Moscow Police Chief James Fry officially announces run for Latah County Sheriff

Moscow Police Chief James Fry, who oversaw the investigation of the University of Idaho student killings, has filed to run for Latah County Sheriff. 

Fry registered as unaffiliated on March 4 according to a document from the Latah County Elections office. He will be running against incumbent Sheriff Richard Skiles, a Republican. 

Fry is retiring from the Moscow Police Department after 29 years in law enforcement, including eight as chief. He said he is not ready to be done with law enforcement and wants to bring his experience as a police chief to the broader community. 

“There’s some things that I’m looking at doing, getting out in the smaller communities and trying to develop some community policing philosophies out there,” Fry said. “There’s things that I’ll bring to the table that we did here in Moscow.”

 If he’s elected, Fry said, he would add a drug-detecting dog for the county, a second school resource officer and an additional detective. 

“I want to look at a forensic detective for the county, because we have them here, and we know the value of that,” said Fry. “Everything we deal with is forensics and I think it’s hugely important to the investigations we do today.” 

In an email, current Sheriff Skiles said if he’s re-elected, he’ll continue to move his office in a forward direction. 

“If re-elected, I plan on continuing the development of my office and the highly trained deputies and staff that work with me,” Skiles said. 

Idaho candidates have until March 15 to file to run for office.

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