BY PEPPER FISHER
PORT ANGELES – The Clallam County Sheriff’s office has just gone live with a new, user-friendly way to report crimes and other concerns online.
As of September 10, residents can report many types of non-emergency crimes without requiring a Deputy to physically respond to the location.
Sheriff Brian King says you can now report vehicle prowls, code violations, animal complaints, harassing phone calls, hit and run vehicle collisions, traffic complaints, vandalism, theft, and even insurance claims.
“The nice thing about this, and I’ve heard this from the public, is that, “Hey, I don’t want to bother you guys, but I was involved in a fender bender in a parking lot at Walmart. And my insurance tells me I need a police report.” This will allow you to be able to file that directly and receive that police report in real time back after it’s actually filed. And you’re not going to have to wait on several layers of bureaucracy and ultimately getting to that report.”
The Sheriff’s Office will be utilizing this new program to capture anonymous tips through the “Crime Tips” option, and will be phasing out the previous tip-line in the coming months.
“Information is power. And so we need everybody to tell us everything that they’re seeing. You take a picture of a car that looks suspicious in your neighborhood, and you capture the license plate. Go on to our crime tip, you know, load that picture up into a report and send it to us. It could make or break a case.”
Sheriff King says, keep in mind, if you’re reporting a crime and have suspect information, you should still call dispatch so a Deputy can be immediately assigned. And if a crime is in progress or there’s an emergency, call 911.
King says the new reporting system is not meant to replace a person’s ability to talk face to face with a Deputy when that’s what is needed or called for, but it creates a new option for the many instances when time and efficiency are more important.
“We didn’t want to sacrifice our service to the community. Like, it was important that if you call and you want to talk to a Sheriff’s Deputy, then we’re going to be there. And, that is still the case. But I would tell you that the times have changed, and we here at equal amount of feedback of like, “Yeah, I don’t care to really have to talk to a Deputy in person. I can communicate with that Deputy virtually and I will be just fine. And so, I mean, I think that’s just the changing tides. And we need to embrace them, and we need to be revolutionary. And so, that’s what we’re trying to do.”
The online reporting platform is available on the front page of the Clallam County Sheriff’s Office website: clallamcountywa.gov/497/Sheriff