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The Courts

Judge Slaps Sanctions on Seattle for Deleting Thousands of Texts Between Top Officials (seattletimes.com) 65

Posted by msmash from the how-about-that dept.
A federal judge has levied crippling sanctions against the city of Seattle for deleting thousands of text messages between high-ranking officials, including the former mayor and police chief, during the three-week Capitol Hill Organized Protest -- a ruling that will undermine the city's defense against a lawsuit filed by business owners and residents affected by the high-profile protests. From a report: In a pair of lengthy orders Jan. 13, U.S. District Judge Thomas Zilly sent the so-called Hunters Capital lawsuit to trial on two of five claims, dismissing three others. He also ordered the city to pay the attorneys fees for those who showed city leaders destroyed significant evidence about their decision-making during CHOP, including their move to abandon the Police Department's East Precinct. The judge found significant evidence that the destruction of CHOP evidence was intentional and that officials tried for months to hide the text deletions from opposing attorneys. "The Court finds substantial circumstantial evidence that the city acted with the requisite intent necessary to impose a severe sanction and that the city's conduct exceeds gross negligence," he wrote. For that reason, Zilly said that when the case goes to trial he'll instruct the jury that it may presume the text messages were detrimental to the city's legal position and that there's significant circumstantial evidence they were deleted intentionally.
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Judge Slaps Sanctions on Seattle for Deleting Thousands of Texts Between Top Officials More

Judge Slaps Sanctions on Seattle for Deleting Thousands of Texts Between Top Officials

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  • Sanctions? More like a slap on the wrists (Score:5, Insightful)

    by schwit1 ( 797399 ) on Friday February 17, 2023 @02:17PM (#63301687)

    All lawsuit moneys paid will come from taxpayers. For the cities' pols nothing will change.

    Every one of them should do jail time plus get a huge personal fine.

    • IIRC the lawsuit is against the city. The next step would be a criminal case against individuals, although it sounds like there is insufficient evidence to actually make much of a case.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by lsllll ( 830002 )
        Yeah, because they deleted the ones that probably would have incriminated them. It's sad that taxpayers will have to flip the bill.
      • The judge should have jailed everyone involved with destruction of evidence, obstruction of justice, and a laundry list of other crimes. If it was me or you, you better be damned sure that would happen to us.

    • destruction of evidence is a criminal matter and I think that after this trial the judge will refer the former mayor et al for criminal prosecution.

  • Innovative idea here... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Kokuyo ( 549451 ) on Friday February 17, 2023 @02:17PM (#63301689) Journal

    Perhaps it would be more effective if the lawsuit wasn't against the city but the officials in question.

    As a representative of the people, I feel willfully breaking the law (as in destroying evidence) should be considered high treason or something like that.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by ebonum ( 830686 )

      They have qualified immunity. Can't touch the ruling class. But they CAN lose their jobs...

      • Re:Innovative idea here... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by taustin ( 171655 ) on Friday February 17, 2023 @02:40PM (#63301759) Homepage Journal

        Generally speaking, qualified immunity doesn't cover a public official who knows they're doing something illegal, or should/are required to know.

        But there should certainly be criminal prosecutions for destruction of evidence and obstruction of evidence, with minimum prison time and a permanent ban on any public service job.

        • They deleted text messages be very valid claim as to why should be stripped. That is destruction of evidence so qualified immunity goes right out the window.

      • Re:Innovative idea here... (Score:4, Informative)

        by mysidia ( 191772 ) on Friday February 17, 2023 @03:28PM (#63301913)

        They have qualified immunity. Can't touch the ruling class. But they CAN lose their jobs...

        Since there's evidence they Deliberately did something they knew was illegal; there is no Qualified Immunity defense. They should go ahead and pursue a personal action against each one of them.

      • Another goober who doesn't have a clue what he's talking about. Destruction of Evidence is not covered under Qualified Immunity which requires the official in question to have a REASONABLE BELIEF that they were acting appropriately.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by dargaud ( 518470 )
      Exactly. Don't fine the city, fine the official who took the decision. And make sure the money doesn't come from city coffers, but from his pockets. Otherwise it's just another tax on the citizen.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by HiThere ( 15173 )

      Not treason. The constitution defines that. But it ought to be considered malfeasance, which is a felony. And possibly also "conspiracy to commit malfeasance". Perhaps there's and abuse of office tag that could also be added.

      Unfortunately, if you can't really prove that they did it to conceal wrong doing, I don't think the criminal charges would stand. Perhaps the state or the feds should investigate.

      • Unfortunately, if you can't really prove that they did it to conceal wrong doing

        There is substantial evidence that they acted with intent. That's not my opinion, it's what the judge said.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by HiThere ( 15173 )

          Substantial evidence isn't enough for criminal prosecution. It's enough for civil prosecution, which depends on "preponderance of the evidence". Criminal prosecution requires "beyond a reasonable doubt".

  • What republicans think of when they hear Seattle. https://www.ggrecon.com/media/... [ggrecon.com]

  • Article is true and important, but seems offtopic for this site as a whole.

    Now if they could recover all the deleted texts through some cool hacky solution, now that would be interesting :-)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Ksevio ( 865461 )

      Slashdot has always had a spot for rights against corrupt authorities. The tech angle here is a bit lacking, but it's a sad thing that the some think "woke" is bad when it's against police corruption

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by HiThere ( 15173 )

      A hackish solution to recover the deleted emails would have a very hard time proving provenance. So they couldn't really be used as evidence. (Clues to recover additional evidence, though, that would work.)

  • Subpoena the phone companies (Score:3)

    by ebonum ( 830686 ) on Friday February 17, 2023 @02:19PM (#63301703)

    I'm fairly sure AT&T or other networks have copies of all the text messages somewhere.

    • Yes but only for so long. This happened around June/July 2020 so most likely they no longer have them. Now the city was directed to preserve the evidence and appears to have deliberately deleted it. I do not know the timeline of events but the deliberate deletion may have been discovered after it was possible to recover them from the networks. I am speculating that based on sanctions order because if they were recoverable, the sanctions would not have been as severe.

    • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

      by jwymanm ( 627857 )
      It's become custom in government to now delete/erase/factory reset every device every couple months it seems. They shouldn't be able to erase anything at all while on public money. I even heard congress uses whatsapp and stuff to communicate. Fucking nuts

      • Re:Subpoena the phone companies (Score:4, Interesting)

        by quantaman ( 517394 ) on Friday February 17, 2023 @03:32PM (#63301921)

        It's become custom in government to now delete/erase/factory reset every device every couple months it seems. They shouldn't be able to erase anything at all while on public money. I even heard congress uses whatsapp and stuff to communicate. Fucking nuts

        I work with someone who came from government, the only text they ever send is "call me".

        I'm coming of the opinion that things like FOIA shouldn't apply to things like emails and text messages. All it does is encourage people to take communications offline or to make them through encrypted channels. And that makes government more corrupt and dysfunctional and creates a lack of records when those records become required by something more serious (like legal proceedings).

        I think the best case is that government officials are generally able to keep more personal & informal stuff like email and texts private, that way they'll actually exist if they're needed for a court case (unless of course they destroy evidence like these bozos did).

        • I work with someone who came from government, the only text they ever send is "call me".

          This text makes no sense. Why don't they call you?

          • I work with someone who came from government, the only text they ever send is "call me".

            This text makes no sense. Why don't they call you?

            Because it lets me return the call at my convenience.

            If it's not urgent they don't want to interrupt me.

  • Because, thereâ(TM)s all sorts of dubious going on in Seattle that seems to come from the top.

  • Mayor should be prosecuted (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SmaryJerry ( 2759091 ) on Friday February 17, 2023 @03:19PM (#63301885)
    It was very ridiculous for the mayor to literally allow a take over of part of the city - roads were blocked off, police were told not to go there by the city itself, essentially no law. There were/are videos of the chaz/chop members doing 'self-enforcement' (aka the people with guns hold the power) talking to each other saying the mayor was on their side and if there were any problems then just call the mayor. The mayor was all for this 'autonomous zone' until the murders and rapes starting happening. If anyone remembers they had videos of shooting victims being carried to the edge of the zone because ambulances couldn't even get in. Instead of calling the national guard or any other kind of help, the mayor was all for the cause. It's very unfortunate those texts were deleted, but there is video evidence as well that will hopefully be enough to prosecute - although at that time any form of protest that included violence was being deleted by youtube, reddit, and other big tech companies themselves and essentially wiping clean the internet of wrong doing because they stood on the side of the cause and didn't want the causes being reflected on poorly due to violence at the protests.

  • but actions like those make even harder to say one certain past US president was wrong when arguing against the Summer of Love, and adds fuel each side for even more finger pointing. The sole common for any party? Law abiding citizens lose, no matter how.

  • This is because they were likely directing the protests and enabling them via handing intelligence to them.

    Seattle government is full of card carrying Communist racists and has been for years, everyone knows this.

    • doubt they were directing it but text probably show that they were actively letting it happen and in agreement to not stop it. That would fit in with businesses that had their lively hoods destroyed while police and leadership sat on their hands. they think deleteing the messages makes crim's they face less but reality just proves it and adds on the attempted cover up.

  • Seattle should settle (Score:3)

    by laughingskeptic ( 1004414 ) on Friday February 17, 2023 @05:11PM (#63302175)
    This is effectively summary judgement without the summary judgement value. With these instructions the jury has to find for the plaintiff. If this goes to trial, Seattle's attorneys are walking into this doomed, the only question is the amount of damages the jury will assess. I wouldn't want to bet on leniency from the jury on damages.

  • ...wait, they're trying to punish the _politicians_ by sanctioning _The City_...

    Why is this even seriously entertained?? THE CITY gets its money from the citizens, not the fucking politicians. Even when the citizens win... they lose! What's the point??

  • ...the state sanctions YOU

  • Hopefully Steve Lehto covers this, but as I understand it the destruction of evidence is an implied admission of guilt.

  • The mayor and city council are ruining it. They have invited "homeless" people in recreational vehicles to move onto city streets and be provided with free cocaine. With businesses moving out, the city will probably run out of funds but I doubt if any of the people responsible will be unelected or lose their jobs.

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