‘The story’s done’: Curley rips media fixation on Bite of Seattle communication delay

Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson asked the city’s Office of Inspector General to conduct an independent review of how public information was handled after the Bite of Seattle shooting that killed three people and injured four others at Seattle Center.

Host John Curley said on “The John Curley Show” on KIRO Newsradio that the media’s weeks-long focus on the roughly five-hour communication delay has run its course and the inspector general review will answer any questions that remain.

“This won’t be that hard,” Curley said. “It’ll be a bunch of text messages. It’ll be a bunch of either phone calls or whatever, and it’ll just show you the thing came in at this time, and then this person got called, and this person got called, and at some point the ball got dropped.”

Curley asserted that the press should be covering the victims instead.

“Hey, media, why don’t you follow up on the three people that are dead? Who are they? How are their lives affected by this?” Curley said. “But like, ‘What? We weren’t told for five hours. We had to stand there and wait.’ Yeah, it sucks. It sucks for the media.”

Curley declares the delay story is over with

KIRO producer Joe Wallace agreed, saying the story no longer warrants daily coverage.

“It’s a story. It deserves to be mentioned on Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday [after the shooting] maybe if there’s still something hanging there, but we’re like weeks out of this at this point,” Wallace said.

Curley acknowledged the delay was frustrating for reporters and for festivalgoers who left belongings behind, but believed there was no ongoing public safety threat after the shooting.

“Pretty good chance that the person that shot that kid, I’m sure it’s a gang-related kind of thing going on, that person’s not going to run out of the Bite of Seattle and run around shooting more people,” Curley said.

Curley closed by declaring the segment the last time his show would address the delay, saying the inspector general’s findings would be the next development worth covering.

“We’re not going to be talking about the five-hour delay and waiting for dignitaries and this other crap,” Curley said. “You can’t find something else to talk about? Mark this in the book. We did it, the story’s done.”

Watch the full discussion in the video above.

Listen to John Curley weekday afternoons from 3 – 7 p.m. on KIRO Newsradio, 97.3 FM. Subscribe to the podcast here.

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