Police officers who joined Jan. 6 rally ask Supreme Court for anonymity (2025)

This month, an attorney for the four officers filed a petition with the high court to stay that decision. The attorney, Joel Ard, argued that naming the officers “could be disastrous, especially given the unorthodox and unpopular nature of these beliefs amongst the Seattle Community in general.” Justice Elena Kagan requested that Sueoka’s legal team respond to the officers’ petition by Friday.

Neil Fox, an attorney for Sueoka, said they were reviewing the petition and would file a response by the deadline.

Ard did not respond to a request for comment Sunday, nor did the Seattle Police Department. During the investigation, the officers were found “not to have engaged in unlawful or unprofessional conduct,” according to Ard’s petition.

They were four of six Seattle police officers who were investigated after they attended the rally. In August 2021, two officers, a married couple, were fired after the investigation revealed they had stood by as rioters violently invaded the Capitol. Across the country, current and former law enforcement officers faced scrutiny — and in some cases, formal charges — over their presence at and around the Capitol.

Five people died as a result of that day’s riot, and 140 police officers were assaulted. On his first day in office in January, Trump pardoned almost all those charged or convicted in the riot.

After the insurrection, the Seattle Police Department asked officers to self-report if they attended the rally. The city’s Office of Police Accountability, a civilian-run oversight board, began an investigation, and interviewed the officers.

During those conversations, the officers were asked about their political beliefs, the Supreme Court petition states. According to the document, the questions included: “Were they showing support for a political group by attending the January 6th Rally?” and “What were their impressions of, and reactions to, the content of the January 6th Rally?”

When Sueoka and others requested the investigation records — including the interview materials — the officers, under “John Doe” pseudonyms, sued the police department, oversight board and those who had made the public records requests. The officers alleged that their privacy rights would be violated if the unredacted investigation records with their identities were released.

“In addition to the Government disclosing the identities of Applicants, the records themselves demonstrate more than just mere attendance at a political rally,” the petition states.

Sueoka then requested that the officers be identified in the court proceedings, starting a separate legal battle that reached the Washington State Supreme Court. It ruled that the officers had not adequately shown their need for privacy.

In the new petition, Ard said the Washington State Supreme Court “overlooked” that the officers were “specifically questioned as to their political beliefs, motivations for attending the Rally, and their impressions resulting from same.”

On April 9, the state court said it would not rehear the case, leading the officers to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene.

While a stay on the state decision would afford the officers privacy, Sueoka “would merely have to wait for the final disposition of this case to obtain unredacted records and would not suffer any irreparable harm,” the petition states.

The persistent litigation, according to the petition, has already had a “chilling effect” on the officers, making them suppress unpopular opinions they might have.

“This is understandable,” the document says. “Would anyone feel free to exercise their First Amendment rights knowing that their names would be plastered all over the Seattle Times?”