By Erica C. Barnett

Since the city reinstated an old law allowing judges to banish people from certain areas if they’re accused of violating Seattle’s drug laws, two people have been arrested and jailed for violating Stay Out of Drug Area orders. The first case involved a woman who was originally arrested in Westlake Park in downtown Seattle after police looked into her open bag and saw a container with white powder inside; after spending almost two weeks in jail, she was banned from the central business district. Six weeks later, she was arrested again when police saw her in the area.

The second person accused of violating their SODA order was a man who was arrested twice within four days, both last month, for smoking crack in Belltown. He was banished from the Belltown SODA area but didn’t leave; instead, he was arrested again two days later when police saw him in the same area.

Both were referred into a “drug prosecution alternative” proposed by City Attorney Ann Davison to replace Community Court—an alternative to prosecution that Davison unilaterally ended. in 2023. (Public drug use and simple possession weren’t misdemeanors in Seattle until the city passed a law in 2023 enabling Davison to prosecute these cases.) At the time, Davison argued that community court was a failure, in part, because many people didn’t show up for their first court appearances.

Davison’s new “alternative” court option requires people to get assessed for substance use disorder—a step that’s arguably unnecessary for most of the people prosecuted for using drugs in public, since the Venn Diagram of people who use drugs on the street and those with addiction are basically concentric circles—and to stay out of trouble for 60 days. People can also choose to opt in to services at the court’s community resource center when they get their assessment.

A recent report from the King County Department of Public Defense, which provides attorneys to indigent defendants, found that just six of more than 200 misdemeanor drug cases Davison’s office filed between January and August of this year resulted in a defendant completing treatment or receiving a court order compelling them into treatment. As with community court, more than half of the defendants Davison prosecuted for drug use or possession failed to show up in court and had bench warrants issued for their arrest.

Tim Robinson, a spokesman for Davison’s office, said the drug prosecution alternative “connects the defendant to a meaningful drug evaluation and referrals to service providers” at the resource center.

Robinson noted the city attorney’s office doesn’t offer the drug prosecution alternative to everyone; people office considers “repeat prolific defendants” are ineligible, as are people who have been through the alternative process before. In contrast, “Community Court was mandatory for a wide variety of crimes, even for prolific repeat defendants,” Robinson said.

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One problem with Davison’s new alternative, critics have argued, is that it eliminates the mandatory services that were an integral part of community court and replaces those services with the threat of arrest, jail, and prosecution. For people with severe substance use disorders who don’t have a way of using drugs indoors and out of sight, this creates a ticking clock to avoid arrest, but doesn’t guarantee (or require) services that could help them stop using drugs.

PubliCola found eight cases over the past month in which Davison’s office referred defendants to the alternative court process. All of these cases are still open. In each case, the person arrested stayed in jail at least overnight; the woman who was arrested in Westlake Park for violating her SODA order was jailed for 13 days in July, when she was initially arrested, and another night in October, when she was found inside the downtown SODA area. Seattle pays King County a one-time fee of $279 for every misdemeanor jail booking, plus a daily fee of $386 for every day the person remains in jail.

When Seattle Municipal Court Judge Damon Shadid proposed a compromise alternative after Davison eliminated community court, he suggested eliminating this “Phase 1” engagement and jumping straight to Phases 2 and 3, plus a new fourth phase—a concrete appointment with a service provider, followed by short-term and long-term engagement phases that could include housing, treatment, and ongoing case management.

Instead, Davison kept Phase 1—requiring defendants to go to the resource center for an assessment—and eliminated all the other phases, replacing the carrot of services with the stick of arrest, prosecution, and potential jail time.

Robinson said Davison “continues to be optimistic that it can be an effective public safety tool that will create meaningful opportunities for positive impact on the lives of those who struggle with addiction.”

Davison is up for reelection in November. Her opponent, Erika Evans, got 56 percent of the vote to Davison’s 33 percent.

erica@publicola.com