"Mayor McGinn Comments on Birk's Resignation"

Cienna Madrid (SLOG):

Fresh from my inbox:

This afternoon Chief Diaz accepted the resignation of Ian Birk, the officer who shot and killed John T. Williams on a Seattle street in August. His resignation followed the news today that the King County prosecutor would not be filing criminal charges, but that the Police Department’s Firearms Review Board concluded Birk did not follow his training or department procedure in the Williams shooting.

While Chief Diaz and I both said today that disciplinary decisions would have to wait for a final review by the Office of Professional Accountability, it appears clear that Officer Birk saw the writing on the wall. He could read the same Firearms Review Board report that the rest of us did.

His resignation is effective immediately. The final OPA review will continue, so that the Department can properly close the case and recommend to the state whether Birk should be allowed to work elsewhere as an officer of the law.

To recap, this morning Satterberg announced that Birk wouldn't face criminal charges, an hour later SPD confirmed Birk's shooting of Williams was heinously unjustified, meanwhile the police officer's union newspaper continues to toe the dickish line that a "media frenzy" is to blame for all these accounts of police violence—not the officers kicking the shit out of people and/or killing them, then the mayor's press conference is overrun by protesters (and he's all, "STFU and work with us, police union"), and then, then Birk resigns as a massive protest takes over the first floor of City Hall.

What a hell of a day.