How many car crashes can state patrol ignore when protecting Nazis?

author : Pat Tassoni topic : police misconduct | resisting the nazis

by Pat Tassoni

As we pass the anniversary of when a dozen Nazis came to demonstrate at the state Capitol building on July 3, 2006 and because the Washington State Patrol by their own insistence provided 'security' for the event with 275 troopers, we have an opportunity to look at the myth of police effectiveness. I'm not going to address the estimated $50,000 wasted in staff time and fencing the grounds to keep hundreds of peaceful protesters from interacting with the nazis, but rather the change in collision statistics as the troopers abandoned their normal patrol activities for that day. Troopers were pulled off their regular assignments of driving the state's highways, leaving the roads to anarchy. Well, WSP did most likely replace less experienced troopers on some of the abandoned routes as the regular trooper was suited up in riot gear to stand in the sun for hours in front of the Nazis.

The following is not meant to be an in-depth sociological study but a cursory glance at imperfect data -- but it does offer intriguing data from a unique day that has neither scientific controls nor an institutional drive to know the truth. To begin with, no agency, including WSP, maintains a central source of the daily activities of their troopers throughout the state such as tickets written, stops made, etc. Furthermore a list of tracked results, of whether or not tickets issued were later thrown out of court, whether or not stops made resulted in arrests and convictions, etc could not be found. Who knows what WSP is doing? It was suggested by a state worker that I'd have to go county by county through each level of courts to find what really happened that day. Does having fewer troopers on the road mean less speeding? Does society collapse without their presence? What does happen when you pull troopers off the highways, replacing some with less experienced ones? Are better or worse tickets issued? Are better or worse stops made? Surely, if the state really cared to know, they could find out with the vast resources at their fingertips.

The police as an institution rely on the idea or myth that their mere presence is a deterrent to crime, speeding, and the collisions which presumably result. On July 3, we were given a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to stumble into an analysis of this myth, but are unable to fully evaluate it because of a lack of serious data. What happens when the police are reduced or absent? Nothing significant. According to the state Department of Transportation, a report for collisions on state routes that occurred on July 3rd for the last four years proves it. (Not unexpectedly, there were no significant weather extremes on these early summer days that would impact traffic safety.) In 2003 there were 171 collisions resulting in 67 injuries; in 2004 there were 116 collisions resulting in 40 injuries; in 2005 there were 122 collisions resulting in 49 injuries; and in 2006 [the year of the nazis] there were 125 collisions resulting in 53 injuries. The telling year is less than a 3% increase in collisions, but well within the norm for the last three years. Having fewer troopers on the roads apparently didn't change anything, for better or for worse -- it's like they were never there anyway.

Pat Tassoni was the organizer of "Nazis are Clowns" and is suing the Washington State Patrol on another matter.