WATCH: Seattle City Council Pushes For Poverty, Drug Addiction To Be A Legal Defense For Criminals (VIDEO)
The Seattle City Council is quietly considering a new law that would create a legal loophole that will allow misdemeanor crimes to be broadly defended for those with substance addiction, mental illnesses or those in poverty.
Scott Lindsay, a former Seattle Public Safety Advisor warned that this unprecedented potential law will create a ‘green light for crime’
Lindsay said, “I am not aware of any legislation like this anywhere in the United States, even globally. All cities have criminal codes to protect their citizens from criminal acts. This would basically create a legal loophole that swallowed all those codes and said ‘green light to crime’. If you don’t feel very protected right now, this would wipe out almost all remaining protections that we have.”
Anything under a felony excluding DUIs and domestic violence would by law not be prosecuted.
Lindsay continued, “This would absolutely open the floodgates to crime in Seattle, even worse than we often currently struggle with. It’s basically a blank check to anybody committing theft, assault, harassment, trespass to continue without disruption from our criminal justice system.”
The new proposed legislation did not have a public hearing.
Lindsay also said, “This is a backdoor to get this legislation into the budget process, not through the normal democratic processes with transparency, dialog, public discussion.”
Councilmember Tammy J. Morales claimed there is no research that indicates having more police increases public safety in Seattle neighborhoods.
Morales said, “But just the notion that we need more police, ever an ever growing force in order to increase public safety is just a false notion. There is nothing that, um, no research that indicates that, um, you know, a large police force increases community safety at all. And the truth of the matter is that when we’re talking about community safety, we’re talking about public safety, the question is safety for whom? Right. Because I represent South Seattle, where many people do not, in fact, feel safe, um, having extra police in the neighborhood.”
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