OCO director Jeremiah Bourgeois fired by Governor Ferguson — concurrent with DOJ CRIPA opening and multiple OCO staff departures
On April 24, 2026, Governor Bob Ferguson fired Jeremiah Bourgeois as director of the Washington Office of the Corrections Ombuds after approximately six months in the role. The Governor’s administration cited ethical misconduct allegations including misuse of a prison ID badge and creation of a toxic workplace. Bourgeois publicly stated that his firing was retaliation for asserting the OCO’s independence from DOC. The firing occurred during a period of multiple OCO staff departures and twenty-five days before the U.S. Department of Justice opened a CRIPA civil rights investigation into the Washington Corrections Center for Women.
What happened
Timeline of documented events
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Late 2025. Governor Ferguson appointed Jeremiah Bourgeois as OCO director. Bourgeois was the first formerly incarcerated person to hold a senior executive position in Washington state government. He had served 27 years in prison on a murder conviction, obtained his law degree following release, and had been a public advocate for correctional reform.
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Prior to April 20, 2026. Multiple OCO staff members resigned or went on medical leave. The Daily Fly reported that “several employees” had departed before Bourgeois’s firing. The exact number and the reasons for those departures are not fully documented in the public record.
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April 20, 2026. Bourgeois was notified of a misconduct investigation and ordered in a letter to cease all work and to have no contact with OCO employees, according to the Seattle Times. He was placed on paid leave within days.
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During paid leave. Bourgeois denied the allegations. He refused to follow the restrictions imposed during the investigation and sent a defiant email to the Governor’s office stating that Ferguson had “no authority to instruct me as to how I conduct my work.”
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April 23, 2026. Bourgeois published LinkedIn posts stating that his efforts to make the OCO “less beholden to the state Department of Corrections” had “apparently displeased” officials in the Governor’s office. The Governor’s termination letter cited these posts.
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April 24, 2026. Governor Ferguson fired Bourgeois. The termination letter referenced the LinkedIn posts and cited insubordination. Following the firing, Bourgeois sent a text message to the Seattle Times: “I’m happy to have had this opportunity to serve the people of Washington. I did so with integrity.”
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May 6, 2026. The Daily Fly reported that the Governor’s office declined to comment on Bourgeois’s ouster.
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May 19, 2026. DOJ Civil Rights Division opened a CRIPA investigation of WCCW (see WA-2026-DOJ-CRIPA-WCCW). This was twenty-five days after the firing.
The two accounts
The Governor’s administration’s account: Ferguson’s office cited ethical misconduct as the primary basis for the investigation — specifically, Bourgeois’s alleged misuse of a prison ID badge and the creation of a “toxic” workplace that contributed to staff departures. The LinkedIn posts and Bourgeois’s refusal to follow restrictions during the investigation were cited in the termination letter.
Bourgeois’s account: Bourgeois stated publicly and in writing that the investigation and firing were retaliation for asserting the OCO’s independence from DOC. He characterized the Governor’s instructions as an improper intrusion on his role as an independent overseer and stated that his efforts to eradicate the OCO’s reputation as “beholden to DOC” had displeased the Governor’s office.
Neither account can be fully evaluated on the publicly available record. The Governor’s office declined to provide additional public comment. No independent investigation of the misconduct allegations was completed and published as of the date of this registry entry.
Institutional context
The OCO is established under Chapter 43.06C RCW as an independent office within the Governor’s Office. The statute does not specify grounds or procedures for the removal of the director, nor does it require legislative notification of a removal. The current enabling statute provides no formal protection against removal for cause related to the exercise of the office’s oversight functions.
As of May 2026, the OCO was operating under acting leadership, with the office having experienced both director removal and staff attrition during a period when it had an active investigation into WCCW and when DOJ subsequently opened a CRIPA investigation into the same facility.
What the primary sources say
Prison Legal News is the primary published account of the firing, reporting both the Governor’s stated grounds and Bourgeois’s responses. The Daily Fly confirmed that staff departures preceded the firing and that the Governor’s office declined to comment.
Status
No legal action has been filed. The OCO is operating under acting leadership. The Legislature has not publicly announced any review of the OCO enabling statute’s removal provisions. The DOJ CRIPA investigation of WCCW (WA-2026-DOJ-CRIPA-WCCW) is open and independent of the OCO directorship.
Why it’s in the registry
The registry documents structural threats to independent oversight bodies. The documented facts here — director removal, concurrent staff attrition, a disputed account of the basis for removal, and a concurrent federal civil rights investigation of a facility the OCO had recently investigated — constitute a documented institutional rupture. The registry takes no position on whether the Governor’s or Bourgeois’s account of the firing’s cause is accurate. The structural finding is that an independent ombuds office experienced both leadership removal and staff attrition during a window of heightened federal oversight activity, and that existing statute provides no procedural protection against this combination.
Reform implication
RCW 43.06C should be amended to specify that the OCO director may be removed only for stated cause, with a written documented record of findings, and with mandatory notification to the Legislature. The current statute’s silence on removal procedure means that the independence of the OCO is a function of executive discretion rather than law. An independent inspector general or ombuds office that can be removed by the Governor at will — for any reason, without a documented record — is not institutionally independent in the way the statute’s intent requires. See [reform: independent_inspector_general].
Reform implication
The factual record in this case — an OCO director fired after six months, during a window in which multiple staff departed and the DOJ opened a CRIPA investigation of a DOC facility — is a documented institutional rupture regardless of which account of the firing's cause is accurate. If the Governor's stated grounds are accurate — ethical misconduct, misuse of a prison ID badge, and creation of a toxic workplace — then the firing is a legitimate exercise of gubernatorial removal authority. The structural problem in that scenario is that the OCO enabling statute (Chapter 43.06C RCW) does not specify the grounds or process for director removal in a way that creates a documented record requirement or requires legislative notification. A removal for legitimate cause, conducted without a public record of the factual basis, is indistinguishable from a removal for retaliatory cause in the absence of that documentation. If Bourgeois's stated account is accurate — that the firing was retaliation for asserting independence from DOC — then the firing is a direct structural threat to the OCO's statutory function. The OCO exists to provide independent oversight of DOC. If the director of that office can be removed by the Governor for asserting independence from DOC, the independence is nominal. The concurrent facts are not disputed: (a) multiple OCO staff had resigned or gone on medical leave prior to the firing; (b) the OCO director was fired on April 24, 2026; (c) twenty-five days later, on May 19, 2026, DOJ opened a CRIPA investigation into WCCW, a DOC facility that the OCO had investigated in June 2025 (WA-2025-DOC-WCCW-FORCE); (d) the OCO is now operating under acting leadership. The reform argument does not depend on resolving the disputed factual question. Whether the firing was legitimate or retaliatory, the outcome is the same: an independent corrections oversight office lost its director and experienced significant staff attrition during the same window in which a federal civil rights investigation opened into a facility the office had recently investigated. That combination — staff attrition, director removal, concurrent federal escalation — is a documented institutional vulnerability that existing statute does not protect against. The required fix is statutory: RCW 43.06C should be amended to specify that the OCO director may be removed only for cause, with a documented record of findings, and with mandatory notification to the Legislature's relevant oversight committees. Without that protection, the independence of the OCO is a function of the executive's discretion rather than law. See [reform: independent_inspector_general].
Sources
- Washington Governor Fires Independent Prison Watchdog“Bourgeois added that it was his efforts to make the OCO less beholden to the state Department of Corrections that 'apparently displeased' Ferguson.”Primary → No archive copy yet
- Critics question WA's progress reducing solitary confinement in state prisons“Gov. Bob Ferguson fired its director, Jeremiah Bourgeois, last month amid allegations of ethical misconduct and fostering a hostile work environment that had led several employees to resign or take medical leave.”
- Tensions reach boiling point between governor, WA prison watchdog“Bourgeois raised concerns about the timing of the investigation, suggesting that the governor's office has improperly intruded on his role as an independent overseer.”