,” police acknowledge in the report. In the bedroom, officers found two marijuana plants growing in pots.
“They were able to see the full extent of my pathetic grow,” Laudanski says. “There were four little nuggets of bud the size of your pinkie on one and five on the other.”
The conclusion of the police, after breaking his door open, busting the lock, pushing him to the ground, and stomping around with submachine guns? “There was no law violation that was discovered,” said SPD spokesman Sean Whitcomb, reached by phone the next day. A receipt from the search warrant confirms, “No property seized.”
Political leaders have been scrambling to explain why so many city resources were spent on a low-level case, particularly when the suspect was innocent. Democratic state senator Jeanne Kohl-Welles (D-36) called the raid on Laudanski “totally inexcusable.” She added, “Will could have been shot.” Kohl-Welles is right: Armed nighttime drug raids have resulted in at least a dozen fatal shootings in the U.S. in the past several years—including innocent residents shot by SWAT teams and cops shot by residents who think their home is being robbed.
“I apologize for the city for allowing this to happen,” said Seattle City Council member Nick Licata.
And Mayor Mike McGinn, after nearly a week of silence on the raid, announced on November 1 that he would lead an executive review of the city’s marijuana policy along with police chief John Diaz, city attorney Pete Holmes, King County prosecuting attorney Dan Satterberg, and Licata. “The group will review existing policies and make recommendations regarding any changes,” McGinn told The Stranger. In addition, Diaz has required that assistant chief Jim Pugel personally approve all future search warrants for marijuana. That provides no guarantee of policy change but does open the door for a shift in police procedures.
Why did it happen in the first place? The answers are contained in a weak search warrant. “You could establish probable cause with tons of evidence or just establish probable cause,” says King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office deputy chief of staff Ian Goodhew. “It is a fairly low standard, but it’s one that is required for a search warrant.”
This “low standard,” according to an affidavit filed by narcotics detective Tyrone Davis used to apply for a search warrant, was the mere smell of pot. Triggered by the complaint of one neighbor, on October 13, Davis and his sergeant walked outside Laudanski’s apartment and saw a boarded-up window with a fan in it, the affidavit says, suggesting a ventilation system typical of indoor marijuana cultivation. Davis could also smell marijuana near the apartment’s south window. “I could smell this odor even stronger as I placed my nose near the window,” he writes. “It was clear to me that an odor of marijuana was coming from behind that window.”
This search warrant makes clear that SPD had every indication that this was a small garden—it was in an apartment, after all. Large marijuana grows are in houses or warehouses, and often pungent enough to smell distinctly from the street.
But SPD’s Whitcomb says officers need to investigate complaints of potentially illegal behavior—and the standard procedure in narcotics cases is a fully armed raid on a private home. “When dealing with limited information, we have to act,” he says. “We do that by gathering information of any evidence of any criminal violation.” But the warrant reveals SPD didn’t use all its leverage to gather evidence before taking a scorched-earth path of investigation. For instance, state law allows officers to obtain electricity records that would indicate if a large number of lights were being used for a major operation, to speak to people in the neighborhood to find out if commercial activity appeared to be under way, or to observe the apartment to see if a tenant was using the property primarily as his home. Such procedures would have indicated that this was a small personal grow (the lowest priority under city law) and likely a medical-marijuana grow (legal under state law).
SPD’s own directive established this January on medical marijuana says a “supervisor’s decision to take action or not should be weighed in favor of keeping the community safe.” The directive names eight factors to consider: presence of a “for profit” operation, weapons, electricity theft, other illegal drugs, evidence of narcotics trafficking, presence of children, environmental concerns, or violent crime.
This warrant shows police saw none of those signs.
King County prosecutor Satterberg’s office certified the warrant anyway (it was then approved by a judge), despite issuing its own policy in 2008 saying that Satterberg won’t prosecute people for medical marijuana and that he supports law enforcement’s “reasonable efforts to carefully and sensitively investigate these [marijuana] cases.”
“I acknowledge that the amount of force used compared to what officers ended up finding can seem out of proportion,” Goodhew says.
Senior deputy prosecutor Ellen O’Neill-Stephens, who certified the search and is notoriously cynical about medical marijuana, is the same person who authorized a search on a medical-marijuana advocacy group’s office based on an unsubstantiated tip in 2008. Both warrants resulted in no arrests.
“This is maddening,” says ACLU of Washington drug-policy director Alison Holcomb. “It’s unacceptable that this could happen when we have a medical-marijuana law, a ‘lowest law enforcement priority’ ordinance, and written policies calling for ‘careful’ and ‘sensitive’ investigation of these cases.”
In fact, the bust may be revealing a rebellion of the rank-and-file officers and narcotics prosecutors who are out of step with their departments’ official (though arguably halfhearted) directives to avoid these sorts of busts. “Based on what seems to be fairly clear guidelines for the investigation in the department’s policy manual, it would appear that either inadequate training or disregard for policies established by department leadership was at play here,” Holcomb says.
In the meantime, the police department’s Office of Professional Accountability has begun investigating the incident, responding to a citizen complaint of police misconduct, and Laudanski has been discussing the matter with a civil-rights lawyer.
“I haven’t been able to sleep for two days,” says Laudanski. “That’s how this has left me. This should not have to happen to anyone else. I could be dead or in the hospital or permanently injured.” 
The police department has embarked on a top-down policy of search with the hope of seizure in an effort to enrich themselves though property sale in the context of decreased department funding. Simple as that.
Indeed, I experienced a rant by Captain Mike Meehan at the Burien Criminal Justice Center where he stated that Medical Marijuana is a lie, and that there is no proof that it ever helped anyone. After that meeting, I promptly resigned my participation in their task force, and wrote to Cindy Petit to voice my disgust with Captain Meehan’s tirade. SPD and other law enforcement organizations blatantly and regularly take the law into their own hands and make judgments contrary to what is on the books. It is a serious problem that needs to be addressed – perhaps in the Legislature. There should be severe penalties for anyone entrusted to uphold the Revised Code of the State of Washington and who make themselves a defacto legislator to change it as they deem “fit” or right. The damage they can do to people already suffering is clearly underestimated.
hmmm, If the ACLU hadn’t come out against I-1068, we have made pot legal Tuesday. We might have lost it too – but the ACLU coming out against it didn’t help.
All this military style / SWAT team raid set up, is doing what? Protecting cops from citizens protecting themselves from cops who want to jail people in order to keep them from hurting themselves by smoking pot in their living rooms. The stupid, it burns BAD.
Shouldn’t have gone after tobacco users … if you had left us alone, your pot would not have seen so bad but now the anti-pot people have more firepower. 😉 Next time some stupid ban on something comes up, think twice about supporting it.
I wasn’t aware that the SPD was busting down the doors of tobacco growers based on the smell of tobacco wafting from the apartment. When did this happen?
If it IS the rank-and-file ignoring marching orders, I have to wonder why they care so much. Seriously, why? And really, why does ANYONE care that/how people like to get high? “Public safety” is one of those catch-all justifications/rationalizations for policies that don’t really make sense, kinda like “national security,” though there are also actual issues of public health and safety that do make sense to legislate (e.g. water quality, traffic laws), and national security too.
@5: Sie’s talking about the whole anti-smoking push: ever-increasing taxes on tobacco, public smoking bans, personal vilification of smokers, denial of health care coverage or drastically inflated insurance premiums (which is really stupid – should we not cover people who eat fast food and don’t exercise? people who skydive? sports players? people who drive or bicycle on public roads? people living in high-crime areas? frequent travelers? all of those drastically increase the incidence of health problems or injury…), etc.
Sie’s saying that attacking tobacco as a recreational drug because it isn’t particularly healthy has enabled some of the same arguments to be deployed against marijuana by association (as another smoked recreational drug; tobacco, or nicotine specifically, also has medical uses in addition to recreational ones e.g. treating certain neurodegenerative conditions, epilepsy, psychosis, bipolar, schizophrenia, because it acts as a moderately effective inhibitory-neuron stimulant)
John got it. Essentially when you attack one thing, all others that are even remotely connected gain more support against it, you see humans (at least in our country) always go to the extreme one way or the other. Extra taxes to pay for health coverage costs would have been fine and understandable, but the rest was just opening doors for all things remotely related, and pot is very closely related to tobacco.
It’s a running start, and it would not surprise me if they even go after incense burning people just because “it smelled like smoke.” Remember the old adage, give them an inch, they’ll take a mile … well … they’re taking that mile, and they were given a few more than one inch, so suck it up. The only way to stop excessive persecution is to take their control away. I still trust and respect the police, because if any other anti-pot person had the same power as the cops they’d have done the same thing.
To me tobacco is my anti-anxiety medication, the only one that has worked oddly, I always wind up with the worst side effects of any prescription medication I take. So when they went after us smokers I was angry, now I’m just laughing my arse off, sorry, but pot fans just asked for it … and worse, many pot fans actually believe tobacco smoke is more dangerous! LOL
Next time you see a cop sniffin’ outside your window…fart.
This happens in more way than one i have been charged with trafficking in marijuana in Ohio. I dont sell I only smoked recreationally. I have recently quit due to the loss of my job, home, car, personal belongings, dignity, and integrity. You see here they put me on the news about 10months ago saying i was charged with Trafficking. The ignorant ppl in this state see you on the news and your guilty. I have yet to go to court. I have asked why it was necessary for our law enforcement deemed it necessary to assign a confidential informant to me. I was NOT selling anything so it was not because they believed me to be a trafficker. The informant came into where i worked for 2 weeks bugging me to get an ounce for him from the guy i was getting from. I told him no repeatedly and said i wasnt comfortable doin that. I did not know this man. Then one day he was waiting outside work for me and had me call so i did. Then the next thing i know im being arrested. I had been in trouble for unrelated charges approximately 5yrs prior and the lead detective on this case just happened to be the detective 5yrs ago. Ive been told by my public defender “which by the way they are all jokes” that an informant is supposed to know where to get the narcotic from. My question is considering hes never met me, doesnt know any of my friends, or ever hung out with me did he come to the conclusion that he could purchase marijuana from me. The only answer that i can come too is that the detective told him to come after me. Now if this is the case then it is unfortunate because the police did not do any sort of investigation before hand. I know that the lead detective was aware of where i was working because his house is not far from that location. It seems to me that he took it personal that i was working in his neighborhood so he used his position to remove me. My public defender can only say how do I prove this. I know that I am not the only person that this happens too. It is unfortunate that our law enforcement go as far as creating crime rather than looking for it.
@7 Tobacco smoke is more dangerous, numerous studies show positive correlation between smoking cigarettes & lung, neck & throat cancer. The few studies that have been done on cannibus smoke show a negative correlation between smoking pot & lung, neck & throat cancer. This is because THC has anti-oxidant properties.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles…
Also its very easy to ingest cannibus in without smoking the raw plant (vaporizer, edibles, etc.)
@10 Does it even matter which smoke is more dangerous? It seems like the point here is, if we allow the government to take away or limit a person’s rights for their own good, doesn’t that make everyone a possible target? Think about that when you vote to limit anyone’s rights, you’re making it just that much easier to limit your own.
no justice no peace, fuck the police
I hope he sues the po-leece ’til they don’t have a pot to piss in.
It is a good thing Laudanski was only armed with a bath robe and was white. Had he been a native american armed with an enormous three inch carving knife, he’da been killed, probably had all pistols in the room emptied it to him. Gosh I’m surprised the police didn’t think of it…then it would have been “justified….
It is a good thing Laudanski was only armed with a bath robe and was white. Had he been a native american armed with an enormous three inch carving knife, he’da been killed, probably had all pistols in the room emptied it to him. Gosh I’m surprised the police didn’t think of it…then it would have been “justified…. Oh, wait, he’s white, maybe they would’a just maced him ‘er sumpin’…thought it through a-little…’naw, they’da done him…
The police are greed mongers. They don’t care about marijuana. They want to “seize” as much property as they can. Cash is easy to pocket and divide among them. Everything else is fair game too. Fight some real crime for a change.
Same generic problem happening all over. Seems that there is this interesting new thing whereby the police/DA’s, etc., have decided that their “job” entails a right to pick and choose what “they” think should be illegal, in spite of the actual laws. Way too many “police” forces think they have some constitutional obligation to continue to treat MMJ users as though they are law breakers. In a “real” country, the police would protect MMJ users/growers just like they protect anyone else. That isn’t happening very much anywhere that has MMJ laws, even in California.
Same generic problem happening all over. Seems that there is this interesting new thing whereby the police/DA’s, etc., have decided that their “job” entails a right to pick and choose what “they” think should be illegal, in spite of the actual laws. Way too many “police” forces think they have some constitutional obligation to continue to treat MMJ users as though they are law breakers. In a “real” country, the police would protect MMJ users/growers just like they protect anyone else. That isn’t happening very much anywhere that has MMJ laws, even in California.
I can’t even get the damned police to help me when my car has been broken into, or when there’s a domestic disturbance next door 90% of the time. I actually get a flat out “there aren’t enough resources” or some other BS excuse for why there won’t be an officer coming to my place this time. But they have the resources (AND TONS OF THEM!!) to investigate this stupid shit???
Unbelievable.
The SPD is 6 months behind on publishing their “MONTHLY” OPA Reports of complaints against officers…
Some Chief Deputy is sitting on his backside instead of releasing them….what’s up with that…
Why is the SPD 6 months behind on publishing MONTHLY OPA complaints against police officers?
Maybe all you whiner ass Seattle stoned brained vermin should tell the brass of SPD, via your “community organziers” through the marxist City Council that you want NARS banned…. NARS are Narcotic Activity Reports….. You see some Seattle subjects called in and complained about the robe wearing gent’s crib… it’s activities… etc… so the Po Po…. acting on the subject’s NAR followed up… they wrote an affidavit for search warrant… and some lefty judge down at the lefist court signed the warrant…. You all get it…… A lefty judge AUTHORIZED the search warrant…… I sincerly hope all my heroes in blue do JACK SHIT from here on out…. log on….. 9 hours later log off…. all the while count the $40 + an hour they are making……. Middle finger to all that read…….
As long as “public servants” ignore the “serve” in their job description, instead waging a “war” on its own citizenry, they will continue to dehumanize citizens and treat them as the enemy. This whole mindset MUST be revised.
As long as “public servants” ignore the “serve” in their job description, instead waging a “war” on its own citizenry, they will continue to dehumanize citizens and treat them as the enemy. This whole mindset MUST be revised.