After over three decades as a deputy prosecuting attorney in Thurston County, including 16 years as the department’s chief of staff, Christy Peters is running to be Thurston County’s elected prosecuting attorney.
The incumbent prosecuting attorney, Jon Tunheim, announced in March that he intends to retire at the end of 2026 after 38 years of service to the Thurston County Prosecutor's Office, 16 of which were as the elected prosecuting attorney.
Tunheim has endorsed Peters, who is running unopposed, as his successor.
She has so far been met with an outpouring of community support from both sides of the aisle, which she attributes to the community’s confidence in her experience and her longtime commitment to public service.
“It's been very helpful because I think it's going to make for a very smooth transition from the current elected Jon Tunheim and Myself,” Peters said.
Peters is proud of the current state of the prosecutor’s office, saying the work she has put in as chief of staff has built .”a very strong foundation of prosecution here in Thurston County.”
That said, Peters is excited to “move on to the next level.”
“And what I mean by that is taking some of the programs that are in their infancy and expanding them,” she said.
One of the programs that Peters wants to firmly establish is a violent crime unit.
The Thurston County Prosecutor's Office already has a general felony unit, “but Thurston County is large enough now where we really need to consolidate our specialization and high level prosecutors in a violent crime unit to focus on the most violent offenders in Thurston County,” Peters said.
On the other end of the prosecution spectrum, Peters hopes to improve the county’s innovative justice programs, which include Drug Court, DUI Court, Veteran’s Court and other diversion programs.
Those programs serve defendants with mental health issues or substance use disorders under the philosophy that, if those individuals can get the services and treatment that they need, they are less likely to commit additional crimes.
Peters’ goal is to expand those programs and train deputy prosecutors to think of them when considering their cases.
"Is this someone who's hurting people more in the community and will continue to do so? … Or is this an individual that, if we were to give them the right services … they'll never commit crimes again, or at least have a much lower level of recidivism?” Peters said.
She is also focused on supporting the next generation of Thurston County deputy prosecutors and legal support staff by building up the office’s internship program.
That program has historically only been open to law students, but was recently expanded to undergraduate students.
The program, which served 16 students last summer, gives students hands-on experience in the Thurston County Prosecutor's Office, teaching them about the justice system and the work a prosecutor's office does along the way.
“We want to give them a pipeline to positions with experience,” Peters said.
Tunheim himself started out as one of the Thurston County Prosecutor's Office’s first interns.
“He's true evidence of really having moved through the entire ranks of the prosecutor's office,” Peters said. “Some of our strongest employees have started as interns in the program.”
Peters additionally hopes to improve the Thurston County Prosecutor's Office’s data transparency by making the public more aware of a data dashboard the office operates.
That dashboard was created with a federal grant and shows the county’s crime demographics, ranging from how many assaults happened in Rainier over a particular month to how many robberies happened county-wide, and more.
“I call it one of our best kept little secrets,” Peters said. “It doesn't need to be a secret. It shouldn't be a secret. The public deserves to have that information.”
The dashboard is accessible online at https://tinyurl.com/f3vjpxps.
For more information on Peters’ campaign, visit https://petersforprosecutor.com/.
