hi I'm calling in Thomas and Dexter
Avenue North I think somebody's dead so
I believe it's going to be car versus
ped and they're doing CPR I'm sorry fire
I don't have more for you but it just
occurred and I believe the officer is
involved she was 26 anyway she had
limited
value were you aware that it was being
recorded no I was not when police
received disturbing information in
reference to a potential overdose a race
to the scene will trigger a sequence of
shocking tragedies on January 23rd 2022
at 8:00 p.m. Seattle Police dispatchers
receive a call that will set in motion a
night of both Madness and Scandal hard
it's hard to think okay that happens all
right just try to try to relax and think
with me have you done cocaine before yes
okay do you think you've overdosed on it
I think so yes okay so I'm going to get
you some help all right okay so stand by
can I have your name please no just to
so we know who we're looking for we're
getting some assistance to as quick as
we can right now you can call me Alex
Alex did you want to give your last name
no I'm okay just kind of freaking out
right now First Responders and a medic
team are quickly dispatched to Alex's
location 6th Street North downtown first
in route is Officer Kevin Dave who
speeds into action in his single officer
Cruiser a fire and medical team prepare
to meet him on 6th Street officer Dave
swerves his police SUV through downtown
traffic flashing his lights and Blasting
his siren to warn oncoming traffic and
pedestrians in overdose cases every
moment counts he's approaching the
intersection of Dexter Street and Thomas
Street a two-lane road with a bike lane
and a construction site obscuring a
portion of the sidewalk from view
officer Dave speeds through this 25 mph
Zone when the catastrophic happens some
of the following footage has been
redacted out of respect for the
victim
three Mary 2 starter supervisor start
fire for a struck
pedestrian off screen officer Dave
quickly jumps out of his vehicle and
dashes out into Dexter Street moments
later we hear the unmistakable sounds of
emergency CPR tragically a pedestrian
had been struck
3 4 5 6
78 despite Dave's persistent CPR The
Pedestrian remains unresponsive at 30
pause 4 25 26 27 28 29
30 1 2 three four five
six right no I'm not all
right Dave soon notifies dispatch and a
squadron of police cruisers and
ambulances descend on the scene to
assist so someone's doing CPR Dexter
North and Thomas I'm sorry fire I don't
have more for you but it just occurred
and I believe the officer is
involved so the officer may be involved
the officer not though by now Alex has
been given proper medical assistance and
all attention has shifted to the tragedy
unfolding in downtown Seattle
dispatchers are now receiving calls from
eyewitnesses who will prove a crucial
role in the investigation that will come
later was it
a pedestrian what correct they're doing
a CPR right now the person was crossing
the road um I think police were coming
going fast so they hit them I'm not sure
if there's anything I need to do there's
another there there's two police
officers here I think there's another
one coming right now officer Dave's
colleagues comfort him as he describes
what went down on the crosswalk she saw
me she started running through the
crosswalk SL on my
brakes instead of staying back where she
should before
Crossing
[Applause]
five be okay right man the same cannot
be said for the young woman lying
unresponsive in the street a 23-year-old
grad student despite medic's best
attempts she passes away after being
transported to the hospital yeah Dave
you okay physically no medical ISS no
medical
issu I'm not going to ask any question
just I just don't want you to know that
I'm here for you that we're going to get
you everything the RS that you need
okay okay thanks all right while the
true intentions behind the officer's
assertion that he won't ask questions is
unknown it's possible he's trying to
protect officer Dave clearly body
cameras are rolling and documenting the
conversation there are also labor and
department policies involved in these
types of situations some agencies won't
allow a responding officer to question
an involved officer and require an
internal group or external law
enforcement agency to do so one
important purpose of this type of policy
is to maintain impartiality many police
are represented by unions and it's
possible that it could be against Union
rules for officers to question each
other without the presence of a union
representative council or both as stated
the specifics of this particular
incident are unknown and these are a few
of the potential reasons the officer has
stated that he won't question officer
Dave photos of the aftermath were taken
and evidence was tagged and inventoried
officer Dave's Cruiser a Ford police
interceptor had sustained heavy damage
to its front push bar passenger side
headlights and minor cracks to its front
windshield debris was scattered AC
across the cold Seattle pavement two
airpods were found presumably ejected
from the pedestrian's ears at the moment
of contact body cam footage from officer
Dave's Cruiser was inventoried and sent
to the police archive to be reviewed
during a pending internal investigation
another police body cam would later
Elevate this freak accident to the level
of international Scandal several
witnesses later told what they saw from
where they stood on the sidewalk that
fateful night um I was trailing behind
them we changed sides of the street to
avoid a construction zone they were
ahead of me they were crossing the
street we heard a siren I heard a siren
I would presume The Pedestrian also
heard a siren I observed them beginning
to run presumably to exit the roadway as
they heard a siren approaching and then
I heard a loud thump and I observed the
police officer come to a halt I was not
far behind them so I was coming coming
into view of Dexter Street it was very
quick you saw the Collision what
happened after that so that person kind
of got kicked by the car into the air
and they flew in the air about 10 10 m
in the Northbound Direction certain
factors were suspected to have
contributed to the deadly Collision a
construction site leading up the east of
Dexter Street significantly obscured
driver vision and a partly see- through
metal chain fence LED out to the edge of
the road orange construction barricades
also partially obstructed view of the
intersection from AF far The Pedestrian
was evidently already walking outside
the crosswalk when officer Dave began to
approach in his Cruiser she was possibly
wearing airpods that could have made
hearing police sirens difficult later
analysis of the footage revealed that
officer Dave had performed proper
collision avoidance breaking and
emergency steering to the center of the
street he'd initiated his siren
appropriately moments before the
Collision unfortunately the Ford Cruiser
was too powerful to be slowed by a short
period of breaking and the steering
didn't effectively change the direction
officer Dave is sent to the West
Precinct and is met by Officer Daniel
utterer from the DUI Squad whose duties
include investigating drivers for signs
of impairment it's protocol to have
drivers evaluated in serious injury or
fatality collisions after completing his
testing of Officer Dave officer otter
concludes that Dave has exhibited no
signs of impairment and is safe to
operate a motor vehicle Weeks Later
police archivists were routinely going
over bodycam footage to prepare for
internal review and Analysis in the
process they stumbled on a potentially
problematic piece of audio captured by
Officer Auditor's body cam immediately
following his session with officer Dave
the body cam had recorded officer udor
side of a phone conversation with Mike
Solen the president of the Seattle
police officer Guild y totally all right
brother well
uh yep um I'm sure uh tcis is and I oh
he's good he says well normally we don't
give voluntary statements and I said hey
you're gonna have to decide if you
wanted to give a statement or not but it
does not seem like there's a criminal
investigation going on yeah I mean he's
going 50 that's not out of control
that's not Reckless for a train
driver yeah lights and sence
yeah well there's some the
initially uh he said she was in a
crosswalk uh there's a witness that says
no she wasn't unfortunately witness
statements aren't always reliable
clearly the victim was in the crosswalk
at the time of impact but that witness
could be different because I don't think
she was thrown 40 feet either I think
she went up on the hood hit the
windshield then when he hit the brakes
flew off the car but she is
dead
[Laughter]
no it's a regular
person
yeah yeah just write a
check
just $111,000 she was 26 anyway she had
limited value apparently Daniel was
unaware that his body cam was still
recording through extensive police
analysis it was determined that officer
Dave had been going upwards of 70 mph
and that The Pedestrian had been flung
nearly 140 ft the body cam video was
brought to light allegedly by a leak to
the media and complaints from outraged
citizens began pouring in it turns out
that Daniel 's duties went beyond those
of the DU Force he also served as vice
president for the Seattle police
officer's Guild with pressure mounting
the police officer Guild issued a press
release addressing the elect alleged
misconduct and that they claimed that
officer otor comments had been taken out
of context within days the office of
police accountability had received a
complaint that alleged officer utterer
had violated Department policy officer
uder initially requested a rapid
adjudication a mechanism of the police
bureaucracy that would wave a full
investigation in exchange for minor
discipline but his request was denied
officer uder and Union president Solen
were both promptly brought in to give
official statements they were
interviewed by Sergeant Corey George of
Seattle's office of police
accountability a police task force that
works to ensure professionalism and
Safeguard against unethical or
inappropriate police Behavior your body
warn video captured a conversation
between yourself and officer so and can
you explain the content and context of
the phone call I was I was finished and
I was heading home and we were talking
about because I had very limited
information on unseen so I telling what
I kind of knew at the time and those
details always changeed during the
course of an investigation Mike was or
officer Solen was talking about what
could anybody do what can anybody say
about this and and that was kind of the
context of the conversation I remember
in earlier in the conversation where we
spoke about uh boy it never stops it's
always something happening we were
talking about that and then this uh was
a conversation about maybe things we
knew at the time and then this is awful
what can attorneys possibly say about
that and that was the end of the
conversation were you aware that it was
being recorded no I was not it has been
alleged that you violated uh SPD policy
manual section 5.1 standards and duties
subsection 10 employees shall strive to
be professional what is your
understanding of this policy section I
understand it very well you don't want
to do anything that could potentially
diminish trust in the police department
uh cast doubt on uh an investigation or
cause a problem where the police
department might have to explain
something do you believe that you
violated this policy I did not violate
that policy it was a private
conversation in a car alone that just
happened to be recorded by my camera
turning on probably when I made a u-turn
or another car could have simply passed
by next came Mike Solen Daniel's boss
and good friend at one point officer
auditor says she's dead and begins
laughing shortly thereafter do you
recall what you said to officer auditer
to make him laugh I remarked on how F he
comed on how fast the officer was
traveling and how she unfortunately was
struck by the police vehicle and how
that she hit the windshield of the
vehicle and I was remarking that she was
more than likely dead instantly which
was a tragedy and I said that the city
is going to have to pay out a lot of
money on this one and that was the
context of the conversation at one point
officer Au mentioned just WR a check
then he laughs for a few seconds and
says $1,000 she was 26 anyways she had
limited value do you recall what you
stated to offer otter to have them
elicit that response well it was
remarking in how the city is going to
have to pay out a ton of money to the
family in this tragic situation and then
how can the city lawyers in general
speaking and negotiating on the city's
behalf with the family how do you put a
price tag on human life and that was the
Crux of the conversation okay so you
don't believe that any of the Laughing
was making light of the situation or
laughing at the fact that somebody had
had died I think without context just
hearing the audio which is unfortunately
captured in a private phone call you
could have that as a reasonable takeaway
police officers we deal with tragedy
almost on a daily basis and we're human
beings just like the next person but we
have to process these in a manner that
allows us to go to that next tragic
event and humor and sarcasm is used for
us as a A coping mechanism in response
to the events the Seattle Police
Department announced on September 28th
20 23 that officer Daniel utterer would
be reassigned to a non-operational
position records show that over his 12
years on the police force he had been
investigated dozens of times for various
incidents the victim janavi kandula was
23 years old and a graduate student when
she met her tragic death on Dexter
Street in September of 2023 Northeastern
University and Washington elected to
award their mourned student a postumus
degree the King County Prosecuting
attorney's office is currently
conducting a criminal review of the
crash