Seattle Settles Lawsuit Over CHAZ Response
The city of Seattle is settling a major lawsuit regarding the 2020 Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone (CHAZ) when protestors seized control over part of the city. The zone subsequently barred police from entering and sparked a sharp increase in violent crime.
The lawsuit is now settled, ending nearly three years of legal wrangling over the effects of the autonomous zone. The suit was brought about by more than a dozen Seattle residents and business owners over the city’s handling of the situation.
The city and litigants agreed to a $3.65 million settlement for those negatively impacted by the zone. The occupation continued until July 1, 2020, when the city finally dismantled the occupation.
During the investigation following the zone’s end, both then-Mayor Jenny Durkan (I) and chief of police Carmen Best deleted “thousands” of text messages. A federal court judge’s investigation found that some of these texts were involved with covering up the zone’s effects.
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The settled lawsuit was not the only one regarding the autonomous zone. The family of a murdered teen launched a suit against the city, as well.
https://youtu.be/qaO3HciOrn8
The CHAZ area was an illegal attempt to carve out a portion of Seattle during the tumultuous riots in 2020. The autonomous zone was one of the highest-profile cases of violence and separatism during the aftermath of the death of George Floyd.
After the prominence of the zone, the area’s leaders rebranded as the Capitol Hill Organized Protest Zone (C.H.O.P), though CHAZ remained the more well-known acronym.
The autonomous zone’s leadership blocked Seattle police from entering the area, calling it a “cop-free zone.” Protesters also briefly occupied the city hall.
The CHAZ experiment had a number of negative consequences following the restrictions on police. This played a role in at least one murder. There was a sharp increase in crime in the area, including robbery and vandalism. There was at least one case of a woman attacked intimately.
The protests and start of the autonomous zone also coincided with a dramatic increase in violent crime in Seattle. This included a significant number of murders.
The city of Seattle announced a $76 million reduction to its police department. This was about a tenth of the overall budget, though some city council members had called for a full half reduction of the police budget.
The reduction in the police budget and declining safety in the city sparked serious consequences. The number of homicides increased by 61% in 2020 over the previous year. This represented the largest increase in more than 25 years.