This is Part I of a three-part series that will examine the shooting of John T. Williams, how it may change Seattle, its police force, and look at the lives of the two men at the center of it all
Just two men know precisely what happened on a sunlit Monday afternoon in downtown Seattle. But only one is still alive to tell about it.
And yet that person, Ian Birk, a two-year beat cop with the Seattle Police Department isn't likely to say anything about his Aug. 30 confrontation with First Nations member John T. Williams until a multi-tiered investigation is complete - which may be several months from now.
Citizen uproar continues over the confrontation that left Williams dead with three bullets in his body and one, reportedly, in the head. Williams lay face to the sky on the sidewalk at the corner of Howell Street and Boren Avenue, in front of him stood Birk whose gun was still trained on Williams, and above his left shoulder, just out of his view, was a billboard for Virginia Mason Medical Center reading: Givme Peace of Mind.
A foot-long piece of pine, upon which Williams was carving an eagle, fell to the sidewalk as did the three-inch carving knife he'd been using - a gift from a friend the day before.
How it happened
According to Seattle Police, Birk, who worked with the West Precinct, was patrolling the area when Williams was walking westbound on Howell Street from Boren Avenue in the crosswalk. Birk saw Williams was carrying a knife and a block of wood, and considered this unusual and potentially dangerous behavior. Birk stopped his patrol car, made contact with Williams and instructed him at least three times to put the knife down. Friends of Williams said Williams was, if not deaf, hard of hearing in one ear, and likely did not hear Birk. Another friend, interviewed two weeks later at a memorial held in the Diamond parking lot adjacent to where the shooting took place, said Williams, who was a chronic inebriant, may also have been schizophrenic, that he heard voices and talked to himself, and so may not have understood Birk's commands.
When Williams refused to drop the knife, Birk fired four shots that sent Williams backward and onto the sidewalk with his feet splayed. One witness contends that Williams was shot in the back.
"I was dumbfounded," said Lummi Jim, a drinking buddy of Williams' and a member of the Lummi Nation. Lummi Jim was living with Williams in the Downtown Emergency Services Center at 1811 Eastlake Ave., which houses 75 homeless men and women with chronic alcohol addiction. Lummi Jim said he would often hear Williams in the next room talking to himself while carving, using the three-inch knife he'd recently given to Williams.
The last man to speak to Williams, other than Officer Birk, was a homeless man who goes by the name of Leprechaun, a man of small stature with a thick grey beard, ruddy complexion and sad eyes. Like Williams, Leprechaun is a chronic inebriate. He'd known Williams for some years, saw him regularly around the Denny Triangle neighborhood and in Pioneer Square, where Williams frequented the Chief Seattle Club, an aid center for Native Americans. On Aug. 30, the two men had been drinking 16-ounce cans of Busch beer along Howell Street just north of the Honda of Seattle showroom, when Williams got up to cross the street. Standing still, Leprechaun watched as the scene with Birk began to unfold.
"John was walking away and he shot him in the back," Leprechaun said. "They shot him in the forehead. What kind of s*** is that?"
At that point, Leprechaun, in a state of agitation, began screaming at the officer. Several minutes after the shooting, when additional officers had arrived, Leprechaun's shouting drew their attention. Three officers tried to calm him down and asked, as a safety measure, that Leprechaun take his hand out of his pocket. Angered, Leprechaun refused and the officers took him down to the pavement, cuffed him and put him in one of the squad cars. Leprechaun said police later questioned him at the West Precinct about the shooting before releasing him.
"Maybe I was out of line because I saw the whole thing go down," Leprechaun said of the shooting.
Departmental change
Police Chief John Diaz, just three weeks into his term, held a press conference the next morning at which time he reassured citizens that the gravity of the matter would not go unchecked.
"As the chief of police, I know that these are incidents that demand the most thorough, comprehensive and objective investigation. No one in the department wants to end up using deadly force on an individual. It's something that all of us dread," Diaz said. "My pledge to our citizens is that we will conduct a transparent investigation."
It has been 22 days since the shooting. And in that time, Birk has been placed on paid leave and an investigation begun by the Seattle police homicide section is nearly complete. The investigation includes the transcribed testimony of more than 16 witnesses (including Leprechaun's), physical evidence, including video and audio recordings. The most notable action came on Sept. 15 in the Norman B. Rice Conference on the seventh floor of City Hall. Chief Diaz, flanked by Mayor Mike McGinn and three officers, announced a reorganization of the command structure of the department. Officer Nick Metz, for example, was promoted to the rank of Deputy Chief of Operations and Community Relations, a marriage of duties, Diaz said, that would help close the gap in the kind of community building some residents feel is sorely lacking.
Also, Captain Steve Brown will assume command of the department's training section. Brown was last in command of the West Precinct, which oversees the Queen Anne and Magnolia neighborhoods. Diaz is also expanding the number of officers trained in crisis intervention who can then train first-line responders facing crisis situations.
Diaz is also looking into wearable video cameras for all police officers - something that is in practice at some California police departments. He is also adding more tasers to the existing stockpile of 300. Birk was not equipped with a taser, and members of the community, including one retired Seattle police officer, wondered why.
When the Seattle Police homicide section completes its closed investigation, it will submit it on Oct. 4 to the Firearms Review Board and King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg for their review. Details of the investigation will not be disclosed prior to the King County Inquest. Citizens who wanted answers to questions such as "why didn't officer Birk have a taser?" and "Why didn't the officer call for back up?" may not get an answer until the end of the year, when the county inquest is complete.
Down on the second floor of City Hall, just hours after McGinn and Diaz's press conference, the Energy, Technology and Civil Rights Committee of the Seattle City Council, chaired by councilmember Bruce Harrell, began. The session was to focus on emergency radio communication changes. But the council chambers were flush with activists, representatives of the ACLU, angered citizens and friends and relatives of Williams. More than a dozen men and women took to the podium to insist that City Council not sit idle on the matter. Some asked the council to consider firing Diaz.
Pamela Masterman Stearns, a member of the Wooshekeetaan Clan and president of the City of Seattle Native American Employees (CANOES) read a statement that there was a "tangible feeling of distrust, anger, and resentment in the city." She also recommended police: hire more officers who understand the Native American community; increase beat walks; and return to home rule, whereby officers be required to live in Seattle as a way to encourage a stronger connection with the community and reduce community fear.
A tipping point
The shooting of Williams has been a sort of tipping point among citizens who feel that police have gone too far, and comes on the heels of two incidents that drew wide police criticism: the roughing up of and shouting racial epithets at a robbery suspect; and another officer punching a teen-age girl in the face during a scuffle in South Seattle that escalated from a jaywalking incident. Diaz, who pointedly mentioned during his recent press conference that in 30 years of policing, he's never had to fire his weapon, no doubt wants better police-citizen relations. Yet some feel his department reorganization isn't enough, and that the closed procedure of the investigation into the shooting has only widened the chasm between police and the people it is charged with protecting.
"I don't think change will happen," Leprechaun said.
The following afternoon, at the parking lot at Boren Avenue and Howell Street, Jay Westwind Wolf Hollingsworth organized a memorial march in honor of Williams. About 300 people turned up. Some burned incense. Some carried cedar sprigs. Some sang with anguish and beat traditional drums. Many wore beads or homemade vests, headbands and eagle feathers. Most showed up at the site of the shooting with suppressed rage. Several in the crowd held cameras aloft as news-channel helicopters hovered overhead.
Native Americans of various nations grabbed hold of totem carved from Western Red Cedar and spoke passionately on Williams' behalf, condemning the shooting and the Seattle police.
"It's sad that it takes seeing a tragedy to get our people to come together," said Leona Ward, Williams' cousin and First Nations member. "All he did was carve, sing and dance." After about 45 minutes, traditional drummers led the somber phalanx of men and women through the rain down Boren Avenue and to City Hall. Police officers cleared their way by blocking intersections and directing traffic.[[In-content Ad]]
