A woman in Lacey, Washington, approached a sheriff’s deputy parking outside an elementary school and confronted him, saying that he was “scaring” families. Her clip went viral, but to her surprise, everyone was on the deputy’s side, including the local sheriff.
The original clip was posted to Instagram on Thursday, February 12, and was recorded outside Seven Oaks Elementary School. From the get-go, the woman questioned the Thurston County Sheriff’s deputy, asking, “Why are you here?” He explained that he was doing a collision report and that he would leave after finishing up.
The Washington woman, however, told the deputy that one of the teachers said that deputies had been “circling since about 8 [am].” The deputy, confused, told the woman he wasn’t there at 8 am, insisted he was doing his job, and tried to end the conversation to continue. The woman had other plans in mind.
“You work for us, and you’re scaring these families,” she added. “You should probably go do your job where your job lives. ‘Cause I don’t see that it needs to be right here all morning.”
An ‘Upsetting Sight’
The deputy, remaining calm, explained that a fellow deputy had left the school five minutes ago and that he was completing a collision report for them. The Washington woman, apparently not willing to hear him out, asked him to acknowledge that he could be “a very upsetting sight for people.”
“For us to be able to collaborate with you all at all moving forward, you’re gonna have to show us some humanity,” she continued, calling the deputy and his colleagues the “defending line between us and [expletive] fascism.” According to her, if he does not follow this, he is not part of the community.
The deputy told the woman he was not going to continue going back and forth with her and focus on finishing his collision report instead. After that, he promised to leave the school’s parking lot.
Backlash, Sheriff Responds
The two-minute clip ended, and it went viral pretty quickly. Apparently, many forwarded it to Thurston County Sheriff Derek Sanders, who then issued a statement on Facebook and even commented on one of the woman’s other Instagram reels. She had disabled comments on the original clip.
Sheriff Sanders stated that he was going to place a letter of commendation for the officer, identified as Deputy Domeno. He exalted his “tact, professionalism, and unwillingness to take the escalation bait,” and added that, despite Domeno being a deputy with only months on the job, he acted like a “30-year veteran.”
“We encourage our deputies to spend time at our elementary schools, and the staff and kids absolutely love being around our deputies and school resource officers,” Sheriff Domeno added.
While some defended her actions, the vast majority of users, as said above, were supportive of Deputy Domeno’s handling of the situation.
“I would have just rolled up my window and ignored her,” one user said. Another one wrote, “Well, that didn’t go the way she thought it would.” A third one added, “She really thought she was doing something here.”
