Liberty Lake’s Master Patrol Officer Jordan Bowman named detective

Liberty Lake Detective Jordan Bowman took the reins from retiring Detective Ray Bourgeois at the beginning of February, making him only the second detective the Liberty Lake Police Department has ever had.

Bourgeois was the second police officer hired by the city of Liberty Lake in 2002, shortly after the city incorporated. He had served as the department’s only detective for many years and retired at the end of January after a decadeslong career in law enforcement.

Bowman was a Master Patrol Officer with the department, where he has worked since May 2017, before being promoted to detective.

He was born in Southern California and lived there until moving with his family to Ione, Washington, in 2003. As soon as he turned 18, he joined the U.S. Navy and served as a military policeman for four years before leaving the service in fall 2010.

Bowman is the only police officer in his family, and he said he was influenced in his career choice by television shows he watched when he was younger. “I’ve always enjoyed helping people,” he said. “I grew up watching ‘COPS’ and ‘World’s Wildest Police Videos.’ That’s the direction I wanted to go. That’s why I joined the Navy. I figured it would give me a leg up, some experience.”

His plan to gain experience worked as intended and he started working for the Pend Oreille County Sheriff’s Office as a corrections officer after he got out of the Navy. After a year, he became a deputy with the department. He continued working in Pend Oreille County until he came to Liberty Lake in 2017.

Liberty Lake and the surrounding area, where Liberty Lake officers routinely respond to assist the Spokane County Sheriff’s Office and the Spokane Valley Police Department, is much more urban than the mostly rural Pend Oreille County. “It’s drastically different,” Bowman said.

The area is growing rapidly and that doesn’t seem to be slowing down, he said.

“I’ve been here four years,” he said. “The amount that it’s changed in four years is just incredible.”

He worked his way up to Master Patrol Officer, completing 1,200 hours of training and serving as the department’s less-lethal-weapons instructor. When Bourgeois announced his retirement last year, officers in the department were asked if they had any interest in becoming a detective and Bowman submitted a letter of interest.

Bowman said he has done detective work before. “In Pend Oreille County we handled all our own cases from start to finish,” he said. “I kind of missed that aspect coming here.”

Bowman started working with Bourgeois a month before he retired, gradually taking over all the cases under investigation. The experience made Bowman realize that he would have some big shoes to fill.

“I guess I didn’t really realize how much Ray took on,” he said. “Ray was really busy, and he was really good at his job. He was very diligent in doing his job.”

But Bowman isn’t able to give his detective work his full attention just yet. The department will be a little short-handed for another month or so until a new officer is hired, so Bowman is still responding to calls when needed. “Up until we’re fully staffed, I’m kind of doing both duties,” he said.

Bowman said he has enjoyed working in Liberty Lake and considers it the best place to work as a law enforcement officer.

“The community is very supportive of us, our City Council is supportive, our mayor is supportive and our administration is very supportive,” he said. “It’s a family atmosphere. We’re not just an employee, we’re a person. It’s been very good working here.”