Above photo: Olympian police officer photographed with armed med, from The Olympian posted on Facebook by Braden Pauli.
A photo circulating on social media Friday showing an Olympia Police officer posing with a group of armed men in front of Baskin Robbins on Olympia’s west side has prompted outrage from many, a response from Mayor Cheryl Selby, and an investigation by the police department.
A Facebook post featuring the photo that was shared on Twitter Friday is captioned “this is us the 3% with a OPD at 140am when she came to that k (sic) us for being there and her partner on duty came and thanked us to.” It shows the officer in the middle of nine men, some sporting tactical gear and many of whom are flashing a hand gesture with three fingers outstretched and thumb and forefinger touching.
In a statement Friday night, Interim Police Chief Aaron Jelcick described the men as “a group of armed individuals dressed in fatigue or militia like clothing.” The photo, according to the statement, is believed to have been taken in the early morning hours Friday.
In a statement Friday night, Jelcick announced the Police Department had initiated an investigation into the photo and would update the community as soon as there’s more information.
“I am disappointed and frustrated that the photo was taken at all, but particularly at this sensitive time in our city and nation,” Jelcick wrote. “I regret that this photo may damage the trust our community places in us that we have worked so hard to build. I apologize for the pain this has caused our community. It is imperative that Olympia Police Officers uphold our values, remain neutral to the message at public demonstrations, and do not engage in or promote conduct that will bring discredit to themselves, the Department or the City.”
The hand gesture is associated with the Three Percenters movement also mentioned in the photo’s caption. The gesture also looks similar to the “okay” sign — which, according to the Anti-Defamation League, took on a new significance due to a hoax by members of the website 4chan in 2017. They claimed the gesture represented “wp” for “white power,” and eventually it was sincerely adopted by some white supremacists.
“Three Percenters, who are right-wing extremists but are not typically white supremacists, often make a hand gesture to symbolize their movement that uses the outstretched middle, ring, and pinky fingers to represent a Roman numeral ‘3,’” the ADL website reads. “This gesture, from certain angles, can often resemble an ‘okay’ hand gesture and has been misinterpreted by some as a white supremacist symbol.”
Olympia Mayor Selby wrote her reaction to the photo on Facebook Friday. In it, she refers to the gestures as “white power signs.”
“After a long week for my community, I’m discouraged that I have to make a post like this,” the mayor wrote. “I have confirmed a photo of an Olympia police officer posing with a group of armed militia members, some of whom are displaying white power signs. I find this behavior to be abhorrent and unequivocally unacceptable.
“Our council/manager form of government restricts me from discussing disciplinary measures, though my council and I are demanding a thorough investigation,” she wrote. “As the picture clearly illustrates in no uncertain terms, a culture change within the police department and city government is clearly needed.
“We hear our community demanding it and we must rise to meet this challenge. The presence of an armed militia is not what we want to see in Olympia, and we are asking those people to stay home to ensure that peaceful protest can continue in our city.”
She ended her post with “BLACK LIVES MATTER!!!!!”
The “3% of Washington” Facebook page responded in its own post, saying the hand gesture was not “a white power hand sign,” but the 3% gesture.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups and other extremists in the U.S., says “percenterism is one of three core components within the antigovernment militia movement.” The reference to “3 percent,” according to the SPLC, is rooted in a “dubious historical claim that only 3 percent of American colonists fought against the British during the War for Independence.”
The Anti-Defamation League says group members “view themselves as modern-day versions of those revolutionaries, fighting against tyrannical U.S. government rather than the British.”
On its website, the national Three Percenters group refutes the labels “anti-government” and “militia,” describing itself as “a national organization made up of patriotic citizens who love their country, their freedoms, and their liberty” and saying it is “very pro-government, so long as the government abides by the Constitution, doesn’t overstep its bounds, and remains ‘for the people and by the people.’”
Reached by phone Friday night, Washington State Three Percent founder Matt Marshall told The Olympian that Washington’s group doesn’t affiliate itself with the national group. Part of the reason they broke off, Marshall said, was because national groups were acting like a militia.
He says the Washington group aims to “prepare our communities, support our communities, and if we need to, defend our communities.”
“Just because you’re a group and the Southern Poverty Law Center … labels us as something does not make it true,” Marshall said. He pointed out that Three Percent of Washington is registered as a nonprofit corporation with the Secretary of State.
A gun store in the strip mall on Harrison Avenue, ostensibly Private Sector Arms, had asked for “armed members of the community to make a presence in his parking lot,” Marshall said, after hearing that gun stores in the area might be burglarized. Washington Three Percenters from the area responded, he said, pointing out that one of the members was African-American, two were Hispanic, and one was Jewish.
They were there in a defensive posture, he said, and nobody showed up to target the store. When asked whether any Three Percenters have been to the rallies and protests in Olympia, he said over 30 were there a few days ago as part of the protest but none were open-carrying weapons.
The development comes just hours after Mayor Selby held a press conference Friday morning asking citizens to self-police Friday evening, when the city expected outside groups may instigate violence at planned protests.
During the press conference, some citizens demanded the mayor address the issue of people bringing firearms to recent demonstrations prompted by the death of George Floyd. People cannot be arrested for carrying weapons, City Manager Jay Burney told them, and the city can’t ban open-carrying.
Sara Gentzler joined The Olympian in June 2019. She primarily covers Thurston County government and its courts, as well as breaking news. She has a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Creighton University.