Proposal aims to increase protections as attacks on Seattle firefighters rise

SEATTLE - Seattle City Council’s Public Safety and Human Services Committee were unanimous in voting to extend new protections to firefighters. 

The legislation was proposed by Councilmembers Lisa Herbold of District 1 and Andrew Lewis of District 7 following an alarming rise in on-the-scene assaults, threats and slurs made against firefighters responding to emergency calls. 

FOX 13 was the first to report on the data, which showed more than 100 attacks on emergency personnel last year.

"SFD personnel have experienced more than 50 instances of this workplace violence in the last six months. Today, it’s not only occurring at incident scenes but elsewhere in the community as we perform other aspects of our job, such as during fire inspections or other routine duties," said Lt. Kenny Stuart, president of the Seattle Firefighter Local 27.

"Assaults and threatening behavior towards our unarmed members who are simply trying to help others have become a regular and unacceptable part of these responses," said Chris Lombard, assistant chief of the Seattle Fire Department. "Our members are experiencing this with such regularity we’re starting to have trouble of even getting them to continue reporting them. They’re feeling almost hopeless in some of these regards."

Numbers released to FOX 13 News in a Public Data Request revealed the dangers firefighters were up against. In 2021, firefighters reported 13 cases of assault, threats or slurs against them when responding to a call. 

Those cases were reported to the department by email. The department launched an online portal in 2022 to track assaults. The number of cases jumped to 135 in 2022, roughly a 930% increase year-to-year.

"SFD members have been hospitalized from assaults. Some have required surgical intervention, they’ve been punched, they’ve been threatened with death and much more," said Lombard.

"Aggressive threats to shoot us, aggressive bystanders throwing items at SFD and AMR personnel. Bystanders swinging rebar and wood sticks, patients spitting on firefighters, residents threatening firefighters with hammers, shards of glass and other tools," said Stuart.

The city said Seattle’s current law has protections for public officers who are responding to emergencies. This makes it a crime to physically interfere with them as they provide aid. However, the law does not explicitly include firefighters, EMS or other fire personnel, except the Fire Marshal. 

Without that protection in the law, it puts firefighters and their safety at greater risk of being attacked.

"Everybody knows what it feels like to be threatened with violence. It changes your focus of attention and what we’re looking for here is the ability for firefighters to focus 100 percent of their attention and efforts on the job at hand," said Stuart, a 27-year veteran with the Seattle Fire Department.

The department officials explained the attacks, threats and slurs happen mostly in public areas, often when responding to an overdose or mental health issue.

"As a case in point, this year already, SFD has responded to over 500 overdose-type calls, hundreds of calls for those in mental crisis and much more," said Lombard. "These incident scenes are often very chaotic and when EMT’s must focus on the surroundings, they struggle to focus on the patients and provide the best of patient care; always having to look over their shoulders."

If the law is updated, it would become a crime to physically interfere with firefighters on the scene.  It would also open an opportunity to partner with Seattle Police on strategies to create adequate space and access for firefighters to give emergency aid. The union president said this would help reduce confrontations before they start, especially when a crowd surrounds firefighters. 

"When I say surrounding, I mean a circle of people, so you can’t see your way out. Individuals attempting to attack the patient while the patient is under our care. Individuals stealing the patient’s belongings out of their pockets or from their person while we’re trying to care for them and breathe for them," said Stuart. 

The proposal will go to the full City Council for a vote, scheduled for May 2. 

"Every day, Seattle’s firefighters are rushing into danger to protect us, whether it be from a house fire, a car wreck, or an overdose. They do so unarmed, and often their life-saving work reviving a person makes it difficult to have any defensive awareness of a possible threat. It’s time we make sure we are doing all we can to protect them," said Herbold. "This is a common-sense fix to Seattle’s laws that allows firefighters to focus on the dangerous work they do and makes us all safer."