Police chief: ‘You don’t get to assault police officers’

“You don’t get to assault police officers. Period.”

The Bremerton Police chief is frustrated &#8212 frustrated about the way the shooting in Olympia on Thursday was covered in the media.

We need to be more aware of the message and headlines written about “so called police violence” and we need to know that it’s never acceptable to assault a police officer, Chief Steve Strachan wrote in an op-ed for the Kitsap Sun.

An Olympia officer is under investigation for shooting two men he said assaulted him. He was responding to a call that the men allegedly threw a case of beer at a grocery store employee after attempted shoplifting.

Strachan said he’s not offering a “blanket defense” for every police action and that there’s no excuse for a number of incidents that have occurred nationwide in the past several months.

But, he argued, the vast majority of officers and deputies are doing the right thing.

“In each of our 30 years in law enforcement, we have never seen our profession doing more than we are now to improve our transparency, accountability, and communication skills,” Strachan wrote.

The chief said he was disappointed by news coverage that implied the Olympia officer was punishing the men for the minor offense of shoplifting.

“We all need to be more mindful of the underlying message and implication,” Strachan wrote.

The chief also reiterated that people “cannot pick fights with police,” even during arrest.

“Every physical confrontation with police involves a gun — the one on the officer’s hip. As officers, we are all necessarily committed to never get into a position to lose our gun, which means we cannot lose the fight, ever,” he wrote.

Strachan said continuing to have dialogue about relationships and accountability is important, but it’s equally important to remember that word choice matters.