PAGE A6, KEIZERTIMES, DECEMBER 31, 2021
Jefferson calls it a career after
23 years with Keizer Police
BY MATT RAWLINGS
Of the Keizertimes
When he was 17 years old, Eric
Jefferson admitted that he didn’t think
highly of police. However, it was the
influence of former Salem cop Paul
Wilson, who was a Student Resource
Officer at South Salem High School,
that caused Jefferson to change his
mindset.
“I was one of those kids that could
have gone either way on the railroad
tracks, but he saw something in me
and kind of kicked butt around to make
sure I was staying in line,” Jefferson
said. “He was the one that pushed me
into the career field that I went to.”
After three decades as a police offi-
cer, including 23 years with the Keizer
Police Department (KPD), Jefferson
officially retired from what he called “a
rewarding career.”
“It was where I could go to work in
the civilian world to fulfill that need
to be a part of something important,
something more than a normal job,”
Jefferson said. “I really fell in love with
the work, because it’s one of the few
jobs in the world that there is not one
instance of one day that is the same,
ever. In 30 years of doing this work, you
touch a lot of lives.”
Jefferson graduated from South
Salem in 1985, then served for four
Keizer Police officer Eric Jefferson, along with his K9, Buster, chats with community members at KeizerFEST in August. Jefferson retired in
November after 30 years as a cop.
Photo by MATT RAWLINGS of Keizertimes