DeFrang steps down 

Peninsula News Network - 6/17/05 - Port Angeles, WA - The longest-serving deputy in the history of Clallam County is stepping down, leaving his post as Clallam County Undersheriff.

Fred DeFrang, by far the most senior staff member in the Clallam County Sheriff's Department has been a local cop for 34-years. PNN had first learned DeFrang might be stepping aside earlier this week, but the move wasn't confirmed until an official announcement Friday morning.

DeFrang began his career as a reserve officer with the Port Angeles Police, and then spent two years working as a cop in Sequim. But he will be forever remembered for his tenure at the Sheriff's Department, where he began work in 1974. DeFrang has spent the past twenty years with a variety of administrative assignments, working the past decade as Undersheriff.

But his main work was in the field, where he supervised detectives and work on major cases, many of them legally groundbreaking. Since the late 1980s, DeFrang has been intimately involved in narcotics enforcement, first with the Clallam County Drug Task Force, and then the Olympic Peninsula Narcotics Enforcement Team. 

DeFrang has also been involved in community and political affairs, serving a term on the Clallam County Charter Review Commission. In 2003, his name had been mentioned for appointment when former Sheriff Joe Hawe resigned, but he later withdrew from consideration after getting in a tiff with county commissioners over having to take a pay cut to assume the post. That appointment went to his fellow Undersheriff at the time, Joe Martin. In 2004, he had announced plans to run for Clallam County commissioner, but later pulled out of the race with little public explanation. Since that time, DeFrang had not been as publicly visible as in the past with word circulating that he had been out on medical leave. He retires at age 54, with no immediate word on what his future plans might be, and whether he might seek future political office.

Martin is expected to name his new Undersheriff Monday. Possible front runners for the post might include Captain Ron Cameron, who is another CCSO veteran that has worked in drug enforcement and major crimes since the 1980s, and Captain Steve Snover, who also has comparable field experience in addition to working as Martin's right hand man on administrative matters.