King County deputy accused of promoting prostitution

SEATTLE – A veteran King County sheriff’s deputy was accused Thursday of promoting his estranged wife’s prostitution, stealing ammunition from the department’s gun range where he worked and selling steroids.

King County prosecutors charged Darrion Holiwell, 49, with three felony counts, including second-degree promoting prostitution, first-degree theft and a controlled-substance violation. He would face 12 to 20 months in prison if convicted as charged, prosecutors said.

The 19-year-veteran and member of the SWAT team was arrested and booked Thursday morning into King County Jail. His arraignment is set for July 1. A message left with his lawyer, Kris Costello, was not immediately returned.

“This is a form of police corruption,” Sheriff John Urquhart said at a news conference Thursday. Urquhart said he was flabbergasted by the events and planned “to root out this kind of behavior.”

The sheriff’s office is investigating whether top commanders were involved or should have known about the alleged theft and sale of live and spent ammunition from the Ravensdale gun range where Holiwell worked since 2006, Urquhart said.

Investigators have interviewed 10 high-ranking deputies, who said they did not know anything about the theft, he added.

The sheriff said Holiwell set up his estranged wife as an escort for several months last year while he was off work with an injury. Holiwell paid for some of the ads on an escort website and collected about 80 percent of the proceeds, Urquhart said.

His wife told a King County detective that she began her escort business after moving out of the home she had shared with her husband, and that she would initially tell him when she had an appointment and when she was done, according to the charging documents.

The sheriff’s office investigation also found that Holiwell took brass from spent bullets and ammunition from the county range and sold about 19,000 pounds to three gun shops to create “a slush fund,” Urquhart said. The money was used to “basically trick out” weapons for himself and the SWAT team, he added.