Bit slow so I found a few things. I believe the police may have had something to do with his lack of social media activity but there are some holes in this hypothesis.
1. He was having a major chimpout from July 7 through July 9, posting some of his best content on IG.
2. He was cited on July 8, but posted some of his best vids the next day.
3. As mothman96 noted above he got cited around the time of his choking video. If the police took his phone as evidence he wouldn't have been able to post the videos of July 9th.
4. He said in the podcast that the men that beat him up asked for his ID. I've never heard of people who attack others in public to ask them for their ID. He probably got questioned by police officers who asked for his ID, and he just made all the other stuff up.
5. He also stated that he skinned his knee after he fell from picking up litter.
Looking at point number 5 first, since we now know he is involved in community court, that explains why he was pickin up litter. "Instead of getting booked into jail, defendants who opt into the program do community service and are connected to services that are co-located at the court, such as affordable housing, and addiction and mental health treatment providers. The program also accepts walk-in clients who want to access services." There was speculation that he left HOC for Union Gospel which has a community service requirement, but it is now clear based on his pics and the podcast that he left HOC for the Arena. His community service is likely connected to the court program.
As far as the police taking his phone, this may be a possibility. We know he was cited and released. This is discussed at 420.1 (heh heh..420) of the Spokane Police Department manual that states a general approval of this policy and that it is conducted in lieu of arrest and is known as a "field release" when the individual is not transported to a jail.
This is just the police manual, the actual Washington law is found at RCW 46.64.015 and states "Whenever any person is arrested for any violation of the traffic laws or regulations which is punishable as a misdemeanor or by imposition of a fine, the arresting officer may serve upon him or her a traffic citation and notice to appear in court." Based on this reading I am unclear if a cite and release actually qualifies as an arrest, but if it does, then RCW 10.105.010 contains further language that any property involved in a felony may be seized, but also "(2) Personal property subject to forfeiture under this chapter may be seized by any law enforcement officer of this state upon process issued by any superior court having jurisdiction over the property. Seizure of personal property without process may be made if:
(a) The seizure is incident to an arrest or a search under a search warrant;" So what this means is that if his field release qualifies as an arrest, then the cops can take his personal property as evidence since it is incident to an arrest. However, since this occurred on July 8th and he posted more vids on July 9th, I don't think this is the likely case.
I think what happened was one of the two scenarios:
a) Since cops generally have to see a misdemeanor to arrest someone, he probably chimped out again on the 9th, got reported, and the cops did not have a legal basis to do anything to him but gave him a stern talking to and said if there is further trouble then they will fuck him up.
b) The cops witnessed him chimping out again, or responded to a report, and then asked to see his ID, and took his phone as evidence. This may be legally dubious, and he does have a public defender involved, so the cops may have just took his phone so he'd STFU and once he got a lawyer involved they returned his property.
I think some general combo of those two scenarios is the likely event. He's probably also sober and undergoing addiction treatment, which would explain why he was more lucid in the podcast yesterday. With a clearer mind he is also back to genetics and telomeres and other pseudoscience, whereas when he is all hopped up on substances he's just chimping out and shouting about greed and bitches and thots. Going forward I don't think we are going to see as many chimpouts until he completes his treatment in October and gets back on booze and weed.
