News release from the Tukwila Police Department

On 01/28/2017, the Tukwila Police Department along with various other agencies responded to a mutual assistance call by the Port of Seattle Police Department to assist with crowd management for a demonstration which was underway. During the demonstration, no Tukwila officers deployed pepper spray. However, officers assisted with taking several demonstrators into custody and several low level uses of force were reported by officers to command staff. Per our normal protocols, all uses of force are reviewed by the department.

During the course of the demonstration, a traveler with a red suitcase was denied freedom of movement to get to his flight by several individuals who were participating in the demonstration. The traveler was pushed against a wall where he was surrounded by a large group of demonstrators. Approximately six of these demonstrators continued to push and assault the traveler impeding his ability to travel. Upon observing this, officers quickly moved in to stop the assault, detain those involved and safely extract the traveler from the area.

Officers identified one individual involved who was still actively assaulting the traveler and attempted to detain him. An officer reached over several individuals in the crowd to stop the assault. The officer was able obtain contact with the suspect by his hair which successfully ended the assault. At this time, other protesters actively worked to obstruct the officer from detaining the suspect including an unidentified male in a red shirt who grabbed at the officers arm as he was trying to detain the suspect. Demonstrators proceeded to physically block and obstruct officers from pursuing the suspect who fled the scene on foot.

The suspect was inaccurately reported by an uninvolved bystander filming as being a female but is actually a white male approximately late 20’s to early 30’s with long dark hair. At this time, the suspect has not come forward or contacted us to assist with the assault investigation nor has he contacted us to file a complaint against the officer. Anyone with information about the identity of the suspect is encouraged to contact us at 206-433-1808.