‘We are intervening way too late’: State police leader says WA’s crime drop still masks deeper problems

Crime fell across every major category in Washington last year, with violent crime down 13.8%, homicides decreasing around 21%, and property crime plunging 21.3%, according to the annual Crime in Washington report from the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs (WASPC).

Steve Strachan, WASPC’s executive director, joined “The Gee and Ursula Show” on KIRO Newsradio and warned against any single explanation for the decline, or any elected official looking to claim credit.

“Anyone who tells you that there’s one single reason, and as we hear elected officials sort of looking to take credit for this, anyone who points to one thing doesn’t know what they’re talking about,” Strachan said. “It’s a lot of factors, of course it is. I would also lay the Washington reductions against nationwide trends, and we’re seeing many of the same things nationwide. They’re a little more pronounced nationwide than they are here in Washington.”

Strachan cautioned that while the numbers are moving in the right direction, each statistic still represents a victim.

“These are numbers, that’s a good thing,” he said. “We should celebrate that. But these are also victims; these are human beings. Anyone who is a victim of any kind of crime, including what is sometimes called minor crimes, property crimes, burglary, car theft, it’s incredibly impactful.”

Technology is part of the answer for crime reduction, but with guardrails

Strachan said cameras, license plate readers and cell phone video have changed the calculus for people considering committing a crime, and he pointed to a recent Pierce County case as an example.

“With proper guardrails built in, auditing, I think that it is an incredibly powerful tool,” Strachan said. “Between cell phones, between private security and Ring cameras, and those things like license plate readers, they have made a significant difference. And part of that, I think, is people are aware of the fact that if they do something, the likelihood is higher that somebody may be catching that on video.

“If you look at that Pierce County case from just a couple of days ago, victim by the name of Diaz, a 17-year-old kid, just a stupid, tragic crime where he was shot and killed over a $10 necklace, and he gave the necklace to the suspect, and he was chased down,” he continued. “Tremendous work by Pierce County Sheriff’s Office, FBI, Mexican authorities, and they got this guy from Mexico and brought him back. And part of that, not the whole thing, but part of it was surveillance cameras.”

‘We are intervening way too late’ with juvenile offenders, Strachan said

Strachan noted one of his biggest concerns is the state’s failure to hold young offenders accountable before they escalate to more serious crime.

“One of my greatest frustrations right now is that we are intervening, particularly with younger kids, way too late,” Strachan said. “Look at car thefts in this state. Car thefts spiked massively in ’21, ’22, and ’23. They have nosedived more recently. There are a lot of reasons for that, but unfortunately, one of the reasons I’m hearing this consistently from chiefs and sheriffs is that those, let’s call them kids, 14- to 15-year-olds that were out in stolen cars were caught.

“Nothing happened; they were just sent back home,” he continued. “They were emboldened. They got involved in worse and worse crimes, drive-bys, and eventually very violent crimes, sometimes homicides. And now they’re in juvenile rehabilitation or, unfortunately, reincarcerated. That’s not the right way to handle this. In the name of compassion, we’re not intervening early enough.”

Why WA is still last in the nation in staffing after 15 years

Strachan said the state has been at the bottom of police staffing rankings for so long that residents no longer know what adequate service looks like.

“Frankly, we’ve become so accustomed to it,” Strachan said. “It’s been so many years. It’s been about 15 years we’ve been last in the nation. And so, people really don’t even know anymore what it’s like to have somebody show up when you have a relatively minor crime, and you want the law enforcement agency to do something about it.

“It’s going to take us a long time to start to build out of this,” he continued. “That commitment and not whipsawing back and forth, chasing the headline today and actually committing to this over time in a bipartisan way, is what it’s going to take.”

A total of 236 murders were recorded statewide in 2025, down from 296 the year before, according to the WASPC report. Violent crimes fell from 28,900 offenses to 24,913, and property crimes dropped from 308,044 to 242,542.

Watch the full discussion in the video above.

Listen to Gee and Ursula on “The Gee and Ursula Show” weekday mornings from 9 am to 12 pm on KIRO Newsradio.