Slow start for Washington office tasked with probing police violence
An hour before the fireworks went off at Poulsbo, Washington’s annual Fourth of July celebration in 2019, three police officers approached Stonechild Chiefstick, a citizen of the Chippewa Cree Tribe of Rocky Boy Reservation and father of six.
The officers had received a report that Chiefstick was threatening people with a screwdriver. Less than 10 seconds later, following a brief confrontation, Officer Craig Keller shot Chiefstick twice.
An hour later, the celebration returned to normal. The fireworks went off as planned. The Kitsap County Sheriff’s Office investigated. And as is overwhelmingly common with police shootings, local prosecutors declined to charge Keller, who is white, with a crime.
In 2021, Washington lawmakers created the nation’s first state-funded office to investigate police killings like Chiefstick’s, providing an extra layer of accountability for deadly use-of-force incidents that disproportionately impact Native Americans but that are rarely prosecuted.
https://washingtonstatestandard.com/2024/11/17/slow-start-for-washington-office-tasked-with-probing-police-violence/