In the aftermath of the Seattle May Day riot, councilmember Bruce Harrell criticized the conduct of the Seattle Police Department as “idiotic” – he couldn’t quite understand why a bicycle officer might want to arrest an anarchist who allegedly committed a felony. Perhaps a stern talking to would have placated Harrell? (Though not too stern; we wouldn’t want the SPD to commit a microaggression against an anarchist).

Luckily, Seattle police have a lot of images and video depicting the violent and illegal conduct of the anarchists and other activists, which is exactly why the public has been so forthcoming in their praise of the SPD (even if Bruce Harrell wants to grandstand ahead of his re-election campaign).

The video that would be even more helpful in allowing the public to experience the violence SPD officers experienced would be from SPD body cams.

Unfortunately, due to the mostly contrived “controversy” over their use, we don’t have body cam video.

Well, that’s not entirely true. We do have some, courtesy of the SPD. But, well…

It kind of looks like a comic book movie. If you stare too hard, you may have a seizure, so please only look in short spurts. Unfortunately, due to existing Washington law, the SPD notes these videos were “automatically over-redacted (environmental sounds and outlines only) to ensure that information exempt from Washington’s Public Records Act is not released.”

Is this the trailer to Sin City 3 or more redacted video of May Day riots? Can you spot the anarchists?

I’m hoping the uselessness of these videos (to the general public) will renew calls for changes in state law, so that we might actually be able to see the anarchists in action from the perspective of the targeted officers.

For more information, check out the SPD blotter page with a Timeline of May Day 2015.