Seattle police won't enforce certain traffic violations any longer over racism, equity concerns. But some cops fear new rules will embolden criminals.



While Seattle police no longer will enforce certain non-criminal traffic violations due to racism and equity concerns, officers told conservative commentator Jason Rantz that the new policies will embolden lawbreakers to commit more serious crimes.

What are the details?

Interim Chief Adrian Diaz announced Friday that the following violations no longer can be the sole reason officers pull over folks, Rantz noted in a piece for KTTH-AM:

  • Expired or missing vehicle registration;
  • Issues with display of registration plates;
  • Items hanging from rear-view mirror and cracks in windshield (though actual visual obstructions such as snow, fog, non-transparent material, or shattered windshields will be enforced); and
  • Bicycle helmet violations.

"We know there are concerns [that] these violations disproportionately fall on those who are unable to meet financial demands,” Diaz wrote, according to Rantz's piece.

However, folks still can be cited for the aforementioned violations if officers pull them over for more serious reasons, Rantz reported.

Believe it or not, Seattle Inspector General Lisa Judge in a May 2021 memo called for a total ban on low-level traffic stops, KTTH reported, adding that she claimed police pose a risk to black drivers they pull over.

“Police and community are destined to continue the same cycle of traffic stops gone wrong,” Judge wrote, according to the station. “To that end, the issue of what and how conduct should be policed is perhaps as important as other root causes, such as institutional racism and subconscious bias. For safety of both officers and the public and for racial fairness, SPD should seek to eliminate routine traffic stops for civil and non-dangerous violations.”

The police union successfully pushed back against Judge's radical demands, Rantz said, yet fears remain that such proposals aren't necessarily dead but just delayed.

And even though the move was modified to eliminate only certain low-level traffic stops, Rantz wrote that those very stops — e.g., expired registrations, issues with tags — can signal more serious criminal activity afoot.

'Catastrophic impacts' to public safety

“If we stopped conducting traffic stops for all traffic violations in the city, doing so would have catastrophic impacts to our community’s public safety interests,” Seattle Police Officers Guild President Mike Solan told Rantz on his KTTH radio show. “Moreover, if you were to compare today’s decision to what Inspector Judge first publicly said in May, today’s decision is a reasonable approach. Having said this, this decision will still have negative impacts to our community’s public safety interests and still supports the preposterous notion that police still engage in bias policing with traffic stops.”

Rantz reported that a source with "close knowledge of the negotiations around these policies" said that the Seattle Police Officers Guild vigorously fought against no longer enforcing all traffic stops for minor violations, arguing that the outcome would be a "lawless free-for-all."

Emboldening criminals

One officer told Rantz that policies removing officers' enforcement parameters will only lead to trouble.

"Auto theft is off the rails, and they switch plates all the time, or take them off and make fake temporary tags,” the officer noted to Rantz in regard to taking problematic vehicle plates off the enforcement list.

A second officer told Rantz of much scarier possible scenarios.

“Right off the top of my head, anybody who has kidnapped a child and takes their license plates off … or they have a matching vehicle for a bank robbery, and they’ve taken the license plates off … we’re not going to be able to stop them,” the officer noted to Rantz. “And the criminals already take the license plates off of stolen cars to go commit other crimes like armed robberies and carjackings.”

More from Rantz's KTTH piece:

What’s worse, thanks to statewide police reform bills, police can only detain suspects with probable cause. The previous standard was reasonable suspicion. For example, if an officer suspects a car is stolen due to missing registration, a suspicious-looking driver, and even a bullet hole in a windshield, they couldn’t detain the motorist because it wouldn’t meet probable cause.

“I can’t tell you how many gangsters have cars that were shot up three weeks ago but [have] nothing to do with a current crime,” a third officer told Rantz.

Portland police further handcuffed, ordered to halt traffic stops, vehicle searches for minor infractions over racial, staffing concerns



Democratic Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler — who also serves as the city's police commissioner — further handcuffed police this week by ordering officers to stop pulling people over and conducting vehicle searches for low-level traffic violations.

Wheeler, along with Portland Police Bureau Chief Chuck Lovell, made the announcement during a news conference Tuesday, citing racial disparity concerns and low staffing levels, KATU-TV reported.

During the conference, the city leaders directed officers to reserve traffic stops for more serious occasions in which drivers are speeding, under the influence, or in some way endangering others on the road.

That change was also accompanied by another new policy that allows drivers to refuse searches. Under the new policy, officers will not be permitted to conduct a vehicle search unless they obtain an audio recording of consent.

According to Wheeler and Lovell, the policy changes came in response to data allegedly showing that black drivers in the city are disproportionately prone to being pulled over and having their vehicle searched.

'This is a time where officers are, I think most of them know, we're in a time of change. Reform is upon us, and we're really looking at ways that we can meld what the community is asking for with public safety at the same time," Lovell said.

According to Fox News, Wheeler added that the changes "constitute significant progress in our work to reimagine our public safety system for the better and to continue operationalizing our city core values of anti-racism, communication, collaboration, equity, transparency, and fiscal responsibility."

The mayor did admit, however, that the changes were also due to historically low staffing levels.

"We need to acknowledge that the reality that we have a scaled-down bureau, and therefore we need to focus on our top public safety priorities," Wheeler said. "We don't have the resources at this point to squander on anything other than the important mission of protecting the public's safety."

Scores of officers fed up with anti-police sentiment and a lack of support from city leaders left the bureau in the last year, especially as rioters ransacked the city for more than 150 days.

Just last week, the entire 50-member Portland riot squad unit resigned after Portland's district attorney charged a fellow officer over his use of force actions against a rioter.

The police's union head blasted city leaders for the treatment of police over the weekend, arguing they "encouraged and enabled some of the violence" that has occurred in the city over the past year.

The Associated Press noted that all this is taking place amid a rapid surge in violence in the progressive city.

Man arrested three times in one day — twice by same officer — on drug-related offenses. He was released on a court appearance ticket each time.



A motorist in Newburgh, New York, just couldn't manage to stay out of trouble one day earlier this month. He got arrested three times March 7 — twice by the same officer, New York State Police said.

What are the details?

State police from the Montgomery barracks first arrested Robert Radek, 29, just before 8 a.m. for a vehicle and traffic law violation while he was driving a 1994 Jeep Cherokee, police said.

The trooper also learned that Radek was driving with a suspended New York driver's license and was in possession of crack cocaine, police said.

He was charged with 7th-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance and issued a court appearance ticket for April 19, police said.

Seconds, please

When Radek was arrested the second time at 2:30 p.m., he was driving a different vehicle — a 2007 Honda Civic, police said. But the arrest came courtesy of the same trooper who busted him that morning, police said.

While this stop was for a vehicle and traffic law violation, the trooper once again learned that Radek was in possession of crack cocaine — along with 1.3 grams of heroin, police said.

He was charged again with 7th-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance and issued a court appearance ticket for April 19, police said, adding that the infraction is a misdemeanor.

Third time's the charm

The third arrest occurred at 5:45 p.m — and Radek was back in a 1994 Jeep Cherokee, police said. He was stopped for multiple vehicle and traffic law violations, police said, adding that while the trooper was speaking to Radek, he determined that Radek was impaired by drugs.

Radek was charged with driving while ability impaired as well as first-degree aggravated unlicensed operator — a class E felony, police said.

Radek was released on an a court appearance ticket for April 20, police said.