East Wenatchee Police Department Demotes James Marshall for 'Conduct Unbecoming'
Marshall was stripped of his sergeant's stripes after a fight with his girlfriend at a Wenatchee salon and is required to take anger management counseling as a condition of his return to active duty
James Marshall was stripped of his sergeant’s stripes and is back on duty at the East Wenatchee Police Department after being placed on paid administrative leave in May.
He was placed on leave pending an investigation into an aggressive “profanity-laced argument” with his girlfriend Allison Christiansen-Ojendyk at Alexander’s Styling Salon in Wenatchee on Jan. 11. During the dust up the contents of a styrofoam container of teriyaki takeout was thrown against the wall of the business and witnesses said they were afraid Marshall was “going to slap the shit out of her,” according to a report by Wenatchee Police Detective Stephen Evitt, who investigated the incident.
I covered the incident in July and you can read that, Evitt’s report and witness statements here.
Here’s a synopsis of events from EWPD Assistant Chief Erik Hampton, who conducted the internal investigation to establish whether diciplinary action should be taken.
In this article, we’ll take a look at the results of that internal EWPD investigation, which was released to me in response to a public records request, and hear from EWPD Chief Rick Johnson about why Marshall was allowed to return to the department.
I’ll also provide a link to the documents outlining the last internal investigation into Marshall, which was a DUI probe after he rolled an ATV while on vacation on the Oregon Coast in 2023. He injured himself, his girlfriend and her father in that crash and I covered that story after he was placed on leave for that last year.
According to EWPD records, Marshall “claimed memory loss” during that investigation, refused to submit to any breath or field sobriety tests and in the end the Coos Bay Sheriff’s Department requested Marshall be prosecuted “for DUI and Reckless Endangering.”
But for now, back to the most recent investigation into Marshall’s behavior.
A $130,000 Plate of Teriyaki
How the contents of a takeout container of chicken Teriyaki came to cover the wall and part of the ceiling of the salon is at the heart of the matter, and Ojendyk’s story on how that happened changed over the course of the investigation.
According to Hampton she told the salon owner, Lisa Robertson, that Marshall threw the food at the wall moments after the incident had occurred. That was as she was trying to clean up the mess moments after Marshall had left the scene.
But by the time EWPD officials were asking questions her story had changed.