SEATTLE — Washington State Patrol released new details on its investigation into a protest that shut down I-5 through Seattle for five hours over the weekend.
In the early afternoon on Saturday, a group of protesters demanding a ceasefire in Gaza walked into I-5 near Pine Street, after others in the group drove their cars up in a line and blocked the northbound lanes of the freeway.
WSP described the effort as “well-orchestrated and choreographed,” describing how “protesters stormed onto I-5 through a cut in a fence and overtook the NB lanes of I-5 and both nearby overpasses.”
Prior to the protest, WSP had gotten a “single and unverifiable report” on Friday night of a plan to take over the freeway.
“Despite best efforts, we were unable to substantiate the report,” they said.
After that report, they put together a response plan to account for a potential freeway closure.
“Without knowing a time, location, or who was involved, we developed a contingency that prioritized public and traffic safety,” WSP detailed.
As the demonstration began to ramp up, eight protesters reportedly chained themselves to what’s known as a “sleeping dragon” device, designed to keep police from safety cutting them free. WSP further noted that “dealing with this type of device requires highly skilled and trained personnel and are among the most complex and difficult to resolve safety.”
That had state patrol call in its “CUT Team” to unchain the protesters. Because of the complexity of removing the device, “it served to further delay resolution of the protest and the reopening of the roadway.”
As for why there were no physical arrests after the fact, WSP explained the difficulty in taking large groups into custody at the same time. On top of that, rushing the removal of protesters “had the potential to turn an otherwise peaceful event violent.”
“There should be no confusion: the WSP was willing and fully prepared to make arrests had the situation not resolved itself,” they noted. “The crowd size necessitated waiting for the additional resources to ensure the safest possible outcome of a potentially mass arrest incident.”
Reopening the freeway was further delayed after protesters walked off and left roughly 12 cars behind. WSP also called in bomb-sniffing dogs before towing the cars as an added safety measure.
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