Police, Belltown businesses fed up with prosecutors letting ‘crackheads’ off the hook

On a chilly Friday night in the Belltown neighborhood of Seattle, Sgt. Brian Kraus drove his patrol car down an alleyway and came upon a group of men loitering in the alcove behind a business.

One man ducked behind a nearby dumpster, shoved a crack pipe in his coat, and then exhaled a cloud of smoke.

“Are you high right now?” Kraus asked him.

“No,” said the man, who is an immigrant from Ethiopia.

“C’mon! I saw you smoking the crack there. I saw you breathing it out,” Kraus said. “I’d love to arrest you for the crack pipe, but I’m not going to.”

Kraus entered the man’s name into a computer in his patrol car to check for warrants before he cut him loose.

“I would love to be able to arrest him because this is a business, he’s there doing it, but knowing that the city attorney isn’t charging I’ll just send him on his way.”

Later this month, Seattle city officials will meet to determine who should handle low-level drug offenses. Currently, paraphernalia and residue cases, which include amounts of crack, cocaine and heroin less than .1 grams, are not being prosecuted.

Such crimes are considered felonies and traditionally fall under the jurisdiction of county prosecutors. But in 2007, the city attorney at the time, Tom Carr, agreed to prosecute the cases as a favor to the county, which had suffered severe budget cuts and was forced to shed 36 deputy prosecutors.

“The basis for them agreeing to prosecute is this open air drug activity was really hurting the vitality of the city,” said Ian Goodhew, a spokesperson for the King County Prosecutor’s Office.

Not only could Tom Carr’s office prosecute the cases as misdemeanors, but the city could also utilize a valuable law enforcement tool in the process. If convicted, offenders could be given a restriction called S.O.D.A., or Stay out of Drug Area. It allowed police to arrest those individuals if they were seen in a designated area of known drug activity.

“What we were trying to do was to break up the drug markets,” said Carr, who now works as the city attorney in Boulder, Colo. “I always viewed it as positive for the defendant, because a lot of these folks get themselves in trouble when they end up in an open-air drug market.
Keeping them away from a place where they’re more likely to get in trouble was for their benefit.”

During 2007, 2008 and 2009, Carr prosecuted 73 percent of residue cases that police referred to his office, according to figures provided by the City Attorney’s Office.

When Carr left office, however, the prosecutions dwindled and eventually stopped altogether.

Current Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes, who took office Jan. 1, 2010, said the agreement that Carr made with the county no longer applies to him.

“It was an agreement between Tom and the county prosecutor. It doesn’t bind me,” Holmes told KIRO Radio.

During 2010, 2011 and 2012, Holmes filed charges in 39 percent of residue cases that came to his office. He stopped altogether on Feb. 23, 2012, citing a Washington State Supreme Court Decision that he said prevents municipalities from prosecuting crimes using state statute. (Auburn v. Gauntt)

Holmes said he has turned his attention to a new program called L.E.A.D., or Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion. It would allow certain low-level drug offenders to opt for treatment rather than prosecution.

“L.E.A.D. says that low-level drug use is not a criminal justice issue, it’s not something that needs to be prosecuted,” said Goodhew. “There needs to be an intervention with the person that gives them a greater likelihood that they’re going to stop using drugs and turn their lives around as opposed to intervening and locking them up.”

But not all low-level drug offenders qualify for L.E.A.D., which is going through a four-year trial period in Belltown and Holmes admits that the program is being “underutilized.”

In the meantime, police are frustrated with the lack of prosecution and some have stopped making residue arrests altogether.

“We got a lot of good officers that are out here still working, still trying to do the best they can,” said Sgt. Kraus. “What we’d like to see is when we arrest somebody, for them to actually plea to it (or) get convicted of it.”

Officers on patrol get the brunt of anger from business owners in Belltown, who see their neighborhood deteriorating.

One weekday afternoon, Jill Donnelly stared out the window of her upscale fashion boutique on First and Virginia. Baby & Company was one of the first retail stores to see potential in Belltown, and moved into the neighborhood in 1976.

Donnelly fears “crackheads” in Belltown will drive other business owners to neighborhoods such as Capitol Hill. She blames the tumultuous relationship between police, prosecutors and the mayor’s office for what she calls a “broken system.”

“I’ve made it my mission to corral the business people in this neighborhood to make changes,” she said. “I believe in this city and in this neighborhood. I believe in what is to come.”

County prosecutors will likely take back control of residue cases early this year, but it is unclear if they will resume prosecutions. Goodhew said they are more focused on prevention.

“We’re trying to find a way to keep those people from ever appearing in the alleyways and smoking.”