The trial over the future of Denny Blaine Park completed its first week in King County Superior Court, and by most accounts it is moving faster than expected. Friends of Denny Blaine tells Planet Nude the proceedings are running four to five days ahead of schedule—meaning the judge could reach a decision well before the late June timeline originally projected.
The first week belonged to the plaintiff. Denny Blaine Park for All called its witnesses, presented photo and video evidence, and made the case that the City’s abatement plan has failed to curb lewd behavior at the park. Spokesperson Lee Keller set the tone in opening arguments: “This is not about nudity per se. It’s about what happens in that park that’s illegal. There is daily masturbation. There’s people having sex.”
The most dramatic moment came on Day Two, when Judge Chung reviewed videos recorded from Stuart Sloan’s property showing sex acts in the park. Sloan’s house manager Carrie Christensen testified that the city’s response has done little to curb indecent exposure, saying she knows of only three arrests out of what she described as hundreds of instances of sexual conduct. Christensen also said she is not opposed to public nudity, which is legal in Seattle, but that at Denny Blaine nudity “invites a darker element.”
FoDB pushed back. Nicole Baich, an FoDB member whose own image appeared as an evidentiary exhibit in court—she was photographed standing naked at a gap in the park’s new fencing, which she described as an act of protest against the city’s changes—told KUOW that what the court was seeing was atypical. “It’s unfair that an entire historic community and culture is collectively being punished for some bad apples,” she said. She also noted that publicity from the lawsuit has drawn more visitors to what was once a little-known space, and that “no other park is surveilled like Denny Blaine.”
A notable concession emerged from the plaintiff’s own witnesses. Meghan Harman, testifying on behalf of Denny Blaine Park for All, agreed with FoDB on the core principles at stake: that the park should stay open, that nudity is a protected right and should be allowed, and that lewd behavior should be separately enforced and prosecuted.
Perkins Coie attorney Cassandra Carley, arguing on behalf of FoDB, framed the stakes plainly in opening arguments: “This community includes transgender and nonbinary and asexual individuals for whom Denny Blaine Park is one of the safest places that they have. These are neighbors, co-workers, friends, family, citizens of Seattle who deserve respect.”
The City presented its case beginning Thursday. With one remaining plaintiff witness still abroad, the plaintiff is expected to resume briefly Monday before the City wraps up. Friends of Denny Blaine is projected to call its first witness as early as Wednesday June 11.
That’s when the trial shifts in character. FoDB’s witnesses include Washington State Architectural Historian Michael Houser, who will testify about the park’s placement on the Heritage Register; Dr. Kevin Delucio, whose expert testimony will address the documented psychological benefits of body-positive spaces for transgender and non-binary people; and Dr. Neil Malamuth, a UCLA psychologist whose testimony will address decades of naturism research and the absence of any causal link between public nudity and sexual misconduct. The week two witnesses are the heart of FoDB’s affirmative case—and the testimony most likely to matter to Planet Nude readers.
Planet Nude will have continuing coverage. 🪐
Dr. Delucio ought not neglect the psychological benefits of social nudity in this space for ALL people using the park. This answer to the city should not be argued so narrowly ignoring the rest of the community of people who are not a non-binary or transgender person. Shutting down this social space to nudity because the city fails to police and prosecute criminal actors at the park is an affront and obnoxious to the extreme to rights of all upstanding patrons using the park.