The Seattle Times described the bust on May 4 as a major operation to sweep drug dealers off the streets of Pioneer Square, saying that undercover narcotics detectives rounded up 15 of the “most prolific sellers of crack cocaine.” A reporter and photographer joined the officers—posting their story even before the police issued a self-congratulatory press release. A picture of a black woman in handcuffs ran in the paper above a caption calling it a “bonus arrest.” Seattle’s sole daily newspaper spoke only to cops and prosecutors, who hailed the three-month investigation as an antidote to neighborhood complaints and portrayed the defendants as chronic sellers and big-time dealers. Seattle Times reporter Sara Jean Green didn’t talk to anyone else—such as experts on the impact of buy busts downtown—or examine police records to see just what sort of people were arrested.
There’s another side to the story.
Records obtained from the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office show that the 15 people were almost exclusively selling minute amounts of crack, had little or no money, and were overwhelmingly nonwhite (reflecting a racial disparity chronic to police buy busts in Seattle). These were small-time dealers. And local experts agree that sentencing them to prison won’t solve the problems of drug markets or drug use in Pioneer Square.
The total combined amount of crack on 14 of the defendants was only 3.1 grams—a street value of about $310. That averages about 0.2 grams per person. Only one defendant had a notable quantity of drugs or money: 4.85 grams and $583.76.
Of the 14 other individuals, only five had any cash on them whatsoever, other than the money that the undercover officers had given them. According to jail and police records obtained from the county prosecutor’s office, cash amounts on the defendants were $2.49, $2.62, $6.48, $61, and $392. The other nine had literally $0 on their person.
The sweep was conducted, the Seattle Times reports, “in hopes that prosecutors can successfully argue for stiffer prison sentences, taking the repeat dealers off the streets for up to five years,” according to a prosecutor assisting the Seattle Police Department (SPD).
The Seattle Times editorial board also chimed in: “Police and prosecutors going full throttle on drug dealers is encouraging. Bravo.”
But Lisa Daugaard, director of the Defender Association’s Racial Disparity Project, which has followed the city’s buy-bust operations closely for the last decade, says of the defendants: “If they sold drugs, it seems highly likely it was to make a few dollars so they could immediately buy more drugs for their own use. We should be able to address that problem humanely through a public-health strategy.”
Indeed, police records show the defendants were not drug-ring leaders, as the Seattle Times suggested by calling them “some of the… most prolific sellers of crack cocaine,” but unsophisticated addicts. One undercover officer—who repeatedly told the suspect, “Again, I am not the police”—reported that the suspect “continually asked me if he could have ‘just one hit’ from me.” The man was arrested for 0.4 grams of crack and had no money on his person.
Based on officers’ descriptions, seven of the suspects are black, five are Hispanic, two are white (although one of those may actually have been Hispanic, based on name), and one is Native American.
Chasms in racial disparity are typical of Seattle buy busts, historically speaking. While drug sellers are usually white, even in open-air markets, police disproportionately bust nonwhite suspects. Katherine Beckett, a researcher at the University of Washington, and three other researchers concluded in a 2005 study on drug arrests in Seattle: “This overrepresentation primarily results from law enforcement’s focus on crack users, and especially on black and Latino crack users.” They added: “We find that law enforcement’s focus on crack users does not appear to be a function of the frequency with which crack is exchanged, the concentration of crack transactions exchanges outdoors, or other race-neutral factors.” In addition, Beckett wrote in another report called “Race and Drug Law Enforcement in Seattle” in 2004: “By contrast, the SPD conducts very few operations in open-air drug markets where whites, and heroin, predominate.”
For this sweep, SPD captain Steve Brown said it was a way “to consider how best to disrupt the mechanism of the market.” The Seattle Times editorial board noted: “To reduce crime and a sense of menace downtown, busting repeat drug dealers in Pioneer Square could make a real difference.”
But it is unlikely to make any difference. We’ve been through this before—to zero effect. The SPD conducted a major drug bust in April 2009, netting 30 people. SPD declared on its website: “Belltown Drug Ring Smashed by Seattle PD.” Three weeks later, the Seattle Times talked to a neighborhood leader who said the “regulars” were already back.
“In the short term, I think it indicates a message to those openly dealing that there are going to be some immediate consequences,” says Ian Goodhew, deputy chief of staff for the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office. “Does that mean that they won’t be replaced with others? No,” he says. “They will be back.”
“Typically, there is no long-term impact,” says Daugaard. “The basic law of supply and demand drives other sellers into the same territory, which has been established as a site to purchase narcotics.” The handful of arrests, she says, “are a drop in an ocean.”
ACLU of Washington drug-policy director Alison Holcomb adds, “Scooping up street-level dealers simply creates job opportunities for younger recruits.”
There are other ways to handle open-air drug dealing, including programs that divert arrestees to treatment, warning suspects that they’ll be arrested if they don’t clean up their act, and a host of social services. (Goodhew, in the prosecutor’s office, says that the drug-market sweeps are a piece of that puzzle.) No one realistically expects drug busts to stop—crack is illegal, and people don’t want to live in neighborhoods overrun with crack dealers. But the Seattle Times‘ coverage sounds like the deluded propaganda from the 1980s that suggested that we could eradicate drugs through an ever-escalating drug war.
Why does the Seattle Times routinely hail the enforcement and leave out the rest of the story in its coverage?
“It seems obvious to me that there are other questions to be asked, and King County is rich in expertise in this area,” says Daugaard. “One would hope that reporters would avail themselves to those resources.”
Two Seattle Times editors, the reporter Sara Jean Green, the SPD, and community groups in Pioneer Square (who had complained about the dealers) did not respond to repeated requests for comment. 
Wow it looks like you finally grokked that “people of color” is an aboslutely stupid term! Doubleplusgood for you, Dominic! Colored people everywhere thank you! Now maybe you can write an aritcle detailing the facts that black crime-age males make up only about 3% of Seattle but they committed half the murders here in 2008 and 2009!
I am on the streets every day, on my way back and forth to my job. The statement that the majority of the street dealers is white sounds bogus to me. What research are you basing this off of?
I see who is dealing on the street every day and the racial mix seems to closely match that of the Pioneer Square bust. Is it ever possible that the reason that more afro-americans and latinos are busted selling drugs downtown is that they are, in fact, larger in number in the downtown street drug selling “community”?
Hmm. I’d also like to know where you’re getting the info that most “open air” (street?) crack dealers are white.
Why was my posting removed? Because I asked what research you were using to indicate that the majority of street drug sellers downtown is white? I am only reporting what I see on the street every day. I had a much higher opinion of the Stranger before this..
I take it back- I see that my posting has been reposted – thanks Stranger it is nice that we aren’t suppressing any opinions here today…
How dare you presume to comment on the work of The Seattle Times. Until you have won the Pulitzer Prize as many times as The Seattle Times or even Willamette Week, you should keep your comments to yourself.
That whites are responsible for most of the drug delivery in Seattle is the conclusion of a report I mention in the article. Katherine Beckett, a researcher at the University of Washington, published a report called “Race and Drug Law Enforcement in Seattle” in 2004 (.pdf) that cites extensive research on local drug markets, delivery, users, and arrestees. Here are some excerpts of that report:
Hey Dominic why don’t you do an aritcle about how blacks commit fully half the murders in Seattle even though they are only a tiny percentage of the city’s population?
bravo for getting the other side of the story. the police not only busted these people who are merely addicts, they spent countless hours doing the surveillance in order to bust them. talk about a waste of resources. these people need real treatment and services, not another arrest on their record to further perpetuate the circumstances that lead them to addiction and disorderly conduct in pioneer square. it cleans up pioneer square for the moment, but it only makes it worse in the long run.
It’s also worth noting part of another study by Beckett and other researchers conducted in 2005 called “Drug Use, Drug Possession Arrests, and the Question of Race: Lessons from Seattle” (.pdf) that shows people have a skewed perception of who is engaged in drug activity:
Hey Dominic why don’t you do an aritcle about how blacks commit fully half the murders in Seattle even though they are only a tiny percentage of the city’s population? I have bet a friend $100 that you won’t ever acknowledge these facts. You could make me lose $100 just by addressing the facts of black-committed violent crime in Seattle! Of course, you are probably too much of a brainwashed naive white-guilt progressive reality-ignorer to ever do such a thing. Be brave!
2004 was six years ago. Maybe there were more white delete then, and less now, in 2010? Just a thought. I bet black males committed half the murders in Seattle back then though, just like they do now. Blacks committed 14 of the 28 in Seattle in 2008 and 12 of the 21 in 2009. Most of the victims of these black murderers were also black. Why don’t you do a story a out that, Dominic? You know, seeing as how you obviously CARE SO VERY MUCH about the realities facing the black “community” n’shit.
If providing nuanced and thoughtful coverage of Seattle’s drug enforcement policy is so important, why did it have to be spurred by an attack on the Seattle Times?
Whoops. “delete” should be “dealers”. Damn auto-correct.
There are also shitloads more Mexican-latino-whateverthefucks in Seattle now in 2010 than there were in 2004. Also, Seattle is about 70% white so if course there will be “more” white druggies… because there’s shitloads more whites! Big fucking DUUUUH! Did you drop out of high skool because you failed math and you can’t understand percentages and proportions?
Ya’ll crazy people need to chill out. Here’s what the article is about: the cops rolled a bunch of street level dealers, then got a write up that made it sound like they’d toppled some overlords. There are two problems that the article addresses: firstly, this wasn’t a particularly noteworthy or effective use of public resources. Both macro drug war-wise, and micro operation-wise. That’s worth calling out in the paper to begin with. Secondly: the Seattle Times provided glowing and uncritical coverage, overlooking the actual amounts of drugs/money brought in, and the fact that this appears to be as much about appearance as effecting actual change.
For people who are spouting off angrily (and quite racistly, I might add), you may want to take your disputes to the author of the study that Dominic is basing his article off of. Otherwise, I do believe this is a case of attempting to kill the messenger.
For myself, as soon as I read the original Times article, I was waiting to see someone write this precise response. Good on you, Dominic, you’re calling bullshit when it deserves to be called.
Mr. Holden seems to have based his article on the wrong report. Having studied journalism myself in college, I recall learning to seek out relevant sources.
The report is six years old and is referring to Capitol Hill and 2nd & Pike – not Pioneer Square. Isn’t that what this article is about, Pioneer Square?
First of all, you can’t talk about Pioneer Square without also talking about Chinatown. They’re one in the same.
Now, having spent December of ’07 to January of ’09 living on the fourth floor of the Alps Apartments on King Street in Chinatown, I right away sided with the Seattle Times article based on… all the crazy shit I saw/experienced.
Man I saw blacks drunk, high, smoking crack up in the stairs by Jefferson street, fighting in Hing Hay park (and one memorable fight at 2 am on Jackson st. in front of a bank) swarming Occidental Park almost every night, throwing their cans of Joose everywhere, stumbling around the community garden of Main st. every night, yelling at all hours of the morning (almost every night, I swear!). Sure there where some white guys around (and one batshit crazy white lady that caused a couple daytime scenes in Hing Hay). Man, all around Occidental Park is a circus some nights. And all around the Gospel Mission in Pioneer Square, wow.
Did blacks try to sell me drugs? Oh yes. More times then I can remember. I guy even tried to sell me and my Dad something when we were walking up Maynard to Ho Ho seafood restaurant. Did any whites try to sell me drugs? Maybe, but I don’t remember.
Mr. Holden, do you ever go down there? Do you ever leave Capitol Hill? You should talk to my friend who used to work the door at Fuel bar. Crazy black guys trying to stab him, threatening him, because he wouldn’t let their drunk asses in. Or talk to my man Douglas who, to my knowledge, is still the apartment manager at the Alps. He’s been there over a decade and can tell you some stories from what he’s seen.
So what’s really going on here? I’ll tell you. The black guys down there in Pioneer Square/Chinatown are the loudest, most intimidating, most openly drunk, most aggressive at panhandling (by far, with only a native guy who cussed me out called me evil whitey for not giving him money belonging in the same level of aggressiveness) litter the most, fight the most, etc. etc.
Bad for business. Bad for tourism. Bad for the people who live there.
Who’re you going to trust on this issue? Some ivory tower research paper by somebody who never hung out talking to bums, walking the trails under the overpasses through the chain link fences in S dot territory (crack smoking free-for-all back there), walking Chinatown, Little Saigon, the terraces and Pioneer Square at night. And that report is six years old!
Or are you going to trust the police. Who are on the streets daily, seeing what’s going on with their own eyes. That report says they don’t see whites as drug dealers. Bullshit. They harass and stop everybody who’s hanging out after dark and looks suspicious. They have to.
One night I was leaning against the stop sign on King and Maynard and a cruiser did a u-turn through the intersection, pulled up on the curb and the cop leans his head out and says, “what’re you doing, huh, you dealin’?
I says, “Do I look like a drug dealer?”
He says, “I dunno, what does a drug dealer look like?”
So what’re we going to do about all these poor black drug dealers? “…address the problem humanely through a public-health strategy” says Lisa Daugaard.
Great. Whatever the hell that means.
The only source in here that had good input (although pretty obvious stuff) was Ian Goodhew, the King County Deputy chief of staff. But none of these sources (aside from the UW researcher) Back up your claim that whites are the majority of drug sellers in Seattle (not sure what are of Seattle you’re even talking about here) and that the SPD is racial profiling. Instead, they only talk about the futility of the SPD’s drug busts.
Oh my God! The criminals are back. Of course they’re back! There will always be criminals. Just like you must continually sweep your bedroom (Oh my God! The dust bunnies are back!), you must continually sweep the streets of aggressive/fighting drunks, drug dealers, troublemakers etc. etc. The SPD is doing its job! So let us think of ideas for them to do it better.
“The other side of the story” indeed. More like a fractured fairy tale.
@ 17) You are wrong. The report is about drug use, delivery, and arrests in all of Seattle and examines many markets, including Pioneer Square. (Ongoing research has identified the same trends over a period of many years–both about the demographics of drug sellers and of those busted for drugs.) Some excerpts that refer to Pioneer Square:
@Mr. Hickman at al – the Capitol Hill report indicates that basically, when you see white people engaged in drug deals, you don’t perceive a drug deal, or maybe it’s just one friend supplying another with weed. Meanwhile, when two blacks exchange money for any reason, you’re likely to suspect a drug exchange has gone down, and for crack, pills, etc. I think this cuts across communities, certainly the whole 10 blocks from Broadway to 2nd.
Certainly an arrest of 10 “Ave Rats” or the tweakers that used to hang out on Broadway (are they back?) would never be trumpeted as a drug bust, although I guarantee you could get more cash and drugs out of either of those avenues than the police pulled out of Pioneer Square.
Hey who are you gonna believe, your own lying eyes (and mine), or a high-school dropout (Dominic) white-guilt liberal with an agenda who waves around a six-year-old report about a different part of town written by a white-guilt liberal ivory-tower “reseacher” associated with of the white-liberal-guiltiest institutions in the country? I’ll trust my lying eyes, thanks.
Good goin on making yourself look like a fool, Dominic!
Reading these comments is pissing me the fuck off.
The crime of narcotics delivery is the same under Washington law, regardless of the drug being sold. Even assuming more blacks than whites sell crack, crack represents a minority of the drug transactions that occur in Seattle. Many data sources suggest that whites dominate the sale of other serious drugs, which outnumber crack transactions. Yet arrests are concentrated overwhelmingly on crack, although crack is less related to public health problems than meth, heroin & powder cocaine.
And setting aside the racial composition of those arrested — the main point of the article is how anyone in 2010 can get excited about busting a handful of petty-ante drug dealers and “throwing away the key?” We can’t afford it, it doesn’t work, and it actually increases the social instability of affected individuals and families. Can we not think of a more reasonable and promising way to deal with people trapped in this miserable niche of our economy?
@23: There are a lot of white folks in the Mexican Mafia. Even in the Syndicate there are quite a few who got in back in the 80s or have parents in it that got them in (rare, but it happens!). More than a few white folks in the Bloods and Crips, but increasingly rare in the former.
The funny thing about your remark, tinged with racism as it is, is that La Eme’s biggest allies in prisons are the Aryan Brotherhood and the NLR.
Tying this so strongly to race is betraying a lack of comprehension.
Thanks for this article, Dominic – for pointing out that we do need to see much more researched and nuanced reporting on crime & enforcement.
Pew Center on the States reported last year that 1 in 30 Washington adults are either behind bars or under community supervision at any one time. That’s absolutely unprecedented. We need much better reporting on it.
I noticed that you were at the recent presentation by Mark A.R. Kleiman, author of When Brute Force Fails: How to have less crime and less punishment. You – and others – may be interested to read a review I did of that presentation and book — and of Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.
It’s at http://tinyurl.com/alexander-kleiman
Alexander’s book — and my review — discuss the research on Seattle drug busts that you cite here.
You guys ever watch the Wire? The hoppers never hold on to large amounts of cash or drugs. There’s always the stash somewhere else and someone else to pick up the money.
Just because the people the cops arrested didn’t have a lot of crack or cash on their person doesn’t mean that they weren’t dealing all day.
Other than that, yes busting street dealers and buyers doesn’t completely solve the problem, or even half the problem, but what else can you do? Let every neighborhood turn into an open air drug market where the dealers fight for turf and try to hook new customers?
Until there is a much larger scale solution put in place, there is little alternative to having to keep the dealers in check with these expensive policing operations.
@28: But we could have the much larger scale solution you suggest — a public health solution — for less than we spend on the current criminal justice non-solution. So let’s do it. Let’s voluntarily get off the futility train and do something that is both somewhat less costly, and vastly more humane.
First of all I would like to say that like most large publications… 1/2 truths and exaggeration are the norm and not the exception. Just like television these are means to sell product, so the most exciting story is the easiest to sell. The truth is regarded as nothing more than an outline of a of the woven tale about to be told.
That being said. I am disappointed in Seattle for selling out to the kind of small minded large money media operations that are in every other city just selling product. This reminds me of another article that I read about the city counsel and the way that the transients or bums or hobos or street people (what ever) were profiled. That is primarily why I love this publication as much as I do. It is real. There is nothing else. I find that the articles and the advertisements are of value and harbor the very feeling of the city of Seattle. So thank you.
@27 said: “Thanks for this article, Dominic – for pointing out that we do need to see much more researched and nuanced reporting on crime & enforcement.”
Really? Thats what we need to see? More nuances and “research”? How about some actual solutions and blunt enforcement? This article is a great example of what happens when people confuse their wishful thinking with reality.
It would be nice if whites throughout the world were equally uncivil and violent as blacks. It would mean that the whole “equality” marketing myth young people like me have had shoved down our throats was real. I wanted to believe it, but, unfortunately, being a poor white, i have had to deal with this shit in real life, and can’t afford to fantasize. I seriously doubt this writer has spent the slightest amount of time in the areas profiled in this EDITORIAL, and the study he cites is a fucking joke. Universities are on par with American Idol as far as institutions go, if that study is considered legit.
Furthermore, this type of ish is not journalism. I dont know what to call it, ‘fantasy fiction’ maybe? Pathetic.
This @17 Martin Hickman guy’s comment resonated with far more sincerity, and was also far more engaging a piece of writing than the boring tow the line yellow journalist that was published for this piece. I spend time in the areas he described every day. The Stranger’s free, so it’s a redundant point, but that was a comment that rang of truth, which is something i’d pay for. This crap i would never. The writer of this article will not address my comments, i am certain.
Another angle on this is that the goal of law enforcement is rarely to target the most drug dealing (on a money changing hands basis), but rather the drug markets where there are the most peripheral crimes. When people are forced to commit other crimes (from mugging to forgery to what ever else) in order to feed their drug habit, a relatively small drug market (dollars and cents wise) will create more total ‘crimes’ (and citizen complaints) then a larger drug market patronized primarily by people who are wealthy enough to maintain a habit on the side (rtaher than living the full on drug lifestyle). This is ONE reason (and I acknowledge that socio-economic status also correlates very nicely along racial lines) that people are pushing mountains of powder in Fremont and Lower Queen Anne with impunity, while the cops sweep Pioneer Square every other week.
2
3
Dominic gets his pot from a white dude so that means all dealers are white.
7
Blacks are 5% of the metro Seattle population.
Based on the numbers you cite blacks are disproportionately dealers of ALL types of drugs and are 20X as likely as whites to deal cocaine.
There’s two components to this article. The Pioneer Square roundup bust was primarily small time ‘hand to mouth’ dealers and a publicity stunt at that. Hard to argue with that logic. • The second component is racial profiling, IE white cops busting black dealers and letting the white dealers go free. That part is typical PC bullshit as anyone even vaguely familiar with Pioneer Square, the International District etc can tell you. Most drug dealers in Seattle probably are white seeing as how most people in Seattle are white. Most crack dealers in Pioneer Square are black. I don’t think the cops cared at all what color the dealers they were busting were, seeing as how often they probably knew most of these dealers/users/losers on a first name basis anyway.
Isnt it cute to see Dominic jealous of real reporters. Must suck to be stuck at a hipster publication with such a poor reputation. But have fun riding Dan Savage’s coat tails. Geez.
I’m getting really pissed off reading these comments. Many of the comments being left are very racist in tone….and because racism is so deeply ingrained in how this country works, many of you are in deep denial about your own racism. Yes, blacks are more likely to kill other blacks. Yes, because of racism, blacks are more likely to be targeted for drug use. As a black person who doesn’t use crack or kill people, I am saddened by all of this, but I get super fucking pissed when I see clueless white people who don’t understand why these are the circumstances of some black people. This country has a long history of treating people of color like shit and giving white people privileges galore. Until this country does something to fully address the effects of institutionalized racism, nothing will ever change. So, consider that the next time you want to be so concerned about how many drug users are black, and how many black people they kill since you care so much.
@35, 36 – That’s because of a ton of socioeconomic factors, you dumbasses. A good deal of those black-on-black murders were gang-related crimes (I even witnessed one of them firsthand – the shooting in Southcenter Mall last summer), something you have absolutely no clue about and is invisible from the view from your Ballard condo. These people are from parts of town that blacks and other minorities were pretty much forced to live in since Seattle’s early years because of fucked up zoning codes and segregation. Look it up in city records or talk to one of the old-school Seattle blacks or Filipinos who have lived here since before the civil rights movement if you don’t believe me (you probably won’t since minorities obviously intimidate you). And that’s just a tiny piece of the puzzle…
But back to the original topic – I work in Pioneer Square on 2nd & Jackson, a block away from where this bust happened. I see these people every day. Yes, they’re drug addicts who have hit rock (no crack pun intended) bottom, but if you have a shred of human decency you have to kind of feel for these people. Dominic Holden is just standing up for the little guy in this issue, and although there are a few holes in his argument (the “most drug sellers are white” thing for one) the bottom line is that the Times blew this out of proportion into a self-congratulatory SPD wank-fest. Some good press in a time when they’re in the hot seat for “stomping the Mexican piss” out of an unarmed suspect. And I commend him for that. Clearly SPD should be approaching this problem in Pioneer Square from a different angle.
Also, I like how all the ignant-ass crackers commenting on this issue are anonymous, unregistered trolls. I knew Seattle was overrun by white people, but I had no idea there was this unspoken, underlying abundance of racism. And I’ve lived here my whole life.
@ 42
Uh, it looks like the “most drug sellers are white” thing is well documented. See @7.
Dominic isn’t trying to stereotype one race or another (I know…dangit…put back the flags and white hoods…nothing to see here) unlike the ppl making rude comments playing the race card. Dominic is simply trying to say that if it’s really the drugs that’s the issue – well then the police could easily find more drugs in white neighborhoods – statistically speaking. So, obviously it’s not really the drugs. What is it then? The ‘periphery crimes’? Maybe – although I see lots of periphery crimes involving meth, violence, and forgery in the white community. Maybe the real problem is that it’s ‘open air’ and invovling minorities (when do you ever hear of an open air drug market involving whites? they exist but don’t get the label for some reason) – We are just all so disgusted by an open air drug addiction involving minorities – I mean look how addicted they are – we could make the town appear so much more pretty if we just put THEM in prison. Maybe the rats would leave too! Yay for white people and their impressive problem-soving skills!
@45 – what do you mean “deal” with blacks? My guess is you have some fucked up job in some crazy negative environment (are you a cop yourself?) where you see the worst of the worst. By that very assertion your viewpoint is skewed. How many black people or black families do you know personally? And there are plenty of crimes and gang activity from other races – look at the Samoans in White Center and Delridge or Filipinos in the deeper-South parts of town.
@47 – I/m only 1/4 white, and your argument is beyond stupid. Pretty much all of those places are fucked because of outside influences (many involving white people) from the past that have ruined their foundation. The Congo? Seriously? Have you ever read a history book?
I’m done here though, there’s obviously no changing any of your minds and this comment board has been overrun by you spineless bigots. Register yourselves some names, own up to the hateful bullshit you’re spouting and stop hiding behind your anonymity. Bitches.
The major issue I had with this article was the lack of viable alternative solutions to Pioneer Square’s drug problem. Presumably as an alternative to sweeps of the kind performed by SPD, the author suggests the following:
“There are other ways to handle open-air drug dealing, including programs that divert arrestees to treatment, warning suspects that they’ll be arrested if they don’t clean up their acts, and a host of of social services.”
The first alternative ‘diverting arrestees to treatment’ is a head-scratcher since it has arrest as a prerequisite. The second, ‘warning suspects that they will be arrested…’ screams ineffectuality and seems to imply, once again, arrests. The third, ‘a host of social services,’ is so nebulous that it’s hard to even consider. Perhaps this should have been fleshed out instead of using the bulk of the article to play the race card.
Additionally, the racial issues the author raises may indeed be valid, but have no bearing on the case being addressed which is specifically drug-dealing in Pioneer Square. I don’t think anyone would dispute that the bulk of dealers there are minorities. Based on the author’s reasoning it sounds like more efforts should be expended elsewhere, where whites are dealing, but that doesn’t make the Pioneer Square drug sweep an inherently racist effort. Unfortunately Pioneer Square, for obvious reasons (tourists, stadia nearby etc.), is going to get higher scrutiny.
@47: Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia are the most violent places on earth. Outside of South Africa’s urban areas and plantations, the African continent is a cakewalk compared to a lot of former Soviet Russia or colonial Asia. In fact, I will go so far as to suggest that Russia itself is more dangerous for black people than anywhere in Africa.
But yes, let’s whine about how frightened you are and oh my god, people aren’t as afraid as you are, but they must surely be lying because isn’t EVERYONE afraid of black people?
Oooh, spooky.
@2,3,7. I remember this study that claimed most drug dealers are white. It raised an eyebrow with me because most people who have tried to sell me drugs in Seattle are black, like 85% of the time. I am white and live in a predmoniately white part of town so perhaps if people think blacks are more likely to be drug dealers it is based on life experience.
I don’t believe that our experiences count for 100% but it is strange how we are ordered to ignore what we have experienced and see with our own two eyes (usually by someone claiming that our own 2 eyes can’t be trusted because they must be racist) in order to believe some study probably done by someone with preconcived beliefs who is trying desperately to back them up. Perhaps the study is flawed because the people doing it already made up their minds before the study began
@40- it’s fasinating that the bahvaior of “people of color” is always linked to past injustices. Yet I never hear African Americans saying Jews, whether here or in Isreal, are somehow not responsible for their actions because 2000 years of opression are responsible for anything unseemly they do.
This article really angered me, mostly because it failed to recognize the simple fact that drug dealers arrested in this sweep = fewer dealers on the streets. I work in Pioneer Square and it is not pleasant. I once even had some low life (high? dealing? who cares!) shove me off the curb and into oncoming traffic! I recovered before I could get mowed down, but WTF? What the hell is the matter with these people?
I like Pioneer Square and I am tired of not feeling safe there.
@52: Because they’re black? Is there some high-degree of self-loathing in Africa that leads to race-motivated murders?
Or are there other factors that don’t fall under the umbrella of skin tone?
Same Stranger…same garbage reporting. ACLU, race, blah blah blah.
Since when, and why, should people selling crack on the streets not be arrested?
I normally enjoy the Stranger, but this article is an embarrassment to the publication. Please do some real research before implying something as serious as racism. Did Dominic or anyone else at the Stranger talk to anyone living in the artist lofts at 2nd and Yesler and ask them about how often the cops are blatantly arresting minorities for dealing and doing drugs … obviously not, because you’d find out that the cops see what’s happening there on a daily basis without doing a thing. The residents there even took out a banner and ads in newspapers imploring the city to do something. Nothing has been done, the police have turned a blind eye, so if anything I have seen a lack of any enforcement at all in PS.
When some (however minor) enforcement does happen, the stranger calls out a newspaper and the police department for racial profiling.
This might be an issue, just not in pioneer square. Just from the description of the people arrested, I know who they were. They showed up in PS a year or two ago and were running drugs for someone else. I would regularly see them “taking orders” so it really is no surprise that they had very little drugs or money on them. I would have loved to learn more about that and was hoping that would be part of the article … shows the lack of research that went into this article.
The real story here (if anyone at the Stranger would have actually done any research on the ground level, rather than sitting in front of a computer reading research papers) is the crappy police work. Why did their undercover police work only find the street level runners. But doing something is better than doing nothing … those living at 2nd and Yelser have been yelling this for years.
I will continue reading the Stranger because Dan Savage is awesome, but this must be the worst article I’ve ever read!
@ 60) Do you know what “disparity” means? It’s not racial profiling or enforcement bias. It means there are unequal levels of enforcement. You’re the one attributing a motive to police behavior.
I mention racial disparity, a subject that has been researched extensively in Seattle’s buy-bust operations, only in two paragraphs of a much longer article. It seems you’re obsessing–several trolls are also obsessing–over a minor issue of race in a story that is overwhelmingly about something else.
I tried to reach people in Pioneer Square but they didn’t respond to requests to comment. Did you read the article? It explains this. And obviously I have been to Pioneer Square many times and was there the day before I wrote this article.
Maybe you could actually include a link to the Seattle Times story to let readers make up their own minds. On the other hand, what would the Stranger do with their newfound journalistic integrity?