Cop's wife claims he fired gun inside house, punched walls, told stepdaughter to 'go die'
Officer Richard Norris has been on paid leave since his estranged wife filed for a protection order in Snohomish County last summer. Norris was suspended in 2023 for ignoring a DV call.
Content note: This post contains descriptions of domestic violence and misogynistic slurs
A Seattle police officer is under investigation for allegedly firing a gun inside his house last year, nearly striking his wife. Last June, a Snohomish County court granted a protective order to the wife of Officer Richard Norris, who stated that he had an alcohol problem and was physically and verbally abusive to her.
The petition for a protective order contains screenshots of text messages as well as photos of bullet holes and a patched-up wall where Norris reportedly punched.
She wrote in the protective order that Norris fired his gun inside the house near where she was standing. On another occasion, while intoxicated, he allegedly slammed her to the ground with his elbow on her throat.
When she confronted him about it, Norris said he didn’t remember, but he apologized.
The petition alleges that Norris was verbally abusive to the woman’s 14-year-old daughter, calling her a “cunt” and yelling at her to “go die.” He texted that he wished that she would overdose and made inappropriate comments, saying she was the “only female in the house who doesn’t have a body like a little boy.”
The woman was initially afraid to file for a protective order because Norris was tracking her using the built-in GPS on her car, she wrote, and noticed when she was parked near the Snohomish County courthouse.
When Norris broke his leg and was staying with his parents in Bellingham, she decided that it was safe to file for the protective order. The Seattle Police Department acknowledged that Norris was currently on administrative leave but declined to comment on an open investigation.
The investigation has long passed the 180-day deadline set in the Seattle Police Officers Guild contract, but it has likely been paused. It’s common for cases involving alleged criminal misconduct to take years to resolve, especially when prosecutors do not file charges.
Norris has another active Office of Police Accountability investigation for allegations of criminal misconduct from 2020. Norris was suspended in 2023 for ignoring an in-progress domestic violence assault, where a woman was injured, because he was finishing paperwork at the end of his shift.
Clock-watching cops blew off DV call to do paperwork, wait for shift to end
It took Seattle police 44 minutes to respond to a brutal domestic assault, according to a disciplinary report released last Friday. Though officers were available, the call came in during a shift change, and the two dispatched—Ron Willis and Richard Norris—chose to wait until the next watch logged in.