Chronology of Events
This page contains and includes our opinions
5-6-2009:
Out of the clear blue we began receiving insulting, rambling emails from:
BENTBRUSHGRAPHX@GMAIL.COM
Our school was not yet open for business and the web page had only been posted a couple of days prior. The emails came from the Kent, Washington area and appeared to be the illogical nonsense of an alcoholic or druggie so we ignored them.
5-9-2009:
We received a blatant physical threat which originated from Fort Wayne, Indiana. Go here to read the threat.
5-9-2009:
Clearly this was a threat no one could ignore, so on the same day we pulled together what data we had and drafted and sent a formal criminal complaint to the Seattle Police Department. We knew beyond all shadow of a doubt that SPD would screw this up in one way or another, but we were determined to be polite in our first attempt. Read that complaint here.
6-10-2009:
From a lifetime of experience with SPD we knew beyond all doubt that SPD would either fumble the case or not respond to us at all. The latter proved to be true. SPD steadfastly ignored us and refused to respond. Therefore, on this date we filed a case against "John Doe" in District Court in Seattle. That gave us subpoena authority and we served Verizon with a subpoena which commanded them to inform us of the name and address of their user who was assigned the IP address from which the threats originated. Extracting the data from Verizon was painful. And even when Verizon finally complied, they sent the data not to us, and not to law enforcement, but to the court clerk. Obtaining the results of our own subpoena from the court clerk became yet another fiasco, detailed here.
8-8-2009:
A whopping TWO MONTHS later, we were finally supplied the data we had paid for. The threats had come from a Verizon ISP account owned by one Edward Bishe. View the subpoena results here. We had solved the case at our expense for the Seattle Police Department. All they need do at this point was the "mop up".
9-13-2009:
During this period we had sent our SPD complaint a second time by registered mail. At this point we expected no reply from the Seattle Police Department, and we received no reply. The next rung up the ladder is to appeal to the county Sheriff of the county in which the offending city PD is located. On 9-13-2009 we did just that. Read that complaint here.
10-19-2009:
As expected, we received no reply from the King County Sheriff's office. Over some 30 years, we have submitted two or three complaints to the King County Sheriff's office. In 30 years, we have received not one reply. We had also sent a copy of our KCSO complaint to the Seattle Mayor's office. They replied and said they had forwarded our complaint to SPD, and that SPD had gotten back to them saying they had unsuccessfully tried to contact us. We replied to the Mayor that in fact we were aware of no such attempt, and we reiterated our various contact points to the Mayor. We never heard from the Mayor's office again. We then filed a complaint with the Seattle office of the FBI. Read that complaint here.
11-28-2009:
As expected, we received no response from the FBI. We then wrote, again via registered mail, to all agencies. All agencies signed for those deliveries. Read that complaint here.
12-10-2009:
We did receive a response from the Seattle police Department. It's a doozy. Read that response here. Too bad the SPD response had less than nothing to do with the letter we sent them. We received no other response from any of the other addressees, ever.
12-23-09:
We finally decided to file yet another complaint against the Seattle Police Department, through their equivalent of "Internal Affairs". This is an entity which only recently moved its physical office out of SPD (to a location across the street). It appears to still be very much an integral part of SPD, and as such is next to worthless. We appealed to them anyway, to see what would happen. Read that complaint here.
1-6-2010
(Now over a year after first filing a complaint with the Seattle Police Department) We received our first response from anyone or any office associated with the Seattle Police Department. Read it here.
1-13-2010:
Could it finally be that our complaint had made it into the hands of intelligent entities? The odds were against it. We dared them to get on top of this, knowing all the while that they would not. Here is our reply.
1-20-2010:
We received no written or formal reply to our reply. Instead, one Steve Hirjak of SPD took it upon himself to contact the business we were using as a contact point, and to call up that business, and to discuss specific and personal details of the case with one of the employees there, and asked that business to call him by phone(!). He also expressed to this business, who had no part or interest in the case, that we should have simply called the FBI. This was an odd statement because it was made to a business that was never involved in the case, and it was made AFTER Steve Hirjak had been given copies of our complaints to the FBI, which had gone unanswered. So just what was this guy's purpose, anyway? As of late 2010 we still want to know. After the uninvolved business passed Hirjak's peculiar message to us, we fired back as shown here.
2-13-10:
We received a nearly valueless letter in response. Read it here.
2-13-10:
We offer a translation of SPD's idiotic letter of 2-13, here.
9-7-2010:
Having heard nothing from SPD regarding our original case, we wrote to inquire. Read that letter here, sent to SPD via registered mail, as always.
10-4-2010:
Seattle attorney Elena Garella was asked to advise on this case whether it was feasible to obtain a court order DIRECTING the Seattle Police department to do its job, or whether we should file a comprehensive civil suit against the city. When no reply was received she was asked again, and, indeed, a third time. Elena had been a friend for ten years and had performed much great work on our behalf. No reply was ever forthcoming and she was unfriended early in November. The sadness on this end is lasting and profound. No explanation is known or even guessable.
10-24-2010:
Seattle attorney Karen A. Clark was asked to advise on this case whether it was feasible to obtain a court order DIRECTING the Seattle Police department to do its job, or whether we should file a comprehensive civil suit against the city. She had done great work for us in the past. No reply was ever received. We'd like to say this is a Left Coast problem, and, indeed, it is, but in this particular case Ms. Clark hails originally from New York. We do not, then, have an explanation. We have only our profound and growing disappointment in, and fear of, our species.
11-4-2010:
We have received NO REPLY from the Seattle Police Department or any other agency. This is how law enforcement in western Washington works. It's how it always has worked. It's how it always will work. On this date we've filed the following Freedom of Information request with the city. We do not expect that it will produce any useful data (we have in our possession documented proof of lies presented as responses to FOIA requests through the City of Seattle):
Seattle Police Department
P.O. Box 34986 Seattle
, WA
98124-4986
Please consider this a FOIA request. We need the name of the SPD officer assigned to SPD case number 2010-22338. We’re happy to pay any research and/or copy fees.
[signature, address]
11-4-2010
11-2010:
We then approached Seattle attorney "Mike Rosen".
We received a reply asking for an overview; that was supplied the same day.
We received no further response from Mike Rosen.
We've long lamented the bizarre behavior of Left Coast attorneys. Our frustration is justified.
12-4-2010:
We finally received an absurd reply from SPD re our FOIA request (above), saying that they are unable to supply us the name of the officer assigned to this case because his identity must be protected. These people are insane, and that seems a documentable fact. Our reply appears below theirs, here.
12-6-2010:
For public reference, below is a partial list of western Washington attorneys who have been known to work in the area of law enforcement corruption issues:
Bill Sherman and Timothy Leary
Sherman & Leary PLLC
Contact Information
Khodr & Winkelhake, P.L.L.C.
questions@kwlegal.org
John Stocks
Van Siclen, Stocks & Firkins
jstocks@vansiclen.com
Law Offices of Lembhard Howell P.S.
howellembhardg1.qwestoffice.net
lemhowell@quest.net
Law Offices of James C. Egan P.L.L.C.
www.eganattorney.com
Info@EganAttorney.com
Ressler & Tesh
www.randtlaw.com
John Kannin
Kanninlaw.com
Muenster & Koenig
munsterkoenig.com
jrmuenster@muensterkoenig.com
MacDonald Hoague & Bayless
www.mhb.com
law@mhb.com
Leemon & Royer PLLC
www.leeroylaw.com
Contact page
Budge & Heipt PLLC
www.budgeandheipt.com
Contact Page
Fred Diamondstone
www.Freddiamondstone.com
fdiamondstone@seanet.com
ACLU of Washington State
ACLU of Washington
12-7-2010:
Research and case history links to Seattle police corruption cases are here.
If they don't terrify you, you're braindead.
12-12-2010:
We've received a response to our FOIA request. In it, Seattle PD's amazing Steve Hirjak has been shown to be the officer assigned to this case since January of 2010. It appears Hirjak has marked the case "Inactive" since that date, has failed to notify us of that fact, and has not lifted one Goddamned finger in 11 full months on behalf of this case. Welcome to Afghanistan. Read the pertinent docs here. I left Federal law enforcement in 1974 because of this disgusting, idiotic attitude. We're amazed to see that it survives, and thrives, into the 21st century.
2-7-2011:
Yet another complaint to the FBI, this time in D.C..
4-18-2011:
RE our complaint of 2-7-2011 (above), we've received NO REPLY from the FBI or any other agency as of this date, and we never will. We declare law enforcement in this country dead. We will now resolve the matter in another way.
