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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Crime-prevention pioneer dies


Richards
 (The Spokesman-Review)

Sandy Richards, a public safety educator with the Spokane Police Department who put a human face on crime prevention, died Saturday of lung cancer. She was 62.

“She was a pioneer in the department,” said Spokane police Lt. Jim Earle. “She pretty much brought the civilian side of crime prevention to our house and started taking that out to the public.”

Richards, who stood about 5-foot-4, liked to give macho cops a friendly teasing when they asked for her advice, Earle said.

Richards was well-known for her frequent public talks on preventing crime. Her latest work focused on identity theft prevention. She was with the department for about 20 years and worked mostly as a crime prevention specialist.

She received the department’s highest honor, the Medal of Merit, earlier this year.

Richards was born in Colfax on July 17, 1942. She attended Jefferson Elementary in Spokane and graduated from Lewis and Clark High School. She also graduated from Washington State University with a teaching certificate.

She taught for one year and moved first to Coeur d’Alene, then Illinois and Sioux City, Iowa. In 1982, Richards divorced and moved back to Spokane with her three children.

“She came to Spokane and looked for teaching jobs,” said her son, John Richards, a Seattle radio announcer.

She did some substitute teaching and other odd jobs.

“Eventually, she found a job at Block Watch. That’s when she realized she wanted to be into crime prevention,” said her son. “She just dove into it. That’s what Mom did.”

Richards went on to earn a master’s degree in criminology from Eastern Washington University.

Richards was a tough woman, said her son. But she was always focused on others.

“To know my mom was to know how selfless she was,” John Richards said. “She was a single mom who was our mom and dad. She raised us on her own. Even though she worked so many hours, it seemed like she was at all the games and school activities.”

John Richards, her second child, moved to Seattle, and he’d sometimes catch his mother on television talking about crime prevention on regional cable news channels.

“It meant a lot to her to be such a big part of the community,” he said.

John Richards said he and his siblings were concerned for their single mother, an avid reader and crossword-puzzle aficionado. What they discovered after her death was a second family she’d developed through her work.

“We were very happy to learn what a family she had at work,” he said. “It was one of the silver linings we discovered.”

During their last weeks together, she often talked about the respect and acceptance she felt among the members of the Spokane Police Department.

His mother was a frequent traveler who took annual trips to Hawaii and the Oregon coast. She also relished time at a family cabin at Priest Lake.

She is survived by a sister, Dian Cummings, of Spokane; two sons, Eric Richards, of Colbert, and John Richards, of Seattle; one daughter, Lee Richards, of Seattle; and three grandchildren.

Services will be held at 12:30 p.m. Friday at Fourth Memorial Church, 2000 N. Standard. Memorial contributions can be made to Corbin and Moore-Turner Heritage Gardens, 507 W. Seventh Ave., Spokane, WA 99204; the Law Enforcement Officers Memorial; and www.kexp.org, a public radio station in Seattle that employs her son.