Late on an overcast, chilly night last March, after spending the evening hanging out at a friend's house, Jackson and three of his buddies were heading home along Rainier Avenue. As they walked past a closed Shell gas station, Jackson veered toward a pay phone. He wanted to call his girlfriend and tell her he'd be home soon.
After he noticed there wasn't a phone in the booth, Jackson turned back toward the street. A police cruiser pulled into the parking lot, and cut him off. "They pulled in real fast like I was stealing something," says 22-year-old Jackson.
In a flash, Jackson says, two officers--Diamond and Edison--hopped out of the car. One grabbed Jackson's friend Dante Hayworthe, and the other told Jackson to stay put. "I said, 'We didn't do nothing, officer, is there a problem?' He said, 'Yeah, there's a problem, you're trespassing.'" Moments later, Jackson says, he was on the hood of the police car. He says the officer told him to shut up, and talked about whacking people with his flashlight.
Meanwhile, Hayworthe says he was roughed up. "[The officer] slammed my head on the hood of the car," 21-year-old Hayworthe reports. The officers arrested all four men and took them to the South Precinct and then King County Jail.
Neither Jackson nor Hayworthe had heard of either officer before that night, but have since heard plenty of stories from people who've had run-ins with the same cops. "When I was in jail," Hayworthe says, "somebody said [Diamond] was an asshole, he always does stuff like that. [Diamond and Edison] are always together, harassing people." Police spokesperson Duane Fish points out that there is a system for filing complaints against officers. And the police report, written by Diamond, gave a much different account of the evening--according to the cops, they twice asked the men to leave before getting out of the patrol car; also, Jackson and Hayworthe scuffled with the officers and were hostile, according to the report.
Jackson found an advocate in Gormley, who represented him against the criminal charges. Before his June trial, Gormley took Jackson to a meeting of the African American Advisory Council--a group of black citizens who advise the police department on community relations--to tell his story. Unfortunately, SPD brass at the meeting, held in a Safeco Insurance office on 23rd Avenue, cut off Jackson before he could talk. Assistant Police Chief Harry Bailey said the cops shouldn't be discussing Jackson's case due to pending legal action.
A few weeks later, Jackson's case in municipal court was dismissed after the officers didn't show. Gormley and Jackson believe the city didn't want his case to go to a jury, on the chance that Jackson would be found not guilty, and would then use that verdict in a civil suit. (SPD's Fish calls the allegation overblown. "It's not atypical for officers to have a conflict with court proceedings.")
Jackson is meeting with civil attorney Mark Koontz this week to discuss his options. Koontz may approach civil rights groups like the NAACP and ACLU for help with Jackson's case. "It's going to be a full-time job," says Koontz.
