State Patrol trooper happy to make history

SEATTLE — As a public information officer for the Washington State Patrol, trooper Monica Hunter is used to reporting the news, not making it.

But on Thursday, Hunter made news, and history, when she was sworn in as the State Patrol’s first black woman sergeant.

Hunter, 41, scored 92.633 percent on the patrol’s sergeant’s exam in May, the top score among the roughly 200 state troopers who take the test every year.

She said the chance to make history helped push her to achieve.

"Oh hell, yeah," Hunter said, laughing. "I want to wear stripes in this agency because I want to have my say. I want my voice to be heard."

She grew up in Pasadena, Calif., where her mother was a telephone operator and her father worked odd jobs.

Hunter said her father, who died earlier this year, was an alcoholic.

"Now, every time I respond to a fatal DUI, I think, ‘There but for the grace of God go I,’ " she said. "It was not unusual for us to be in the car with Dad every day, and every day, he’d be driving drunk."

Hunter entered the State Patrol academy and became a trooper five years ago. Earlier, she had worked as a cosmetologist and as a flight attendant.

When she decided at age 35 to "trade my pumps for a gun," as she puts it, Hunter’s friends in law enforcement warned her against joining the patrol because of its reputation as an agency that gave women and minorities a hard time.

But Hunter said she wanted to bridge gaps between officers and community members. "A good law enforcement agency reflects the people it is policing," she said.

She likes the patrol, she said, because she feels troopers can be more proactive about preventing crime than most other law enforcement agencies. The patrol’s core mission is to enforce traffic laws, getting aggressive and drunken drivers off the road before accidents happen, she said.

"If we stop them and arrest them before a collision happens, we feel we’ve saved a life," Hunter said.

And contrary to what she had heard, Hunter said the patrol welcomed her. She was the only black woman in the 1,100-member organization when she started. Now she’s one of two.

"I’ve not been denied any opportunities here, and there have been many, many people inside this agency who have mentored me," she said. "I don’t think I’ve been treated any better, but I know I wasn’t treated any worse."

As the public information officer in Seattle, the busiest of the patrol’s eight districts, Hunter is something of a local celebrity. At the grocery store — and even when she does traffic stops — people recognize her as "Trooper Monica" or simply "The Traffic Lady."

"People feel so familiar they’ll say, ‘Ah, Trooper Monica, I’m sorry. I’m sorry I was speeding,’ " she said.

With her promotion, Hunter said she hopes to return to college to earn her degree.