Deposition of Clifford Stott, Ph.D. by The Stritmatter Firm

Deposition of Clifford Stott, Ph.D. Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle December 14, 2023

206.287.9066 l 800.846.6989 1325 Fourth Avenue, Suite 1840, Seattle, Washington 98101 www.buellrealtime.com email: info@buellrealtime.com

Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle

Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

Page 1 IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON IN AND FOR THE COUNTY OF KING ____________________________________________________________ ZOE ADBERG, SARA ANDERSON, MEGAN ) BUSS, GRACE CARMACK, LEANNA CARR, ) AISLING COONEY, ABIE EKENEZAR, EDWARD ) FARMER, NIMA FORGHANI, NOAH FOWLER, ) ZACHARY GARDNER, IAN GOLASH, GRACE ) GREGSON, MIRANDA HARDY, LEXUS HARTLEY,) CLAYTON HOLLOBAUGH, JASON SCHIERER as ) guardian ad litem for minor MALICHI ) HOWE a.k.a. BRYAUNA HOWE, JESSE ) HUGHEY, AUBREANNA INDA, MARY ) JURGENSEN, TIMOTHY KAUCHAK, JENNA ) KINYON, BEN KOENIGSBERG, JACOB ) KOENIGSBERG, SETH KRAMER, DANIEL LUGO,) JACON MARTIN, JOSHUA MATNEY, CHLOE ) MERINO, LOGAN MILLER, TONI MILLS, ) ALESSANDRA MOWRY, KELSEY ) MURPHY-DUFORD, WESLEY PEACOCK, JORDAN ) A. PICKETT, CHARLES PIERCE, DANIEL ) PIERCE, RENEE RAKETTY, JAVIER RIZO, ) ALEXANDER RUEDEMANN, MICHAUD SAVAGE, ) CAROLYN STERNER, SEAN SWANSON, The ) Estate of SUMMER JOLIE WILLIAMS ) TAYLOR, by and through MATTHEW D. ) TAYLOR, Personal Representative, ) MEGHAN THOMPSON, BRUCE TOM, TIFFANY ) VERGARA-MADDEN, ALIYE VOLKAN, STEVEN ) WIDMAYER, JOSEPH WIESER, GILLIAN ) WILLIAMS, QUINN ZOSCHKE, and DOES ) 1-40, ) Plaintiffs, ) v. ) No. 20-2-14351-1 SEA CITY OF SEATTLE, a governmental ) entity, ) Defendant. ) ____________________________________________________________ VIDEOTAPED VIDEOCONFERENCE DEPOSITION UPON ORAL EXAMINATION OF CLIFFORD STOTT, PhD ____________________________________________________________ Witness located in West Kirby, England, UK (All participants appeared via videoconference.) DATE TAKEN: REPORTED BY:

December 14, 2023 Nicole A. Bulldis, RPR AZ No. 50955 | CA No. 14441 | WA No. 3384

BUELL REALTIME REPORTING, LLC 206.287.9066 l 800.846.6989

Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle

Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

Page 2 A P P E A R A N C E S

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FOR PLAINTIFFS:

(via Zoom)

KAREN K. KOEHLER FURHAD U. SULTANI Stritmatter Kessler Koehler Moore 3600 15th Avenue W, Suite 300 Seattle, WA 98119 (206) 448-1777 karenk@stritmatter.com furhad@stritmatter.com

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FOR DEFENDANT:

(via Zoom)

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RYAN J. GROSHONG LAUREL M. CARR K&L Gates LLP 925 4th Avenue, Suite 2900 Seattle, WA 98104 (206) 623-7580 ryan.groshong@klgates.com laurel.carr@klgates.com

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Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle

Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

Page 3 VIDEOTAPED DEPOSITION OF CLIFFORD STOTT, PHD

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EXAMINATION INDEX

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EXAMINATION BY

PAGE

Atty Koehler............................................ 5

Atty Groshong........................................... 67

Atty Koehler............................................ 88

8 9 EXHIBIT INDEX

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EXHIBITS FOR IDENTIFICATION

805

Stott Presentation................................. 91

806

Stott Presentation Transcript...................... 91

807

Placeholder for Native PowerPoint Presentation..... 91

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PAGE

Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle

Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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REPORTED REMOTELY FROM MARICOPA COUNTY, ARIZONA

Thursday, December 14, 2023; 9:03 a.m.

--o0o--

4 ATTY SULTANI:

My name is Furhad Sultani.

My address is 3600 15th Avenue West, Suite 300, Seattle,

Washington 98119.

My employer is Stritmatter Kessler Koehler Moore at the

same address and phone number.

My phone number is (206) 448-1777.

The deposition is taking place on

December 14, 2023, at 9:00 a.m., at -- via Zoom.

caption of the case is Adberg, et al., v. City of

Seattle.

party giving notice of the deposition is Stritmatter

Kessler Koehler Moore.

The

The deponent is Professor Clifford Stott.

The witness may be sworn in.

THE STENOGRAPHER:

The

And just before we get

started, given our deponent's location, if I could have

both counsel stipulate that it's okay for me to swear in

this witness.

ATTY GROSHONG:

So stipulated.

ATTY KOEHLER:

Stipulated.

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Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle

Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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CLIFFORD STOTT, PhD,

witness herein, having been

first duly sworn on oath,

was examined and testified

as follows:

5 E X A M I N A T I O N

6 7 8 9 10

BY ATTY KOEHLER Q.

All right.

Professor Stott, can you please

tell us your name and give us your address? A.

My name's Clifford Stott.

My home address is

39 Dunraven Road, West Kirby, Wirral, on Merseyside, in

the UK.

Professor Stott, could you please tell us what

kind of a -- what kind of a person you are?

do for a living?

What do you

My profession?

Yes.

I'm a professor of social psychology based in

the School of Psychology at Keele University in

Staffordshire in England.

psychology and public order policing, and I specialize

in the analysis of rioting.

23 24 25

I have expertise in crowd

My understanding is that you are also dean for

research; is that right? A.

I am no longer.

I was some while back as a

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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temporary -- you know, it's one of these positions in

academia you populate for a period of time and then step

down.

And I'm not sure if you're still doing this

either, but you were the Director of the Keele Policing

Academy Corporation?

Yes.

Within the university, I -- I am

director of one of our strategic research centers called

the Keele Academic Policing Collaboration which

specializes in police-related research for the

university.

All right.

And I understand that you have

held lectureships and senior lectureships at many

different universities?

universities.

the Department of Crime Science at University College

London and also a visiting professor in the John Glenn

College of Public Affairs at Ohio State University.

Yes, several -- several different At the moment, I'm a visiting fellow in

So the places where you have been visiting

professor or held these lectureships have been in the UK

and out of the UK; is that correct?

Yes, Denmark, Australia, and the UK.

All right.

Yes.

Did you say Ohio?

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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As in American Ohio?

Yeah, in Columbus; Ohio State University.

Okay.

4 5 6 7

And you've also, it looks like, done

quite a bit of writing. A.

Yes.

It's the nature of academia, publish or

perish is the -- is the usual expression. Q.

And it looks like you've been an associate

editor for the British Journal of Social Psychology; is

that right?

Yes.

I've been associate editor for -- for

the British Journal of Social Psychology, and also, if I

recall correctly, the European Journal of Social

Psychology.

and Society.

And I think there was one other, Policing

All right.

And then am I correct that you

have been involved, both as a principal and a

co-investigator, in the research and consultancy

projects for many different organizations and government

organizations?

Yeah, yeah.

I -- in my career, I've probably

managed to attract in excess of 6 million pounds worth.

So what would that be?

research income from various different sources, research

counsels, governments, police forces, in various

different forms, either as research grants or

$7- or $8 million worth of

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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consultancies, but, yeah, multiple projects throughout

my career.

before?

Yes, in the UK.

And were you qualified as an expert?

No.

Was it -- it was a fact --

Yes.

-- testimony?

Yeah.

And then, am I correct -- and let me -- let me

just ask this:

for?

All right.

Have you testified in court

Okay.

How long have you been doing this work

When you say "this work," is -- do you mean as

an academic?

Yes, involving policing.

Involving the study of crowds and policing, I

did my -- I started my PhD in 1989.

since that day.

21 22 23

October 1, 1989, so

And then your teaching, what -- what is the

course that you teach? A.

At the moment, I don't teach anything.

100 percent research-focused.

courses, social cognition, group crises, crowd

I'm

I've taught multiple

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Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle

Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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psychology, mostly method -- research methodologies, a

very specific thing.

really taught -- I mean, I teach occasionally here and

are there on professional development courses and so on,

but I don't do undergraduate teaching anymore.

say, at the moment I'm 100 percent focused on research.

All right.

But at the moment, I -- I haven't

As I

Were you hired by the City of

Seattle following the -- what we call the George Floyd

Black Lives Matter Protests in 2020?

Yes.

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

I was contacted and

13 14 15 16

contracted by Office of the Inspector General. Q.

(By Atty Koehler) All right.

And when you say

"you," was that you personally in your capacity -A.

No.

Sorry, I should -- I should clarify.

also run -- I have a consultancy company as well as have

full-time employment with the University.

technically, it was my company that was commissioned for

which I am the director or a co-director.

partnership with my -- my partner.

So,

I share the

And what is the name of your company?

Crowd and Conflict Management Limited.

And who's your partner?

Her name is Sara Vestergren.

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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that --

Yeah.

-- company?

Yeah.

So the company was retained.

Are there just the two of you that handle

Now, were you

both working on this project or was it just -A.

No, just me, just me.

She's -- she's my

common-law partner, and we just share the -- the company

vehicle if you understand what I mean. Q.

All right.

So my understanding is that you

were employed by the Office of Inspector General, and I

want to now go to --

ATTY GROSHONG:

to the form as to "employed." Q.

I'm just going to object

(By Atty Koehler) All right.

When I say

"employed," what I meant was "your services were

retained by"; is that correct?

You know, to -- you're going to have to

forgive me.

appropriate language.

know.

consultancy work.

can.

what they -- what they called it was a "sentinel event

I'm not particularly clued up on the I mean, I did the work.

I don't

As I say, my company was contracted to undertake If you would like me to clarify, I

It was a project initially involved in -- I think

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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analysis."

Sentinel.

And they approached me initially to help them

to understand how to analyze the evidence that they had

gathered to make sense of what had happened in

relationship to the 2020 protests.

was really a consultancy around methodology, method of

analysis, and helping them to understand the nature of

the evidence that they gathered and to help them to

build an analysis based on the evidence that they --

they had put together.

12 13

So, initially, it

My understanding is that information was

gathered for you; is that correct?

I wouldn't say that, no.

Okay.

Well, you know, to -- information was gathered

for me.

evidence that I was asked to look at and to analyze in

relationship to the 2020 events, they had the

information already.

If you -- if we're talking about the -- the

All right.

They did not gather it for me. So let me -- there's a report that

came out of this which I will just have marked as

Exhibit No. 1, and it's Document No. 190, COS_0842804.

And -- and, at this point, I just want to ask you about

the involvement of some of the people that are listed in

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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the acknowledgments. ATTY GROSHONG:

Counsel, I don't -- I

don't mean to interrupt, but just for exhibit numbering

purposes, we've been numbering exhibits continuously

across depositions.

next in that line rather than -ATTY SULTANI:

7 8

So I think this one should be the

It's been -- it's been

previously marked as Exhibit 190.

ATTY KOEHLER:

Yeah.

ATTY GROSHONG:

Thank you.

ATTY KOEHLER:

If I said Exhibit 1,

misheard.

12 13

it's -- it's Document No. 190.

ATTY GROSHONG:

I may have

Thank you, Karen.

(By Atty Koehler) So let me just ask you.

This

is under the acknowledgments.

"Important contributions were made to the production of

the report by the Seattle Office of the Inspector

General, in particular, Miroslava Meza, Conor McCracken,

and Daniel Hernandez-Aldaco who played central roles in

sampling, organizing, and analyzing data, as well as the

Inspector General Lisa Judge and Deputy IG Amy Tsai who

commissioned the work." Do you know those people?

24 25

It says (as read),

I do.

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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Can you just tell us what they did to help

Yes.

you? They -- they were, essentially, as I --

far as I understand it, but part of a -- a kind of team

of analysts who -- who work for the Inspector General's

Office, and they were assigned to the sentinel event

review.

involved in the day-to-day organizing, gathering, and

analyzing the data for the sentinel event review

process, which I was not directly involved with.

in a sense, peripheral to that.

So they -- they were the people who were

And the -- Miroslava was the line manager of

12 13

that team.

essentially, within that team.

Inspector General.

but I think that covers everything.

basically they -- they work for the Office of the

Inspector General as you, I assume, are aware.

I was,

Daniel and the others were clerks, Lisa was obviously the

I can't quite remember the other, Does it?

But

Yes. And then the other thanks went to a couple

20 21

people from -- a couple citizens, and then the Seattle

Police Department, and then Professor Ed Maguire.

And can you just tell us about

24 25

Professor Maguire's involvement? A.

Yeah.

I think, on occasion, he was -- he

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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joined as a kind of -- what would be the best way to

describe it? -- part of a quality assurance process.

Ed Maguire is a professor at Arizona State University

who also has expertise in -- in the field of crowd

policing, so he -- he -- he got involved on a few

occasions when we had online meetings, yeah.

I have -- I have a long-standing collaborative

relationship with Ed anyway because we're academics in

the same field.

10 11 12

Yeah, but

Are you considered to be a -- one of the

premier experts in this field in the world? A.

Yeah.

I would -- I would -- I would actually

describe myself as "the," but I mean others might want

to contest that.

But, hey, you know?

All right.

So understanding this background,

we -- I know that you wrote, not -- in -- in addition to

this 60-page report, that you did a presentation, and

I'd like to start with the presentation.

Sure.

Before we -- and this will be the next exhibit

number, whatever that is.

But before we show it to you,

I have a couple -- a couple terms I'd like you to define

for us.

Sure.

What is the difference between a protest and a

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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riot? A.

Well, I think that they're both extremely

problematic terms analytically because they're quite --

they're actually quite ambiguous.

I am upset with today's protest -- today's process, I

can express a form of protest.

a large crowd event involving 100,000 people, that is

also a protest.

helps us to clarify what we're talking about, it's quite

ambiguous and quite problematic.

I mean, if I'm -- if

But, equally, if I'm in

So it seems in which the term "protest"

I think the same can be said of the word

11 12

"riot."

Riot itself is also problematic.

I think, in

part, the terminology "riot" has the advantage of

sometimes being defined in law, which gives some clarity

to that term.

scientific point of view, the term "riot" is equally

problematic.

But, equally, from an analytical and

But in common parlance, we often utilize these

18 19

forms of expression to -- to explain certain phenomena

and to describe certain phenomena.

difference?

arguably.

actually clarify and define, I think we'd need to be

slightly more precise in the context within which the

terminology is used and then I might be able to help you

But what's the

I mean, riot is a form of protest,

So, you know, the extent to which we can

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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define it.

I might be able to define it with greater

clarity.

both really, really problematic terms.

them out of context is nigh on impossible --

But my position would be that actually they're And to define

All right.

-- other than to say a riot is a -- is a

7 8

violent form of protest involving collective action. Q.

Okay.

And then the second kind of principles

I'd like you to take us through -- again, before we

start this presentation -- is the evolution of the

scientific understanding of mob -- of -- I guess we'll

call it crowd -- crowd management psychology.

And I'd

like to start out with the concept of -- gosh.

What is

it called?

right term -- mob psychology.

16 17 18

I'm sorry.

Okay.

One moment.

Let me use the

Can you help clarify exactly what it is

that you want to understand about that term? Q.

So as I read your -- again, the 60-page

report, you started off -- do you have your report in

front of you?

I don't, I'm afraid.

If -- if you need it at any time, let us know

23 24 25

No.

and we can put it up. A.

Is it in the -- well, I'm assuming it's in the

exhibit thing that you sent me the other day.

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Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

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It is.

Yeah.

But I think --

-- the title of the file?

It -- it starts with 190, and then it's some

numbers.

And then it says "Crowd Psychology Policing

and Interactional Dynamics."

you, but I think -- let's see if we can do it without

looking at it.

Okay.

Could you --

We can also share it to

So I'm just looking at Page 8, and

historically, you explain the advancements in

understanding crowd psychology and that at the heart of

that understanding is the kind of denouncement of the

old way of thinking --

Yeah.

-- i.e., which is known as mob psychology?

Yeah, yeah.

Could you -- yeah.

Yeah, okay. So that's what I'm asking,

first of all, is can you explain to us what that old way

of understanding was?

Yeah.

So in the context here, using the

expression to describe a form of crowd psychology or

form of theory about crowd psychology that emerged in

the late 19th Century, which still dominates popular

conceptualizations of how we think about, describe, and

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relate to crowd violence.

And the idea here is that

when people gather together in crowds, they suffer a

form of psychological dysfunction such that the normal

processes of conscious control or behavior are

precluded, and that behavior comes to be dominated by

atavistic drives, motivations, emotions, and what we

might call irrationality.

places where normal conscious control or behavior

disappears is a very dominant idea that we refer to as

mob psychology or classical crowd psychology.

So this idea that crowds are

So the psychology that we've developed is --

11 12

is counterposed to that idea, and our -- our work is

a -- is a critique of that idea.

about mob psychology or classic crowd psychology, it's

basically the psychology that was developed in the late

19th Century and most popularly communicated by an

intellectual called Gustave Le Bon and a book called

"The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind" in 1895.

So when we're talking

So as -- as you've researched this further,

you've dispelled the myth.

dispelled kind of this myth of mob psychology, and in

the last 15 years, according to your paper, there's an

alternative approach; is that correct?

24 25

Sort of, yes.

My understanding is you've

I wouldn't say we dismissed it,

because it's around us all the time.

It's continually

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popularized in the media, and so we've certainly come to

dominate the scientific literature with the alternative

theoretical model.

model starts to develop in the early 1980s through the

work of a guy called -- an academic called

Professor Stephen Reicher, and was developed through my

own work because I was a student of -- of Steve Reicher,

a PhD student, through my own work and -- and work of my

close colleague, a guy called John Drury, where we

developed this -- what we refer to as the elaborated

social identity model of -- of crowd behavior.

that's the theoretical model that we now use to inform

policing on a global basis.

And that alternative theoretical

And

Am I correct that one of the hallmarks of that

model involves focusing on how the police behavior

itself affects the crowd?

Yes, you are correct.

All right.

Well, let's go ahead then and look

at and have you take us through the PowerPoint.

And

this will be whatever that next exhibit number is, and

Furhad will put it up on the screen so you don't have to

look for it.

THE STENOGRAPHER:

It's going to be 805.

ATTY KOEHLER:

Thank you so much.

ATTY SULTANI:

And that'll be Bates stamp

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Page 20 1 2

COS_0836154, Stott Presentation. Q.

(By Atty Koehler) Who was this -- who was this

PowerPoint presented to?

presentation to?

Who did you present this

You'll have to forgive me because it's a hell

of a long time ago.

So as the process developed, the

people at the Office of the Inspector General made

decisions about how they were advancing what they called

a sentinel event review process.

increasingly more involved in helping them to make

decisions about how they were managing the sentinel

event process, particularly, the extent to which the

empirical analysis was underpinning and informing it.

But they had, if I recall correctly, a -- a

And I became

kind of panel of people who were stakeholders in various

different organizations within the community and also

within the Seattle Police Department who were taking

part in this sentinel event review process and were

required to interpret and understand the evidence that

the Office of the Inspector General was presenting them

with about what had happened in 2020.

within the sentinel event review process was that they

would focus on chunks of events based around patterns of

behavior and arrest and conflict and violence and so on.

And the decision

And the first chunk, the first part of that

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sentinel event review process, Phase 1, I think they

called it, or something like that, were the first, I

think, four days, four or five days of rioting.

work focused very heavily on analysis of the evidence;

interpretation of the evidence that they had collated.

So part of what I did was to cross-reference the data

and help them to validate their own understanding of

what it was they're interpreting from the data and what

they could safely conclude on the basis of the data that

they put together.

is organized it into timelines, and I was able to

analyze the evidence that they put into those timelines

and help them to understand that they'd actually got the

chronology of the events incorrect based upon the nature

of the data that they had put together.

So my

So, for example, what they had done

So I helped them to build a better, more

accurate interpretation of the data, and through that,

to establish a -- an empirically derived chronology of

the event.

quite a complex process and that requires quite a lot of

work and quite a lot of expertise.

time, they brought me into the process quite late so

they were under pressure to -- to deliver within this

sentinel event review process so they put together these

timelines.

But you need to understand that that is

But at the same

I worked with them to interpret the

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evidence, to validate as best we could the nature of

those timelines, and then this information was presented

to this first panel. As part of the first meeting of that panel, I

4 5

think -- I believe, if I recall correctly, they then

asked me if I would be prepared to provide a

presentation based upon the analysis that we had

effectively collaboratively produced to help the panel

to understand the sequence of events and what the

evidence was telling us about how those events played

themselves out.

for -- is on the 30th, so is that -- it may be the --

this is the major riot on the Saturday, I believe.

it not?

This was the second day.

Yeah.

All right.

And I think that this presentation is

So the next question is this:

Did

you understand that the police -- the police department

did not perform an after-incident analysis, and instead,

adopted the sentinel event reviews subject to points

that the police chief specifically disagreed with by a

second letter?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

I don't even understand

the question.

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(By Atty Koehler) Yeah.

So can you --

Sure.

Yeah.

Did you know -- did you know -- when you were

Did you --

going back and looking at events post-protest/riot, do

you normally see an after-incident report of some type

from the police department?

Not always, no.

Do you sometimes?

It depends on the scale of significance and

consequences, usually.

But I mean, some of the riots

that I've analyzed, the -- the local police force has

produced a -- a report.

standard and inaccurate so I don't really utilize them

very much.

helping inform the timelines, but they're generally not

very good.

Generally, they're pretty poor

I mean, they -- they can be useful in

Well, in this -- in this case, were you aware

that instead of creating a not-very-good document, the

police decided to rely upon the sentinel event review

primarily?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

I wasn't aware of that,

no.

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Page 24 Q.

1 2

(By Atty Koehler) Okay.

For that purpose,

okay. And you were hired to help with what they

3 4

called Wave 1.

Were you hired to help with Wave 2 or

Wave 3 or Wave 4?

No, I don't believe I was.

All right.

So with respect to Wave No. 1 and

your report, we're now looking at the coversheet, and

then let's go to the next page. Now, am I correct that there was a transcript

10 11

so that the words that you said matched to your

PowerPoint?

There was no transcript as far as I'm aware.

Oh, can you look at what would be -- I think,

Exhibit No. 802, and the -- and what it says on it -A.

Oh, yeah. (Unreportable simultaneous crosstalk.)

THE DEPONENT:

Yeah.

I -- I saw that,

yeah.

Yeah, I noticed that the other day.

look -- quick look through last night.

has been produced after the presentation.

I had a

The transcript

(By Atty Koehler) Right.

So you'll notice on these slides, there's

little icons in the bottom right-hand corner because it

was recorded.

So somebody's obviously transcribed the

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recording.

I did not read from the transcript.

Correct. All right.

So if we were to put -- there's an

audio recording, which I don't think that was given to

us.

6 7

It's on the -- it's in the slides.

It's

embedded in the slides, isn't it?

It is?

Well, it's -- I'm sure I saw it as a

PowerPoint.

Didn't I see it was a PowerPoint?

We pulled this PowerPoint.

I don't know if

this -- if there's sound embedded.

the bottom.

remember what -- what happened.

think I had to -- yeah, if I remember correctly, and

forgive me if I've -- I've got this wrong, but I -- I

recorded it in my office.

office to myself and sent them the PowerPoint with the

audio recording so that's why the little audio recording

is in the bottom corner because the PowerPoint itself

has got an audio file, and that's what's been

transcribed.

24 25

Well, that's what those little icons are in Yeah.

I can't -- I'm just trying to I think -- because I

I gave the presentation in my

ATTY KOEHLER:

All right.

Ryan, I'm

going to ask that you supplement with the actual

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PowerPoint not a PDF. ATTY GROSHONG:

Yeah.

If someone could

send me an email post-deposition I'm happy to look into

it. ATTY KOEHLER:

I would like that to be

the -- substituted as this exhibit, the correct video --

I mean, the correct presentation of Professor Stott.

ATTY GROSHONG:

I'm not --

THE DEPONENT:

But I did --

ATTY GROSHONG:

-- sure --

THE DEPONENT:

I did have a brief look at

the transcript.

And as far as I could see, it was a

brief look, but it looked verbatim to me.

ATTY KOEHLER:

Okay.

ATTY GROSHONG:

Karen, I'm not -- I'm

Well, let's --

not -- sorry to interject.

"substituted for this exhibit," but we can talk about

that post-deposition if needed.

I'm not sure what you mean

(By Atty Koehler) Okay.

So just to make the

record clear, we were not given -- we were not given the

actual presentation.

you look at the PDF, which is Exhibit No. 801?

THE STENOGRAPHER:

24 25

We were just given a PDF.

But if

805.

(By Atty Koehler) -- 805.

And if you look at

the May transcript, which will be Exhibit No. 806 --

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Yeah.

-- that was verbatim.

As far as I can see.

absolutely verbatim to me.

I mean, it looks

I'm looking through it now.

All right.

It looks like my language, my parsing, my --

it looks absolutely spot-on.

ATTY SULTANI:

And just for the record,

the 806 exhibit will be COS_0828596.

ATTY GROSHONG:

Thank you, Counsel.

ATTY KOEHLER:

So I would like a

placeholder for Exhibit No. 807, which would be the

previously withheld PowerPoint audio version.

ATTY GROSHONG:

Yeah.

And as I said,

Counsel, I'm happy to talk to you about this after the

deposition.

production sufficiently to say whether it was produced

or not but we're happy to look into it.

I'm not familiar with our document

ATTY KOEHLER:

Perhaps, send an email now

while you're -- while we're -- while we're here so they

can start looking for it.

22 23

(By Atty Koehler) All right. ATTY GROSHONG:

I'm not going to send --

if you want to take a break, Karen, we can do that.

not going to send an email while we're on the record.

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(By Atty Koehler) All right.

So, Professor,

what I don't want to waste your time doing is having you

read the report.

you would be so kind, to take us through your findings.

I'd like you, in summary fashion, if

And so what I'm going to do, if that's okay

to -- and understanding that your report is verbatim,

but I'm going to have Furhad just change -- change slide

to slide and ask you, please, to tell us the

significance of each slide.

report if you wish.

Yes.

And you can refer to your

Well, I'd -- I would hasten some

caution, because if you look at the transcript, you will

see at the -- the end of the document under the section

that's titled "Preliminary Conclusions," it says, "So

looking at the evidence then, it's safe to draw some

preliminary conclusions.

about the kinds of conclusions we draw and recognize

that the analysis here is merely focused on the

behavioral patterns."

And we need to be careful

So effectively what I'm arguing there is that

given where we were and given the time pressures that we

were working to to get us to this point, there was some

lack of clarity about how it was accurate to determine

the data.

Could you please excuse me?

You may have

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heard my doorbell there, and I'm going to -- I,

unfortunately, have to go and answer the door so one

second. (Pause in the proceedings.)

ATTY SULTANI:

Time is now 9:41 a.m.

We'll take a brief pause and go off the record.

(Pause in the proceedings.) ATTY SULTANI:

Time is now 9:43 a.m.

We're back on the record, and I'm going to share my

screen again with the presentation. THE DEPONENT:

So are we ready to go?

(By Atty Koehler) Yes.

Okay.

So I think the -- the structure of this

presentation in its capacity to help clarify what had

happened on the -- on this day is not complete in this

set of slides.

generally correct, but you'll note there's not a

fantastic amount of sort of timing or various things

like that.

I think the -- the sequencing is

And the -- since then, I had the opportunity

to analyze the data in more detail and also had access

to a greater level of detail to put together a more --

what I believe to be a more accurate account of the

sequencing and chronology of -- of the events.

slides here do outline in broad terms and in a way that

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I do still believe is -- is valid, the general patterns.

So --

3 4

Let me then -- let me, sir, then ask the

question as follows.

Mm-hmm.

Instead of giving us conclusions and -- well,

let me strike that.

With respect to this outline, can you tell us

the significant patterns that you believe are valid on a

more-probable-than-not basis based upon your review?

Yeah.

Well, I -- I can try, but, I mean,

obviously, we're dealing with a massively complex set of

events across an extended period of time.

you a rough overview of the pattern and sequencing of

events that begins with a protest outside police

headquarters around the midday period, I believe, if I

remember correctly, culminating around about

1:00 o'clock.

So I can give

Then, there's general collective movement down

towards the Westlake Park area through the downtown.

And it would appear that there were -- there were --

there's some ambiguity about the nature of that

movement, but it -- the evidence does suggest that there

was -- there was a -- there could've been several

different crowds moving through the downtown area, or

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there might have been a larger crowd or it might have

been a combination of both.

firm up around about -- if I recall correctly, around

about 2:15.

I -- I don't have the report in front of me and so on,

but on 4th Avenue as it comes down into the Westlake

Park area.

established by police bike units on -- on the corner of

4th and Pine that filters that flow of protesters into

the Westlake Park area.

But the evidence starts to

And I might have my timings here because

And at that point, a series of cordons are

What I also see is a block down on 5th Avenue

there are also additional police cordons that have been

established on Pine initially, before the intersection

with 5th Avenue, and the crowd abuts up to that cordon.

Now, the interpretation I make based on the behaviors is

that there appears to be a desire among significant

numbers of people to continue marching rather than to

stay in Westlake Park area but they can't because they

can't get through the police cordon.

police cordon, I believe, moves back to behind the

intersection but still blocking Pine, which I believe is

maybe an eastbound or westbound -- I get confused about

which direction's which -- but moves back but also

blocks 5th Avenue in one direction but not the other so

the crowd moves on to that intersection.

But then the

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There is then an altercation between a police

officer and a young Black male where the police officer

pushes the young Black male, says, "Get back," to him

and I believe pushes him.

that, but definitely says aggressively, "Get back."

That then flows into an assertive response by that male

and a few people around him.

blast munition is fired into the intersection and

explodes.

believe, if I recall correctly, another volley of blast

munitions.

13 14

I could be inaccurate on

And then very quickly, a

And then there is a rapid egress, and a -- I

When you say "a rapid egress," what does that

mean? A.

People move away quickly from the area,

predominantly back into -- back in the direction of --

of the Westlake gathering area. Now, you'll see the "fear and flight" slide

17 18

that you just put up there.

That's an interesting piece

of video because I believe it occurs at roughly the same

time.

footage from -- from around here is that there are --

there are clocks.

that street that helps sort of benchmark the time.

And the advantage that we have with the video

There's a street clock in that -- in

But what you see in this video is you hear an

explosion and you -- and you can see people running away

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in fear.

confrontation that is developing on 5th and Pine.

judging by the behavioral reactions and the commentary

of the journalist who's filming that, there is

significant fear in those people.

interpretation that this is some other kind of

explosion, some kind of potentially even terrorist

incident, but it's apparent to me that a lot of people

just don't really know what that explosion is about.

But one thing is clear, they -- they're clearly very,

very frightened and fleeing in fright, I believe, up

4th Avenue.

Now, I believe that's the explosion from the And

Perhaps because the

Now, what -- what then happens is that there

is a lull and the crowd moves back into the intersection

at 5th and Pine.

that's -- that's sort of moving -- moving on a bit.

Where are we?

that's reoccupying the intersection, which I believe is

Slide 12, and -- and a lull.

Now, correspondingly -- and so

So we've gone through that sequence re --

And you can see here that -- this is body-worn

video footage that I had access to.

You can see several

protesters remonstrating with the police about what

they -- what they have just experienced and trying to --

to get some kind of interaction, some kind of

explanation, some kind of communication from the police.

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But what -- what is important to me analytically and

empirically is that the police don't say anything.

police officers just are not saying anything at all.

They're just standing there.

de-escalate the situation.

communicate with people.

there in a corner in a cordon with these people trying

to get some kind of explanation out, which is an

incredibly important point in terms of the nature of

crowd psychology and what we know about effective crowd

policing which is characterized by good dialogue.

The

They're not trying to

They're simply just standing

So I highlight it here because where -- where

I'm looking at all of the evidence around the video

footage and everything else, what seemed to be apparent

to me and has confirmed to be apparent to me through

subsequent analysis is that there was no capability for

the police to -- to utilize dialogue in this period of

time to help de-escalate the situation.

they didn't deploy tactics of dialogue to help them

de-escalate the situation at this critical juncture.

we've seen an escalation, but then we'd seen a lull

or -- or a de-escalation, and there's no -- no

communication going on.

And they --

Now, I think what -- what's missing here is

the subsequent evidence that I was able to unpack from

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later analysis, which is that, in parallel to this,

there are also incidents developing on 4th and Olive --

around 4th and Olive, so -- so the next block down.

4th and Pine and 4th and Olive, there are paralinked

interactions which I believe are entirely independent,

and that those interactions are also playing an

important role in the dynamics of escalation.

involve two separate cordons that were created by -- by

a different squad and I believe also a different

lieutenant commander, different squad commander who is

making decisions about the situation that they were

experiencing in 4th Avenue that were being made, taken,

and evolving independently from one another.

one thing that was also apparent is that communication

in commander control was also breaking down at this

point.

And they

Because

So this is not present in this set of slides,

17 18

but is massively significant in understanding what's

going on and why the situation is developing in the way

that it is.

I can't talk about that.

So if we're referring just to these slides,

I believe we were talking about --

I can if you want me to, but you asked me to

24 25

talk you through the slides. Q.

Yes.

If we can take a pause here and take

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away the slide just for this -- we're going to go back

to it.

The incident that you're talking about, I

believe, is around Page 38 of your report, which is

Exhibit No. 190.

you're -- you're talking about the -- the two different

situations.

Yeah.

And here's one of my questions.

And you're talking -- and I believe

you -- you've used a word, "cordon."

explain for us what is a cordon?

Okay.

First of all,

Can you just

So in -- in simple terms, a cordon is

generally a line of police officers who stand facing in

the same direction in order to manage movement.

you -- you basically get two types of cordon, you get

what's called a filter cordon and an absolute cordon.

So sometimes you'll see police officers standing in a

line formation with small gaps between them and they

still let people move between them, and that's called a

filter cordon.

together so there's no gap between them and utilize the

threat of or actual force to prevent people moving past

them, that's usually referred to as an absolute cordon.

24 25

And then if they close ranks and stand

Now, how those are exercised and created varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.

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Seattle context, these bike teams or bike units, or

however they're referred to, are the norm for how

they -- they create these cordons.

one of the characteristics of these bike squads and why

they've become relatively popular in the US context is

because the officers can use the bikes as a kind of

almost fence-like structure to help them exercise these

cordons.

think it was bike officers on 4th, but on 5th Avenue, I

think they're using what are commonly referred to in the

US context as mobile field forces.

field forces don't deploy with bikes, they deploy with

weaponry and protective equipment.

14 15 16 17

And -- and that's

But in this particular, on 5th Avenue -- I

And these mobile

So, similarly, I'd like you to define the word

"kettling" for us. A.

I -- again, you know, I don't use that term.

I use the term "containment."

Okay.

So, for me, kettling is basically the tactic

of containment.

What happens is that people tend to use

kettling when containment goes on for a significant

period of time.

basic -- basically, public order policing revolves

around various different forms of tactical intervention

that are containment, dispersal, arrest.

But ultimately, it's containment.

That's --

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All right.

-- that's pretty much it.

So at page -- at the bottom of Page 37 through

3 4

That's what they

do.

the top of Page 38, you describe an impromptu meeting

where the command at 4th Avenue states that -- that an

unlawful -- an unlawful assembly is going to be

declared. And then I want to read you this statement,

9 10

quote, "We are going to push these people this way

(gesticulating with an arcing motion toward Westlake

Park, Pine Street, and 5th Avenue).

people south again.

I don't care if there is a

bottleneck on 5th.

We will get them through.

just start getting them off, so get your guys ready to

do that," end of quote.

Start pushing

We will

Yeah.

What is that describing?

It's describing video data that shows the --

who I believe to be the incident commander having an

impromptu conference with several other police officers

who I believe to be squad leaders or lieutenants or -- I

am not sure.

policing is -- is pretty -- very opaque and needs a lot

of modernization.

I mean, the command structure in American

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Page 39 But the guy doing the talking I believe to be

1 2

the incident commander would make him the senior

commander involved in the policing operation, and he's

having a conference with subordinates.

from what he says that he has already taken the decision

that he is going to move towards utilizing his resources

to enact a dispersal of the entire crowd.

On an expedited basis?

Sorry, on an -- on a?

Expedited basis.

And it's evident

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

What do you mean

"expedited"?

(By Atty Koehler) Not a leisurely -- is it --

am I correct, was it a leisurely dispersal that he was

intending or a more active dispersal?

ATTY GROSHONG:

18 19

Oh -- well, I have no idea.

Form and foundation.

(By Atty Koehler) Okay.

Within minutes of him

making that announcement, can you describe what happened

with respect to the protest at 4th Avenue and Pine?

Yeah.

An individual was seeking to move

through the cordon that had been placed on 4th Avenue,

and that escalated into a situation where a -- I think

they're called either 20 mill. or 40 mill. ammunition

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was fired at this guy.

confrontation basically just on that -- on that cordon.

An individual tried to get out of the cordon; had been

prevented from doing so.

situation where the officer -- an officer walked over

and decided that it was appropriate to fire a weapon at

him, which he did, and the individual moved away.

So it was -- there was a

That had escalated into a

In your opinion -- and, again, when I ask for

your opinion, can we agree that all your opinions that

you're giving here are -- are on the basis of your

scientific background on a more-probable-than-not basis

unless you tell us otherwise?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

What -- I'm -- did you ask

me a question?

I mean --

(By Atty Koehler) Oh, yes.

-- clarifying that you were going to ask me

for my opinion and I should understand the nature of my

opinion, but you didn't actually ask me anything.

Yeah.

My question is:

Whenever I ask for

your opinion and whenever you're testifying about your

opinion, do you agree that that is on the basis of more

probable than not within your scientific field?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Same objections.

THE DEPONENT:

Well, no, I wouldn't agree

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with that because it depends on the context and it

depends what you're asking me and it depends on what my

opinion is about.

4 5

(By Atty Koehler) Okay.

questions every single time.

Then I'll ask the

Okay?

Okay.

If I need -- if I need to clarify.

Yup.

Did the actions of the police that you've just

described on a more-probable-than-not basis influence

the crowd psychology -ATTY GROSHONG:

12 13

(By Atty Koehler) -- at that point?

14 15

Object to the --

ATTY GROSHONG:

Sorry.

Object to the

THE DEPONENT:

It's -- you've asked me a

form.

16 17

question that's impossible to answer.

Did the police --

well, do you mean every single police officer?

mean the police as a whole?

involving George Floyd and -- and other police actions

in other states and other cities?

how people were interpreting their relationship to the

police in that situation?

individual act of the officer that you've just been

referring to?

Do you

Do you mean the situation

Did they feed into

Or do you mean this specific

So, again, the -- the question is so

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ambiguous it's effectively impossible to answer. Q.

(By Atty Koehler) And that's a good objection.

And when I meant "the police," I meant the officer.

just described an incident.

Okay.

The officer --

-- you're asking me:

You

So --

Did the action of that

individual officer affect the psychology of the crowd?

Yes.

The answer would have to be no.

Okay.

Did the decision to install cordons and

forcefully move protesters, on a more-probable-than-not

basis, by the Seattle Police change the psychology of

the crowd?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object --

THE DEPONENT:

The decision of the -- of

the police commander to disperse the crowd, did that

decision influence the behavior of the crowd?

(By Atty Koehler) Yes.

No.

Okay.

What, in your opinion, influenced the

behavior of the crowd in this circumstance?

Multiple factors --

Tell us what those --

-- of which policing was one of them.

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Okay.

But as I was trying to explain earlier on is

that there's a general chronology and sequencing to the

event that they're evolving over time and feeding into a

pattern of interactions that is shaping the social

context from which forms of crowd psychology are

evolving.

two critically important things going on.

of interactions between police and protesters on 5th and

Pine, and the other is a set of interactions between

police and protesters on -- on 4th Avenue.

two cordons on 4th Avenue, one facing north -- does it

run north and south or east and west?

think it's north/south, but it effects -- there are two

cordons trying to -- one is preventing protesters

getting into Westlake Park and one is preventing them

coming out.

And the -- at that particular time, there are One is a set

There were

I forget.

The interaction that you've just described

played a role in shaping the interactions between

protesters and the police in that particular vicinity.

The intervention by the police officer pushed that

individual away, but the fact that the conflict had

occurred at the point at which the commander was making

decisions about how to continue his tactical

interventions and was considering a collective

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dispersal, I think, validated the growing assumption

within the police commanders that they were dealing with

a violent and disorderly crowd. But contrastingly, at that point, there had

4 5

actually been very little conflict at all; only two

circumstances where conflict of any serious nature I

could find.

Pine which had already calmed, and the incident

involving the firing of the munitions on 4th Avenue.

Those are the only two incidents of any form of violent

confrontation that I've been able to determine that

happened before that decision was made.

It's that initial interaction on 5th and

Now, if you look at the nature of the decision

13 14

as well, that's critically important because, at that

point, the senior police commander had defined the

situation as a riot.

decision I can only determine were the two incidents

that we have been able to -- to find.

which you can define a crowd of probably in excess of

3,000 people at a minimum as a riot when two incidents

of confrontation involving essentially two individuals

is a riot is, I think, a very, very questionable

decision.

Now, on what basis he made that

And the extent to

All right.

However, if I may just add another point.

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That was a decision.

The decision did not actually flow

into any form of action, and that's a critical thing

too.

though he decided to disperse the crowd, that decision

bear -- bore no relationship to what then subsequently

happened.

and importantly, the senior police commander, was

interpreting the situation.

It didn't really make any difference, because even

It was simply a reflection of how the police,

But what we also need to understand, there was

very little communication going on, in particular, with

the unit that was on 5th and Pine.

had broken down by that point as far as I can work out.

So effectively the police units were starting to act

autonomously because commander control was beginning to

break down.

It was a very complex, challenging

situation.

So the decision that the officer made, I

don't believe affected really then subsequently what

happened in terms of police behavior.

All right.

The communication

What is -- what are your opinions,

on a more-probable-than-not basis, of -- of what

happened that day? ATTY GROSHONG:

22 23 24 25

Object to the form.

(By Atty Koehler) Should we go back to your --

should we go back to your PowerPoint -ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form,

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and --

just tell us?

(By Atty Koehler) -- or -- or do you want to

ATTY GROSHONG:

4 5

Sorry, Karen.

I don't

mean to cut you off. Object to the form.

And if I could just

have a standing objection that Professor Stott has not

been disclosed as an expert in this case.

ATTY KOEHLER:

Limited to our disclosure.

That is just lawyer speak. THE DEPONENT:

Yeah, okay.

know when you want me to say anything.

say nothing.

So let me

Until then, I'll

(By Atty Koehler) What are your opinions, on a

more-probable-than-not basis, with respect to the Wave 1

work that you did?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

So can you just clarify

for me -- you know, I'm really sorry about this, but

please bear with me because you're obviously more

skilled in this territory than I am in relationship to

how these depositions work.

you say "objection," do I shut up? ATTY KOEHLER:

24 25

for the court.

But could you clarify, when

No.

He's just doing that

And he just made a standing objection,

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meaning he's preserved his objection but then he

couldn't help himself but object again.

THE DEPONENT:

Okay.

ATTY GROSHONG:

My objection was actually

on a different basis, Professor.

But I agree with

Ms. Koehler that when I'm making my objections, it's

just for the record.

THE DEPONENT:

Okay.

ATTY GROSHONG:

As soon as I'm done

making them, you can answer Ms. Koehler's --

THE DEPONENT:

Okay.

ATTY GROSHONG:

-- question.

THE DEPONENT:

Okay.

Thank you for the

clarification.

coming at timely points because I struggle with the

questions as well, but --

17 18

I do agree that your objections are

ATTY GROSHONG:

I appreciate that, sir.

THE DEPONENT:

Let -- let me -- I've

Thank you.

19 20

been -- and if I can clarify, I think -- I think the

question you just asked me, again, is one of those

impossible questions to answer.

what happened there?

know, I mean, what --

What's my opinions in

I mean, have we got a week?

(By Atty Koehler) All right.

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specific --

That's fine.

-- about what you want me to give an opinion

All right.

Was the weather nice?

You'd need -- you really need to be much more

on.

know?

if you want me to answer the questions.

Yeah.

Yeah, it was a bit, you

Let's -- let's -- please give me clarity

All right.

Am I correct that -- well, let me

ask you this question.

In your opinion, again on a

more-probable-than-not basis, in your analysis, did the

Seattle Police Department engage in appropriate

de-escalation technique?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

Again, it's -- it's --

it's a very difficult question to answer, but what I can

say is that, in my opinion, the Seattle Police

Department did not utilize dialogue as a de-escalation

tool at critical junctures.

capacity to exercise dialogue, then it's very likely

that the pattern of events would've evolved in a

fundamentally different way and that they would not have

experienced the rioting that took place on that day.

And had they had the

(By Atty Koehler) And what is the basis for

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that statement for your conclusions?

Decades of research.

Am I correct that there was at least one

incident where kind of ad hoc de-escalation occurred

when two officers took a knee but there was no systemic

de-escalation technique that followed?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

Did you say "on this day"?

(By Atty Koehler) I believe it happened on the

It was not on this day.

It happened on, I believe, the fourth day.

Yeah.

9 10

4th.

Well, it was on the Monday, I believe.

Yeah, and it was in a different part of the city.

Okay.

Let me ask the question this way.

Mm-hmm.

When we talk about de-escalation, was the

police action -- the two -- two police officers' actions

in taking a knee in solidarity with the protesters a

form of de-escalation?

It -- my opinion is, yes, that would've played

a significantly important role in helping to de-escalate

what were increasingly escalating and tense

interactional dynamics.

And was that born out by the crowd's response

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to that gesture by the police?

I believe it was.

Okay.

Were the police able to capitalize on

that gesture by two officers?

I don't believe they were.

And can you tell us what they could have done

to foster more de-escalation?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Form.

THE DEPONENT:

Yes.

And that is a core

recommendation that I have subsequently gone on to make

for them and that they have subsequently reformed to

develop, and that's the -- you may be familiar with the

public order engagement team or P.O.E.T.s.

the -- the standard operating procedure that we have

been developing with police forces across the world to

try to facilitate de-escalation in those kinds of

contexts are these dedicated units of dialogue officers

that they did not have available to them at that time,

so, therefore, were not able to utilize, and, therefore,

were not able to unlock de-escalation capability at

critical junctures.

The -- the -- yeah.

So -- but

And I think that

that was still something that could've been achieved

even as late as the Monday, but by -- by that time, it

was already an increasingly polarized situation.

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lot had gone wrong, but there -- there were -- there

were opportunities on the Sunday, there were

opportunities on the Monday, and that was as far as the

analysis went.

the -- the major escalations on Saturday that I also

think they could've utilized but were not in a position

to do it because they didn't have the resources

necessary to -- to do it.

because they -- they had not -- they didn't have the

right conceptual framework in place for crowd

management.

But there were opportunities before

And, in part, that was

(By Atty Koehler) My understanding is that

their primary initial method of engaging the crowds was

to use the bicycle police as meet-and-greet type of

engagement.

Is that correct?

Yes.

That -- that's the terminology and the

background philosophy.

There's a -- there's a pattern.

There's basically a history to the evolution of the bike

squads that involves -- I believe it's the Vancouver

Police Department that were one of the first in the US

context to develop that form of tactical intervention.

These are some of the early developments that

have grown from my -- my work, and they were partly

because there was a UK police officer who was formally

from West Midlands Police who went to Vancouver to work

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and took a lot of the UK policing philosophies that had,

by that time, begun to incorporate our crowd psychology

to drive their reforms.

framework was used to help rationalize and underpin the

development of the bike squads in Vancouver.

learning then came across the border and started to

inform developments in Seattle, and it's through that

that you saw the evolution of the bike squads.

And that -- that conceptual

That

And if you look through some of their earlier

9 10

reports that underpinned the rationalization for the

bike squads, you'll see our theory, ESIM theory, is in

there.

use it to have this so-called "meet-and-greet

philosophy," which is, in part, a kind of de-escalatory

dialogue capability.

properly understood the way that this needs to work,

they were also drawing on crowd theory, classical mob

psychology, such that if a crowd was defined as being

disorderly, all of the de-escalation stuff, all of that

capability would just go.

forces, mobile field forces, and move into a kind of

use-of-force mode that ran the danger of -- of creating

escalatory dynamics.

24 25

So they were aware of the theory, and they did

But because they hadn't really

And then them go in with FFF

And to a large extent, I think that that lies at the heart of went -- what went wrong on -- on the

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30th and indeed on the 29th.

And then they -- it just

starts to feed in, and it -- it changes the nature of --

of the social identities that are driving crowd action

in that context.

with all of this is:

murder of George Floyd translate into violent

confrontation against the police in Seattle?

transitional dynamics that shifted that identity involve

police use of force.

nature of crowd dynamics.

Because the -- the central question Why did an incident involving the

That's how it works.

And the

That's the

So part of the reason for that is because of

11 12

the dynamics of -- of legitimacy and power and how crowd

psychology works.

critically important that police forces have the

capability for dialogue to manage these dynamics in a

different way that don't lead inadvertently to these

transitions.

thing.

this is how interactional dynamics work in crowd events.

And if police forces understand that and that they shape

their strategy and tactics on that basis, it means two

things:

empirically we know that works, and -- and, two, you

know, it -- it reduces the capability of -- of

inadvertently creating the disorder.

And that -- and that's why it's so

I mean, it's not -- it's not a culture

People aren't doing it deliberately.

It's just

One, they develop dialogue capability because

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Page 54 Sorry, I'm -- yeah.

1 2

Thank you so much.

ATTY GROSHONG:

3 4

It's okay.

Counsel, are we going to

reach a good time for a break soon? THE DEPONENT:

I mean, I -- it may be

midmorning to you, but it's -- I haven't even eaten yet.

So, I mean, a break would bring me back very late in the

evening, and I wouldn't necessarily be happy with that.

I think if we're going to have a break and you need to

speak to me more, then we're going to unfortunately have

to rearrange and think about coming back together at a

more convenient time. ATTY GROSHONG:

I just need about five

minutes, Professor.

how she intends to proceed with the deposition.

I'd otherwise defer to counsel on

(By Atty Koehler) Professor, we want to be

sensitive to you.

you go?

What can we -- how much longer can

Well, I could -- I could -- yeah, if you go on

for a -- go on for a while, five minutes is fine.

Sorry, I didn't realize that.

know --

I thought you meant, you

ATTY GROSHONG:

Perfectly fine.

THE DEPONENT:

Yeah.

So five -- and I

can carry on for another half an hour, 45 minutes, an

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hour at most. ATTY KOEHLER:

Okay.

Let's try to --

let's see how we do.

Maybe you can grab a snack, and

we'll come back at -- Furhad is going to let us off and

we'll take a five-minute break. (Unreportable simultaneous crosstalk.)

ATTY GROSHONG:

Before we -- before we go

off, I just want to note that the audio files associated

with Professor Stott's PowerPoint that we discussed

earlier in the deposition were produced to plaintiffs'

counsel on May 27, 2022.

I'll send the Bates numbers to

Furhad during the break.

Counsel's suggestion that

these materials were withheld was incorrect.

ATTY SULTANI:

just not the PowerPoint, Ryan. Time is now 10:23 a.m.

16 17

We have the audio file,

We're going off

the record.

(A break was taken from

10:23 a.m. ATTY SULTANI:

20 21

10:30 a.m.

To 10:30 a.m.)

Sorry.

Time is now

We're going back on the record.

(By Atty Koehler) All right.

Professor Stott,

I'm going to try to get this finished in the time frame

that you gave us.

Can you tell us what your findings were

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regarding the use of force that you saw compared to the

provocation that generated the use of force on -- on --

during this time period of Wave 1?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

Can you define specific

instances of use of force that you're asking me to

comment on?

(By Atty Koehler) Sure.

If we went to Page 36

of your report.

Okay.

We're now back to 5th Avenue.

Yeah.

And the officers are pushing a number of young

and Black protesters --

Yeah.

-- who -- who asked them to, "Don't touch me,"

and then -- there are then -- then chemical sprays,

baton, and bikes were then deployed.

Yeah.

Can you please explain to us your opinion

21 22 23 24 25

about that interchange? ATTY GROSHONG:

Objection to form and

misstates facts as to "deployed." THE DEPONENT:

In -- in my opinion, the

move to the use of chemical weapons, chemical spray, was

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very quick.

tactical communicated verbal interaction to relatively

high-level use of force occurs in a few seconds, and

that is also in a densely crowded situation where other

people are directly affected by these munitions who are

merely peacefully protesting.

sorts of issues that are problematic for various

different reasons.

From -- from verbal tactical -- tactical --

I think that raises all

(By Atty Koehler) All right.

Were there

instances of one -- one water bottle being tossed at the

police and beginning -- beginning a response?

Subsequent to the use of -- of blast

munitions.

important that the chronology is properly understood --

is that you see the initial interaction, you then see a

very rapid escalation including the indiscriminate use

of force if one defines the blast munitions as a use of

force.

emerging from the crowd.

is invariantly consistent with the dynamics through

which collective violence can develop.

multiple -- multiple studies we've done -- we've done on

riots.

collective conflict flows after indiscriminate police

use of force.

So there's a sequence of events -- and it's

After which, you then start to see conflict That pattern is consistent --

And I've seen

You get that sequence of interaction that the

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opinion?

And is that what happened here in your

It is. ATTY GROSHONG:

4 5

Form.

(By Atty Koehler) Did the police characterize

the crowd as riotous even when it was entirely peaceful?

And I'm looking at your report, Pages 47 and 50. ATTY GROSHONG:

Counsel, you're asking

specifically about the incidents described on those

pages?

12 13 14 15

(By Atty Koehler) We're talking again about 4th

and 5th Avenue, and this is Monday, June 1st. A.

So what -- what -- can you clarify exactly

what you're asking me about about -Q.

Yes.

On Monday, June 1st, before there were

altercations, did you note by viewing all the video

footage that the crowds were overwhelmingly and entirely

peaceful?

Do I say that in the report?

Did you conclude that?

Does it say that in the report?

Yes.

That's why I -- I called your attention

to Page 47, which would be Paragraph No. 3.

Okay.

And then it's again at Page 48, the second

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paragraph to the end. A.

Okay.

So, again, the video footage shows the

situation to be overwhelmingly and entirely peaceful,

following which the crowd gathered again on 4th Avenue. So please forgive me.

Just to -- you're

referring me to -- to a report I wrote a long time ago.

So Monday, 4th of June, I mean, if I say it in the

report, then I've said it in the report.

is it that you want me to say now?

What -- what

I just wanted to confirm that --

Yeah.

-- during this time period, June -- June 1, by

sometime around 5:00 o'clock, that the video footage was

showing a crowd that was overwhelmingly and entirely

peaceful.

Yeah.

Well, I think what you're asking me,

perhaps, if I might reinterpret is am I still prepared

to stand by what I have written in the report?

Yes.

And the argument -- and my answer to that

question is:

anything to contradict the analysis that I put together

in that report, and I stand behind every single word of

it, 100 percent.

Yes, entirely.

Okay.

I've -- I've not seen

And despite the peaceful nature of the

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protests, same paragraph, were there a line of officers

that could be seen physically pushing protesters in the

direction they were already walking?

4 5 6

If that's what it says in the report, then

Okay.

yes. Did you -- can you explain to us the

psychology involved when a crowd is overwhelmingly

peaceful but the police perceive them as being riotous?

How can that happen?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

Again, it's a very

difficult question to answer, I'm afraid.

you -- what you're asking me to -- to kind of take you

through is really sort of the complex account of -- of

how crowd psychology evolves over time.

that one thing that's important to understand is that

the events on Monday were informed by events on Sunday

and events on Saturday and events on Friday.

I think

And I think

So part of the danger here is that what

often happens is that crowd events are seen in isolation

and decontextualized, but the psychology that drives

collective behavior in crowds is not.

identity and the relationships, they were evolving over

time so a lot of the psychology that crowd participants

take into their interactions with police and a lot of

So the -- the

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the psychology that police take into their interactions

with crowd participants are informed by prior

interactions.

is operating in this context is evolving over time as a

function of the way in which these groups have

interacted historically over the past few days.

So standing at the barriers, the

So the way in which the -- the psychology

protesters are very likely to have been expecting the

police to be violent and aggressive; hence, wearing of

gas masks, carrying of shields, and so on.

and vice versa, the police now have had, effectively,

two days of violent conflict.

those violent conflict that they've experienced in the

city is informing their understanding about the

likelihood of violence from protesters, which is

reinforced by the fact that lots of them are wearing

masks and carrying shields, which -- which looks violent

and confrontational.

But equally,

And on Saturday some of

So the psychology is -- is evolving over

time as a function of the interactions and is escalating

and escalating and escalating, and there's very little

capability on either side to -- to de-escalate the

situation.

that you've leveraged there for me.

So that's the best I can answer the question

(By Atty Koehler) A curfew order was given with

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15 minutes' notice before it was executed.

Is that a

sufficient amount of time to disperse a crowd?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Form.

THE DEPONENT:

Again, it -- it depends on

the context, depends on the situation, all those kinds

of things.

the report, or at least I try to, that there are some

fundamental problems here about how the law is operating

and framing decision-makings and rights.

already touched on this through the use of the term

"riot" and the decision-making of the officer in command

on -- on the Saturday, that there are some fundamental

contradictions between state law and the constitution in

the American context.

But I think I also make very, very clear in

So we've

If you have a constitutional right to

15 16

assemble and express your views peacefully, how can it

be illegal to assemble?

police to define a peaceful assembly as unlawful and use

that law to enact use of force against the crowd.

is a fundamental and objective contradiction in law that

is feeding into how that event is playing itself out.

And this is vitally important if you want to get to a

point where you want to stop these things from happening

in the future.

And, yet, state law allows the

So what -- the interpretations, the

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psychology at work, the legitimacy that protesters feel

that they have to assemble and express their frustration

about the way that they're being treated by the police

and that others are being treated by the police are also

correspondingly feeding into a situation where police

believe that they have the legitimate right to enforce

the law, so you get this pattern of interaction that is

feeding into why that riot is evolving and developing.

And that's -- that's really important to understand

about the psychology through which this is all playing

itself out.

(By Atty Koehler) Just one second.

So, I mean, at the end of the day, you know,

defining -- the use of the law to define an assembly as

unlawful, whether it is 15 minutes, 15 seconds, or 15

nanoseconds would probably make very little difference

given the fundamental contradiction of the use of that

law in the American context.

The police gave warnings to the people in the

crowd.

crowd could hear the warnings?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

I certainly analyzed that

Did you determine whether the people in the

question.

I didn't have any data from people in the

crowd, so it's -- you know, it's a limited form of

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analysis.

But, certainly, the video footage that I

viewed, as far as I'm aware, given the limited nature of

the data that I had access to, was some considerable

distance away from the crowd.

my opinion of my interpretation of that is that, at the

very least, it would've been very, very difficult for

people in the crowd at that point, if we're talking on

the Monday --

(By Atty Koehler) Yes.

-- to have heard that announcement.

Okay.

And my personal opinion,

Am I correct, again, on that -- during

the same time period that there -- that you found no

evidence of direct physical conflict or sustained

missile throwing at the police before the police

inter- -- intervened?

On the barriers on the 11th near the precinct.

Yes.

Yes, that's correct.

Okay.

That doesn't -- I mean, can I just clarify?

All right.

Moving quick here.

That doesn't mean to say it hadn't taken place.

Yes.

But what from you examined --

The evidence I saw, I did not see any evidence

of violent confrontation that had occurred before the

incidents in question.

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All right.

Am I correct that from what you

saw that was gathered by the process that you earlier

managed --

Okay.

-- or earlier described, that the

indiscriminate use of force deployed by the police

impacted those who committed no crimes and who were

peaceful protesters?

Yes.

And, indeed, the rapid deployment of

munitions and the intensity of that deployment was

really quite remarkable.

level of use of force by any police force.

In the world.

In the --

I -- very rare I've seen that

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object --

THE DEPONENT:

-- world.

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

ATTY KOEHLER:

I -- I wanted him to make

sure he got his answer.

(By Atty Koehler) In the world.

Certainly, yes.

On the -- on the scale --

well, let me clarify.

It's probably better to say I've

never seen that level of intensity of use of munitions

in as confined a geographical location in any other

democratic state.

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Am I correct that it is your opinion that the

Seattle Police Department was locked into a mind --

mindset misinterpreting peaceful protests as mere

continuance of a previous day's violence?

And I wrote that in the report, do I not?

Yes.

Yes, and I stick by that.

Is it your opinion, again, that crowd police

interactions would shape the underlying motivation and

identity uniting protests and drove further protests

beyond George Floyd to more of a police-versus-us

mentality?

Yes, that's correct.

All right.

If you can give me two minutes, I

just want to check with Furhad.

finished.

I think I might be

All right? ATTY GROSHONG:

Professor --

Professor Stott, just to manage your expectations of how

this is going to go, sir, I'm going to have questions of

my own once Counsel's finished.

ATTY KOEHLER:

Yes.

THE DEPONENT:

Okay.

ATTY KOEHLER:

And if -- if we can't get

to those, I think you've -- you gave us up to a maximum

of 45 minutes.

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THE DEPONENT:

get -- get through the order of business.

ATTY SULTANI:

All right.

THE DEPONENT:

I'm helping that ship to

ATTY KOEHLER:

All right.

ATTY SULTANI:

Time is now 10:49 a.m.

We're going off the record.

No, it's fine.

Let's just

shore. Okay.

(A break was taken from

10:49 a.m. to 10:50 a.m.) ATTY SULTANI:

11 12

Time is now 10:50 a.m.

We're back on the record. ATTY KOEHLER:

Thank you.

I have no further

questions.

Well, I might after him, but it

would be very, very, very brief if at all.

16 E X A M I N A T I O N

17 18 19

BY ATTY GROSHONG Q.

Mr. Stott, good evening.

Morning for us, but

evening for you, and -- and thank you for bearing with

us thus far.

name's Ryan Groshong.

representing the City of Seattle in this matter.

don't expect that my questions will last as long as

Ms. Koehler's will, but nonetheless, appreciate you

We did introductions earlier, but my I'm one of the attorneys

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bearing with us as I know it's getting later in the day

where you are, so thank you.

Thank you.

When were you first retained by OIG to assist

with the sentinel event review process?

I can't recall the exact dates, I'm afraid.

I'm sorry.

That's perfectly fine.

Is it -- is it fair to

assume that your retention occurred sometime after the

summer of 2020 protests?

Yes.

Using your -- the date of your report to the

OIG of May 13, 2022, as -- as sort of an estimating

point, are you able to estimate how long prior to the

publication of that report you were retained by OIG?

Probably, it could be up to a year.

probably can find out if you give me a moment.

seeing whether I've got some... Yeah.

19 20

I'm just

So I'm looking at the -- the first

invoice that I sent them was in February 2021.

Okay.

Yeah.

I -- I

So -- and I think that just looking --

yeah, so December 2020.

Okay.

So that's when I started work with them,

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December 2020.

time ago.

3 4

Sorry.

Yeah.

Forgive me.

It was such a long

That's -- that's perfectly fine.

appreciate that. Prior to your retention by OIG in December

5 6

of 2020, to the best of your knowledge, had you ever had

any contact of any kind with anyone associated with the

Seattle Police Department?

No, not to my knowledge.

Have you ever personally attended a protest in

Seattle?

No.

Have you been retained by any other police

department in the United States of America to -- or,

strike that.

departments.

I shouldn't just ask about police

Have you been retained by any other

governmental agency of any kind in the United States of

America to conduct a similar type of analysis to what

you were retained to conduct for OIG here?

Within the US?

Yes, sir.

No.

24 25

This was my first US contract of this

type. Q.

Do you have any personal knowledge regarding

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the training programs of any police department in the

United States other than what's described in your report

with respect to the Seattle Police Department?

Yes.

What is that knowledge, sir?

I've done analysis of the training in New York

for New York Police Department.

training in federal protection services and done

background academic research in relationship to police

training in the UK prior to -- to my work in -- in

Seattle.

Okay.

Also, now familiar with

Outside of NYPD and the Federal

Protective Service, do you have any personal knowledge

regarding the training programs of any police department

in the United States specifically?

Not that I'm aware of, no.

Your work with the NYPD, when was that?

Hmm, it wasn't with the NYPD.

It was with the

Attorney General, I believe.

New York Police Department to court in quite probably a

similar process to this.

analyze training material for them, but that would've

been subsequent to the work that I was doing with the

OIG; certainly subsequent to the start of that work.

They were taking the

And I was commissioned to

Okay.

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Let's have a look at that one. So that was -- that was a year later.

invoiced them in December 2021, so probably would've

been around about October time, October 2021.

And the -- the analysis that you performed

relating to the NYPD, was that regarding their crowd

management training programs?

8 9 10

Yes.

So the attorney general sent me all of

their training material and asked me to review it. Q.

What conclusions, if any -- obviously, at a

very high level -- did you draw with respect to the

NYPD's training programs around crowd management?

Similar to those that I've -- I've drawn in

relationship to Seattle, they heavily rely on

use-of-force methodologies.

policies in relationship to crowd management are

actually applied from one-to-one interactions, so

particularly, sort of use of force and so on.

their kind of conceptual framework and how they think

about de-escalation and so on is -- is primarily derived

from use of firearms in relationship to one-to-one

interactions.

foundation is still drawing on mob psychology and

classical crowd psychology, which seems to be a

consistent and systematic problem in the US context.

Also, a lot of their

Their --

And, in particular, their conceptual

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Is there a police department in the United

States that you are aware of that you believe conducts

training programs that are consistent with the --

hopefully, I get the acronym right here -- the ESIM

crowd psychology theory that you outlined in your report

for the OIG?

I'm not directly aware of any, no.

I --

although, having said that, of course the Seattle Police

Department does draw on the theory and has drawn on the

theory for some -- quite some considerable time, I

believe, at the -- the review of their documentation.

So the Seattle Police Department draws in it; I wouldn't

be at all surprised if there are other police forces in

the US context that are utilizing it but I'm not

directly aware of them.

Okay.

In your review of NYPD materials, were

they drawing on ESIM theory in their training programs

to the extent that you were able to make that

determination?

Not that I recall, no.

I believe you also said that you were engaged

to do some work for the Federal Protective Service.

When --

Yes.

-- did that engagement occur approximately?

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That -- that was later in the -- in the

process.

back to them.

in -- I didn't put a date on this.

So that -- yeah.

So they came across to the UK, and then I went So let's -- so the invoice I sent to them Sorry, one second.

So that -- that would've

been even a year after that, so that's -- that's after

the publication of this report.

mid-2022.

9 10

So it's around about

What sort of work were you asked to perform

with respect to the Federal Protective Services?

I provided them with input around crowd

psychology.

function of the 2020 riots went about completely

reforming their public order training.

now on the ESIM theory, and they asked me to develop a

package for them to help them to do that and to attend

their first delivery of that new training.

day and a half of lectures on -- on that -- on that

course.

So the federal protection services's

And they draw

So I gave a

Putting aside training programs, do you have

any personal knowledge regarding the crowd management

policies of any police department in the United States

other than the three that we've already discussed?

Yes.

What are those departments, other than the

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three that we've discussed, for which you have personal

knowledge regarding their crowd management policies?

3 4

I believe it to be -- I'm not sure how you

properly pronounce it.

Boise?

Yeah.

Is it Boise, Idaho?

Is that...

So there's a particularly

well-known and influential policing model that was

developed there that is consistent with our model.

the people that developed that model have reached out to

me historically and pointed out the correspondences, and

there's been social media communications and so on

between -- between us emphasizing that.

believe I've been contacted by -- informed by police

departments in other parts of America acknowledging the

correspondence between the work I was doing in Europe

and what they were trying to engineer, but I'm afraid I

can't recall exactly which ones those were.

And

And I -- I do

Sure.

Do you have any personal knowledge regarding

training requirements for law enforcement officers in

the state of Washington?

No.

I should clarify, sir.

What I mean by that is

legally mandated training requirements for law

enforcement officers in the state of Washington.

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of that.

No.

I'm not familiar with the specific detail

Do you have personal knowledge of legally

mandated training requirements for law enforcement

officers in any other jurisdiction in the United States

of America?

No.

Ms. Koehler asked some questions about the

involvement of Professor Ed Maguire in formulating your

report for the Office of the Inspector General.

I'm wondering, sir, if you can provide just a bit more

detail on Professor Maguire's contributions.

Well, not much, to be honest with you.

I'm --

recall the -- the part -- I mean, we held regular online

meetings with the team and the IOG [sic].

of that process, we began to invite Ed Maguire who

attended some, but not all, of them.

I believe, pro bono initially.

be commissioned by them to do work on later stages of

the -- you know, later waves.

provided an analysis of the -- of the CHAZ.

And as part

And his role was,

Although, he went on to

In particular, he

But in the work that he and I did together in

Wave 1, I do recall that I asked for him to make a

contribution to helping to quality assure the analysis

as it was evolving in relationship to the timelines

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and -- and the report.

may -- he may have commented on and given me feedback on

earlier drafts of the report, although I can't recall

specifically or accurately.

probably best not to -- to even assert that.

So I do believe that he -- he

So, unfortunately, it's

Sure.

Did Professor Maguire ever inform you that he

had been retained as an expert witness on behalf of the

plaintiffs in this litigation?

10 11

I do recall a conversation to that effect at

some point, yeah.

Do you recall when that was?

Subsequent to the work we did with the IOG,

because the people that I did -- the people that he

did -- he subsequently went to work with had approached

me beforehand.

of the potential for a conflict of interest, and also

because of the work, by that point, I don't think I'd

been properly commissioned.

I went on to do work directly for the Seattle Police

Department.

And I didn't take up that work because

But you will be aware that

Yes. And so, Professor, when you say that you were

approached by people about serving in an additional

capacity, do you mean that you were approached by people

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about serving as an expert witness in this litigation?

Yes, I believe I was.

Who -- do you recall who it was who approached

you --

Unfortunately, I -- I don't.

I may be

incorrect in that regard, but certainly I was approached

by somebody who had an online meeting.

I don't -- she's not present in this meeting.

recall having a meaningful conversation.

subsequent to that, I took a decision to decline the

opportunity to get involved.

It was a female. I -- I

And then

To the best of your knowledge,

Professor Stott, as you sit here today, are you an

expert witness in this case?

ATTY KOEHLER:

question.

Calls for a legal conclusion. THE DEPONENT:

Object to the form of the

In the sense that am I an

expert witness now?

Is my role now as an expert witness

or not?

(By Atty Groshong) Yes, sir.

Isn't that -- so I'm slightly confused.

I'm here as an expert witness and you're asking me if

I'm an expert witness?

24 25

Let -- let me ask with a bit more specificity,

Professor Stott.

And I -- I appreciate the request for

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clarification. Have you entered into any sort of agreement

2 3

with attorneys, in this case, to provide expert witness

services to them?

No.

Okay.

We've discussed that your report to OIG

provided analysis with respect to four protest dates,

May 29th through June 1st.

analyze anything relating to protest activity in Seattle

on dates other than those four dates?

Were you ever asked to

No.

Do you have any personal knowledge regarding

anything that transpired at any protest in Seattle other

than on the four dates for which you were asked to write

a report to OIG?

Yes.

What are those dates for which you have

18 19

personal knowledge? A.

I can't be specific about the dates.

There

were conversations and discussions around the few days

after the four days in question.

personal interest in the -- the autonomous zone, the

days in particular that -- the processes through which

the autonomous zone emerged.

done some broader research in addition to the specific

And I have taken

So, yes, so I've -- I've

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contractual arrangements that I entered into with the

IOG which were focused exclusively on those four days. Q.

You said that you had conversations about the

few days of protests that followed June 1st.

those conversations with? A.

Who were

I believe with the -- the team at the IOG,

because there was -- there was a broad -- when they

brought me in, there was a broad conversation about how

to break up the sentinel event review, how to break it

down.

overall pattern of events because they wanted some

understanding of whether it was appropriate to chunk

them up in the way that they were planning to chunk them

up.

So there was some general discussions about the

Sure.

So there was a kind of general overview kind

of conversation going on and an ongoing discussion about

how to proceed the sentinel event review because they --

they hadn't really clarified what they were doing.

mean, the whole sentinel event review process is highly

questionable, in any case.

to coalesce something together to deal with Wave 1, but

that sat in a broader conversation about what they were

going to do with the rest of it.

And they were rapidly trying

So we, quite often -- so as my role evolved,

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it moved merely beyond a role as an expert in analyzing

the data into a broader consultancy role that was

helping them to understand how to structure the sentinel

event review process, and more importantly, the role of

the sentinel event review process in actually creating

the reforms that needed to be engineered to move the

Seattle Police Department to a point where that wouldn't

happen again, which was my ultimate objective.

Understood. And so maybe a better way to ask it is this:

10 11

For the four days for which you were contracted to draft

a report for OIG, you performed a data -- a data

analysis and a review of materials that's documented in

your report.

Yes.

Did you perform a similar analysis or review

of materials for any protest dates other than the four

discussed in your report?

Not that I recall, no.

Okay.

There's a discussion in your report for

OIG regarding SPD's crowd management ISDM materials.

Other than reading the ISDM, what, if anything, did you

do to assess SPD's training around crowd management?

Could you -- could you clarify ISDM?

Yes, sir.

So the report that you drafted for

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OIG, the -- the first half or so contains a discussion

of --

Yeah.

-- SPD crowd management training materials

referred to as the "ISDM."

various aspects of the ISDM. My question is:

You discuss, in your report,

Other than reviewing the

ISDM, did you do anything else to assess SPD's training

programs or policies?

No.

Strike the policies part, other than your

report?

14 15

No.

The -- you should understand what's in

the report is an analysis of that training document. Q.

Okay.

It's an analysis of the ISDM.

You did

not analyze any other training documents from SPD; is

that correct?

19 20

I don't recall I did.

No, no, I believe it

was just a focus on -- on that document, yeah. Q.

Okay.

Your understanding of your engagement

as we've discussed is that you were engaged by OIG as

part of the sentinel event review process; correct?

That's correct.

Was it your understanding that the sentinel

event review process was not an effort to determine the

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objective truth of what happened at any of these events?

It was.

That -- that was your understanding?

Yeah, and my critique of it.

Say that one more time, sir?

your last --

And my critique of it.

I think I missed

It's -- it's a process

that is informed by an empirical analysis that could be

described as objective, and it's objectivity was

improved by my involvement in that process.

sentinel event review process itself is not a process

that is focused on constructing an objective truth.

It's a conciliatory exercise to -- to repair polarized

relationships.

Okay.

But the

And in reviewing the data that you did

in conducting the analysis that you did, am I correct,

sir, that the materials that you reviewed were the

materials that were provided to you by the OIG?

provided me.

detailed, and better than many other circumstances where

I've analyzed crowd events, not least of all because of

the privileged access we had to police data.

24 25

Yes, and I was entirely reliant on what they But the nature of that data was extensive,

Professor, I'll represent to you -- you may

know this, you may not, but there are approximately 50

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plaintiffs in this litigation for which we're conducting

the deposition today. To the best of your knowledge, do you know any

3 4

of them?

No.

Do you have any personal knowledge regarding

the uses of force or other police actions that they

allege to have affected them?

Specific things that have affected them?

Yes, sir.

No, absolutely none at all.

whatsoever.

14 15

Do you have any personal knowledge regarding

the damages that any of them allege? A.

No. (Pause in the proceedings.)

16 17

No awareness

(By Atty Groshong) Professor, you talked some

about your view of some of the opportunities for

dialogue and de-escalation on May 30, 2020, that you

believe were missed.

Yeah.

Is it your position, sir, that all of these

subsequent violence, looting, property damage that

occurred on May 30, 2020, was the direct result of these

missed opportunities for de-escalation that you've

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described?

No.

In your view, sir, what are some of the other

causal factors that led to the rioting, the looting, and

the violence on May 30th?

Multiple and complex.

How far do you want to

go back?

relates to, you know, patterns of policing across

extended periods of time, both locally and -- and

nationally.

police and minority communities, if that's the

expression you use in the US context, African American

communities and so on.

George Floyd was a significant contributing factor.

then policing -- patterns of policing on the day as well

as the activities of -- of protesters that fed into

these patterns of interaction that escalated the issues.

So perhaps, if I may, I think the -- if there

You know, it's a -- it's a complex issue that

Sort of the historical relationship between

Obviously, the -- the murder of And

is one thing to understand about the analysis that we

bring to bear on these kinds of problems is that we try

to move the analysis beyond attribution of blame to

single parties and recognize that the dynamics reside in

the interactions between them.

these are -- these are interactions.

of interactional dynamics, that everybody involved in

So these are actions -They're a product

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those interactions plays a contributory role.

ask me did the police contribute to the escalation of

the -- of the situation, the answer would be yes.

you asked me did the protesters contribute to the

escalation of the situation, the answer would be yes.

So if you

On Page 56 of the report that you authored for

OIG -- that's Exhibit 190 -- you describe May 30th as

including some of the most serious rioting ever seen in

the City -- the City of Seattle. Understanding the comments that you made

10 11

earlier regarding the problematic nature of terms like

"protest" and "riot," in your view, at what point in the

day did the serious rioting that you're describing in

your report begin?

ATTY KOEHLER:

16 17

After the firing of the -I need to -- I need to

object to the form of the question.

Sorry I interrupted you.

THE DEPONENT:

After the firing of the

tear gas on 5th Avenue and the attacks.

it -- the -- the star, the most -- the episode of the

most serious riot violence that would, you know, easily

fit into the categorization riot, it would be marked by

the attacks on the police cars.

I would mark

(By Atty Groshong) And so it's fair to say,

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sir, if I'm understanding that you -- understanding you

correctly, that by the time the police cars were on

fire, a riot was underway; correct?

Yes.

description.

Yes, I would be content with that

In answering questions from counsel, you used

the term "containment" in response to a question that

she asked you about the term "kettling."

Mm-hmm.

Is it fair to say, sir, that your report that

you authored for OIG does not contain any discussion of

containment?

I can't recall, but equally, technically, I

don't believe that any containment ever occurred.

were -- there were certainly cordons, but there was

never a -- a full containment that was enacted.

was always a rule out of Westlake Park up 5th Avenue.

don't believe there ever -- well, certainly, you know,

once the serious disorder began to -- to escalate, I

can't comment, but, you know, that crowd was never

kettled.

There I

It may have thought it was, but it wasn't. Professor Stott, do you have any law

enforcement experience?

me -- that's a -- that's a --

There

And let me -- let me -- let

(Unreportable simultaneous crosstalk.)

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Page 87 THE DEPONENT:

1 2

That's a bad question.

(By Atty Koehler) That's a bad question. Have you ever served as a law enforcement

3 4

officer?

No.

Have you ever served in the Armed Forces of

any country?

No.

Ms. Koehler asked you about a use of force or

a series of uses of force that occurred on a barricade

line.

of force exceeded what you had seen in any other

democratic state.

You indicated something to the effect of the use

Yeah.

I just want to confirm, Professor Stott, that

the use of force that you were describing in your

comments on that point occurred on June 1, 2020, outside

of the East Precinct; correct?

I believe that to be the case, yes.

ATTY GROSHONG:

those are all of the questions that I have.

Professor, I believe

I -- I will note the rather odd

circumstance that we find ourselves in that Counsel

indicated that plaintiffs would update their expert

disclosures to include Professor Stott.

Professor Stott

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has indicated that he has not agreed to serve as an

expert witness in this case.

To the extent that Professor Stott is

subsequently retained as an expert and disclosed, we

would reserve the right to seek additional deposition

time. Thank you for bearing with me, sir.

7 8

know that it's late where you are.

time.

I appreciate your

10 E X A M I N A T I O N

11 12 13

BY ATTY KOEHLER Q.

Two minutes. First of all, you can be an expert witness and

14 15

not have to be retained by any side.

and you're a witness.

You're an expert

Second, I just want to clarify a response to

17 18

Mr. Groshong.

police policy current -- that was in effect in 2020 was

in line, to a large extent, with ESIM, and you noted

that at Page 27 -- 26, 27, and I think 28 of your

report; is that correct?

You -- you tried to mention that the

That's correct.

I -- yeah.

My -- my analysis

is that they -- I mean, it's self-evident that they were

drawing on it, but they had misunderstood aspects of it

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and that they still also drew on classical theory.

my -- my view is that they incorrectly assumed that once

a crowd begins to exhibit even small amounts of

violence, that they would then interpret that as a shift

to classical crowd psychology.

then leads them to apply this escalatory form of

policing.

And

And it was that that

And, finally, you were retained by the

Seattle -- City of Seattle to review this process that

we've gone through for the past couple hours because of

your expertise and because of your standing as the

number one crowd management expert in the world; is that

correct?

ATTY GROSHONG:

Object to the form.

THE DEPONENT:

Yes, I like to think so.

I'm -- I mean, whether it was because -- because I'm the

number one expert in -- in the world is less relevant

than the fact that the kind of expertise that I was able

to provide for them was relevant to the project that

they had in hand, which was to understand how to advance

their policing approach based on a correct

interpretation of our theoretical model; and, B, the

expertise and experience that I've had in driving police

reform in the European context to enable them to develop

the kind of dialogue tactics that my analysis suggests

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Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle

Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

Page 90 1

were important in why they weren't able to manage that

crowd in a more effective way.

3 4

(By Atty Koehler) And they -- they promptly

paid all of your invoices; am I correct?

Yeah.

No problem, yeah.

Do you know how much they paid you?

It was two projects.

One was a period of

fieldwork in Europe where Captain Brooks and

Lieutenant Dyment came to Europe.

for, I believe, $50,000.

deliver (2) two-day training packages for the entire

command team of the organization, and I believe that

that was a project that was $74,000 or $77,000.

remember exactly.

That was a contract

And then they recruited me to

I can't

And how much did they pay you for doing your

work to assist with the sentinel review process that

we've been talking about today?

There was several invoices.

I -- I'm --

probably somewhere in the region of around about

$60,000. ATTY KOEHLER:

21 22

Professor.

24 25

City.

Thank you so much,

I have no further questions. ATTY GROSHONG:

Okay.

Nothing further from the

Thank you, Professor Stott. ATTY KOEHLER:

Professor, before we go

BUELL REALTIME REPORTING, LLC 206.287.9066 l 800.846.6989

Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle

Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

Page 91 1

offline, you have the right to review your transcript

for accuracy that's called reserving, or you can waive

that right.

4 5

I'm happy to waive that

ATTY KOEHLER:

Okay.

right.

6 7

THE DEPONENT:

right.

We'll waive the

We'll give you a copy of it anyway.

THE DEPONENT:

Okay.

ATTY SULTANI:

Time is now 11:28 a.m.

We're going off the record.

(Deposition concluded at 11:28 a.m.)

(Exhibit Nos. 805 through 807 marked.)

(By agreement between counsel and

witness, signature was waived.)

--o0o--

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BUELL REALTIME REPORTING, LLC 206.287.9066 l 800.846.6989

Adberg, et. al. v. City of Seattle

Clifford Stott, Ph.D.

Page 92 C E R T I F I C A T E

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STATE OF ARIZONA

) ) COUNTY OF MARICOPA )

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I, Nicole A. Bulldis, RPR, a Certified Court Reporter, do hereby certify under the laws of the State of Washington: That the foregoing videotaped deposition upon oral examination of Clifford Stott, PhD was taken stenographically by me, via Zoom, on December 14, 2023, and transcribed under my direction; That the witness was duly sworn by me to testify truthfully, and that the transcript of the deposition is full, true, and correct to the best of my ability; That I am not a relative, employee, or counsel of any party to this action or relative or employee of such counsel, and that I am not financially interested in the said action or the outcome thereof.

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IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this 19th day of December 2023.

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______________________

Nicole A. Bulldis, RPR WA CCR No. 3384

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