Seattle officer heard laughing at pedestrian’s death to speak at upcoming traffic safety conference

Daniel Auderer, a Seattle police officer who was recently caught through bodycam footage laughing and joking about the death of a pedestrian, will speak at a national traffic safety conference this August.

Auderer will be speaking at the IACP Impaired Driving and Traffic Safety Conference. He is one of two Seattle police officers attending the conference, with the other being Detective Tom Heller.

Auderer will lead a workshop called “Becoming a Pickup Artist: How to Get More Out of Interviews” at the conference, according to FOX 13. The workshop focuses on police interviews with witnesses, victims and suspects, and how to get as much accurate information as possible.

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Auderer was assigned to perform a routine sobriety test on Officer Kevin Dave on Jan. 23 after Dave struck Kandula, a 23-year-old graduate student while driving his police car at 74 miles per hour in a 25 mph zone. Dave was reportedly headed to a drug overdose call. He started braking less than a second before hitting Kandula, according to a detective’s report.

The report said Dave was driving 63 mph when he hit the woman and that his speed didn’t allow Kandula or Dave sufficient time to “detect, address and avoid a hazard that presented itself.”

The SUV’s emergency lights had been activated, and Dave had “chirped” his siren at other intersections and used it immediately before the collision, the report said, adding Kandula was thrown 138 feet.

“She is dead,” Auderer was heard saying on a phone call with Seattle Police Officers Guild (SPOG) President Mike Solan, according to captured bodycam footage.

He said a check for $11,000 should just be written.

“She was 26 anyway. She had limited value,” Auderer said while laughing.

When the bodycam footage went public, protests around Seattle formed. The outrage became international after the Consulate General of India in San Francisco demanded the Office of Police Accountability to further investigate Kandula’s death.

Auderer was subsequently reassigned within the department.

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Regarding Auderer’s upcoming seminar in August, the SPD Office of Public Affairs released a statement acquired by FOX 13.

“Daniel Auderer is not representing the Seattle Police Department (SPD) at the IACP conference, and we are not covering the costs associated with the event if he chooses to attend,” the statement read. “Furthermore, SPD has never received a travel training request from Officer Auderer.”

Frank Sumrall is a content editor at MyNorthwest. You can read his stories here and you can email him here.