Kamal Sharif knows what corrupt law enforcement looks like.

He watched his family suffer from crimes while no one stepped in to protect or reassure them. In Somalia, 1996, there was no justice. It was a system, Sharif said, that “only served those who were well off.”

He and his family fled to the U.S., where they settled in Pennsylvania. While safe from bodily harm, it took some time to adjust to the culture. Upon being pulled over for the first time, Sharif’s father was concerned because he didn’t have money to pay off the officers.

“I come from a country that was written from war,” Sharif said during a recent interview.

He had just been fitted for his uniform, and passed his range test the day previous.

Compact and wiry, Sharif seemed older than his 31 years.

“I’ve always had a drive toward service, helping people,” he said.

He says the attributes that make a good cop, in his estimation, were natural to him. Patience. Vigilance. Transparency. The opposite of his first experience with the law.

Sharif started police academy in Pennsylvania on his 21st birthday. He actually earned a bachelor’s degree in criminology at the same time.

Law appealed to him, but in the end, law enforcement won out. A lawyer, he explained, is “already at the end of whatever occurred.”

His heart was in starting at the beginning.

“When something happens to you,” Sharif said, “it takes something.”

His eyes were serious.

After marrying Asha Shee in Washington, whom he met in Pennsylvania, Sharif has been a law enforcement officer in the Evergreen State for 8½ years.

The couple spent their ninth anniversary in Port Townsend, and were smitten.

Adding to their feelings about the area was the fact that Sharif had worked with Police Chief Thomas Olson previously at the University of Washington’s campus, where Sharif was a bike cop.

It wasn’t long before he made the decision to join the Port Townsend Police Department. He was sworn in last Tuesday, and said he’d be hitting the streets Nov. 29.

His wife and three children are still living in Auburn as he sets out to house hunt.

“Everybody understands the situation of housing in Port Townsend,” he said, adding a lot of folks are keeping an eye out for him.

In the meantime, he uses Zoom, Skype, and Facetime to keep in touch with family.

“I like to really spend time with my family,” he added.

Sharif looks forward to getting to know his new community on an individual level while adhering to the  chief’s vision for the force.

“[He’s] very professional, always,” Sharif said of Olson. “He’s for community policing; transparent, a visionary.”

Thus far, Sharif, a self-proclaimed coffee connoisseur, is learning the neighborhoods — coffee shop by coffee shop.

Port Townsend, he said, is “a beautiful community that’s very open and receptive to me.”