Sigh. Anne, you are repeating an old, tired trope that none of those who cite it ever back with hard proof.

“Police do not prevent crime” is an absurd, oversimplified, unsubstantiated claim that irresponsible politicos make to score political points with some demographics. Seattle has one of the smallest police forces per capital of any major US city -and it’s getting smaller as our city grows. In real numbers, not just per capita. While I have profound issues with the way policing is managed, especially in Seattle, including who gets hired and what they are allowed to do, that is not the same as asserting they don’t prevent any crime.

When NYC went into the bloody (literally) doldrums of the 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s, the ONLY thing that stopped the bloodbath was a massive increase in policing and quality of life enforcements. NYC went on to become one of the safest cities in the USA. I know. I lived there.

You see, the Seattle ‘experts’ who claim police don’t prevent crime are clueless. They don’t have much real, first-hand experience or education on the matter. If any. They don’t cite statistics that mean anything. They equate their agenda toward a more equitable justice system (a laudable goal) with a fantastical assertion that all will be ok if/when everyone achieves equity. The reality?
1) when will that equity be achieved? In 10 years? 30? Do we just let the killing and assaults continue in the meantime?
2) everyone, no matter the system, will not, does not ‘behave’. Some people are bad, even in places where there is great equity. People are brutally murdered in Scandinavia, New Zealand and small town Québec. And, yet, they still have significant police forces. Why? Because without them, there would be more killing and assaults, not least of which from REPEAT offenders. Sure, there are small indigenous/First Nations peoples who buck this reality but their civilizations are not vast, modern cities with the pitfalls and challenges of big ‘C’ capitalism. Since civilization evolved into communal living societies, committees have FOREVER included human-on-human violence and some measure of organized attempt to curb it.
3) If there was a permanent police presence at 15th & John the night this stabbing occurred, or even a regular foot patrol 24/7 around 15th, OF COURSE the likelihood of that crime would be diminished. If we had dozens of true neighborhood police precincts (not the few absurd, detached bunkers that stand in for precincts that exist today), neighborhood crime would go down because
a. criminals would be caught more often
b. people would be deterred just knowing more eyes are likely watching.
And, if there was a camera at that corner (face it, we live in a world full of phone cameras and CCTV already, e.g. in almost every major supermarket parking lot in Seattle) to capture the stabbing, police detectives might well apprehend the stabber quickly, protecting others from their next violent act.

I, too, want for all to get the services they need and believe that no one in a wealthy city/state/country should go unhoused. I believe we need a massive policing overhaul into better, more holistic public safety.

I too practice compassion and push for equity, inclusion and understanding.

However, adulting requires being informed and logical. That includes not repeating unfounded, absurd claims of wishful thinking, unless you are prepared to prove such ridiculous assumptions.
Even if we can draw police/public safety numbers down to near-zero, a big ‘if’, that will take many years to achieve.

And, Anne, guess what? Homeless people, generally, fall into three groups:
-Addicts
-The mentally ill/troubled
-The down on their luck and/or squeezed out by brutal Capitalism

Two of those three groups consist of plenty of people who exhibit irrational and sometimes violent behavior. Anyone living on The Hill for any period of time has seen it with their own eyes. Disagree? Get to know your ‘hood. Get to know an addict. Spend some time with someone who is mentally challenged and off their meds.

Being progressive does not mean being ignorant, simplistic and/or irrational. However well-intended you are, your assertions come across as weak hypotheses that belie the facts. The preponderance of evidence shows that a well-managed, well-trained public safety department that is high profile and that executes its duty properly, coupled with equitable community investments, deterrents and sound rehab efforts make for fairer, safer places. A holistic approach.

SHORT TERM, larger police public presences at street level absolutely can deter and prevent crime; smaller ones and slipshod police forces generally signal to opportunists that a free-for-all is acceptable. Let me know if you’d like me to flood you with the evidence ;-)

And, really, do you mean to infer that if you are being followed by a strange aggressor at 1a that you’d prefer knowing there are no police nearby to alleviate you of the dangerous situation. Really?

Thank you.

For decades? Then you remember the mentally ill homeless guy -Michael LaRosa- who murdered a stranger with an axe for no apparent reason at 15th & Union in broad daylight in 2010 (he murdered another man in the ID the day before). And, the brutal, random murder of Shannon Harps by a mentally ill man on New Year’s Eve in 2008. And, Willie Spencer Sorrell, a meth addict who attacked and tried to rape a 72 yr old he followed on 16th ave on Capitol Hill, breaking her pelvis and ribs. This, after two prior cases where he was sexually assaulting strangers.

Police caught Sorrell shortly thereafter. Know how? Fingerprints and detective work. Do you think Sorrell’s future victims don’t appreciate that he was taken off the street? Do you really believe such an apprehension didn’t prevent future crimes, Miss “Police do not prevent crime”-I-am-a-child-Anne? No matter how many times you recite such fiction with zero stats to back such a lame-brained assertion, it doesn’t become any less untrue than if you’d never blurted such obnoxiousness before.

Public safety is a service that extends to everyone, Anne, homeless, housed, of sound mind or not. And, I NEVER suggested otherwise. You are trying to paint me in a bad light with your immature, unfair, inaccurate and lame manner. I never suggested that just because someone is mentally unwell, they will commit crime. Addicts are another story.

“Police State” me arse. You really need to get out more. You don’t have any idea what a police state is. Clearly.

I think that a lot of folks in the ‘hood and on this blog are tired of turning a blind eye to one reality that seems ‘out of fashion’:

A chaotic, overpriced city/neighborhood where services are under-managed and understaffed and where more and more desperate and ill people live in desperation and/or total lack of empathy has direct results that feed into greater chaos, a less-safe environment and a breeding ground of disease (hepatitis anyone?), theft, litter, vandalism, arson and violence.

Read Malcolm Gladwell’s Broken Windows for hard scientific analysis. Or, just continue too advance militant, hardheaded absurdist nonsense.

Believe it or not, people can want to ‘tear down a bad system’ and rebuild anew without abandoning all of the tools and/or learnings gained along the way. And, in transition, some of those same tools remain necessary until/unless better measures are put in place. A rickety path is often better than none when there is no other option. Any seasoned hiker can attest to this.

Your tired hairsplitting and desperate overgeneralization of the specifics I spelled out is one of the oldest, laziest tactics that divides progressives when we should be united. It’s shameful.

I don’t defend bad policing. At all. I made no assumption about the attacker(s). They could be an angry frat boy or some suburban schmuck high on meth. Go ahead, attack me as a defender of The Blue Line. Gimme a break. Attacking others with false labels and assumptions is a sign of a weak argument and desperation and only lowers your standing.

Please stop with you FOX-news style narrative whereby you project your steadfast, uninformed assumptions and worn, lame attempts to discredit anyone who doesn’t walk in lockstep with you. Be better.

I’ve said it before on this forum and I’ll say it again. As a long time Capitol Hill resident, I was once assaulted in Cal Anderson park by a well known repeat violent offender who went on to murder a woman in that same park. Police arrived almost immediately and de-escalated a situation which would have lead to more violence in the park that day by arresting this tragic mess of a person. This argument has got to stop, that police presence doesn’t deter crime. you all are like the COVID vaccine deniers who end up on their death beds. Open your eyes, please…

Yes. We won’t create a utopia in the most brutally inequitable modern capitalist society on the planet by taking the police away. We see what we are creating, and that’s further inequity. Not saying the police are the keys to a better society, I’m saying the problem goes much, much deeper and we can’t pretend we are Denmark when we are ‘Merica.