This site is devoted to increasing public awareness of police misconduct and detainee abuse in addition to providing support for victims of police misconduct and detainee abuse. If you or someone you know have witnessed abuse or have been abused, please let us know.
Packratt@injusticeinseattle.org

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Monday, June 30, 2008

Poll Results

Well, as you may have noticed, I ran a little poll to see what readers would like to see more of from me. The results are final and here's what you had to say:

First, the most votes expressed a desire that the site would be killed off and that I would be arrested for creating it. All I can say about that is it's not a goal I plan on working towards, sorry.

In second place were the votes to keep things as they are with a mix of political information, legal information, stories of misconduct, and other stuff. We'll try, but what gets posted is often at the whims of what's going on outside of our control and one of the issues lately is that the latest contract between the city and police guild may actually make it harder for news of misconduct to get out in the open instead of making that information more open to the public.

In third place was a request for more legal information and support information for victims of police misconduct... Well, I know from experience that there is definitely a lack of support resources and sources of information for victims of misconduct and abuse in Seattle. But, that's what makes it so difficult for us to provide useful and vetted information to other victims of misconduct.

See, as said numerous times, this site has no support within the city of Seattle. The "civil rights" lawyers don't like to talk with us or answer questions because they don't think there is anything in it for them to do so. Civil rights groups like the ACLU in Seattle are too busy fighting to legalize drugs and organizing politicized Gitmo torture protests while ignoring torture in their own city to pay any serious attention to local civil rights abuses, and while the NAACP has been trying to bring more attention to the issue they don't seem very interested in supporting all victims of misconduct.

So... where will we get that kind of legal and support information victims need in order to make the right choices towards seeking justice once they've been abused and get the services the need to recover? Ah, there's the problem, just as there was no place for me to turn when I was hurt, we still have no place to turn to find people willing to help others who were hurt. Being a victim of official misconduct and abuse is still a wrong within a wrong, you get hurt first by the police and then the public when your avenues to justice and support are cut off just because you've been hurt by the police.

Of course, this is why this site is here. While trying to find out what I could do about what happened to me I heard from lawyers who said they turned away hundreds of victims because their cases weren't profitable due to the way the city makes it difficult to find evidence of misconduct and how the city fights such cases legislatively and judicially. In fact, some of the lawyers who used to take such cases don't anymore because it's so unprofitable for them. Organizations like the ACLU and NAACP just don't take misconduct cases unless it's very high profile and will get them some exposure in the press, they don't even give out referrals anymore since there are so few lawyers who take such cases.

So, since Seattle won't help all these victims of misconduct and won't help us help them, we're reaching out to other cities and states in an effort to find that information our fellow victims desperately need. Once we get enough information we'll publish it and make it accessible to the people who need it, not just on the site either.

We've heard you, we know there's a desperate need out there for more information and support, and we're doing what we can to meet that need. So, stay tuned.

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