Sixty-eight days after being forced to resign following July’s Bite of Seattle mass shooting, former Seattle police Chief Shon Barnes landed a new job selling technology to law enforcement agencies across the U.S.
In a Tuesday statement, Arizona-based MissionRT announced Barnes’ hiring as head of public safety programs and strategy. The company sells advanced surveillance systems" and tools like drones and body-worn cameras to federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, according to its website.
In the new job, Barnes will talk to “police executives” about MissionRT’s products, then help craft strategies for implementing them. The company says his work will draw from his experiences as police chief in Madison, Wis., and Seattle, including leading Madison’s body-worn camera pilot and overseeing Seattle’s Real Time Crime Center.
"I am not leaving the mission of policing,” Barnes said in MissionRT’s statement. I know what it means to be accountable for the people you lead and the communities you serve. Chiefs need partners who understand that responsibility.”
The statement did not mention how Barnes’ career ended in Seattle, where he served as police chief for about a year and a half before Mayor Katie Wilson asked for his resignation.
Barnes and representatives for MissionRT did not immediately respond Wednesday to inquiries. A photo of Barnes on the company’s website shows him in his Seattle police uniform.
Barnes’ career in Seattle had a promising start as he tried steering the city’s Police Department out of a period mired in scandal and discord.
Former Mayor Bruce Harrell appointed Barnes chief in December 2024, the same month he fired Barnes' predecessor Adrian Diaz. The former chief's four-year tenure saw an exodus of officers, an alleged affair between Diaz and his chief of staff and a string of sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuits from members of his command staff and other employees.
Barnes — a former high school history teacher and Marine — took over as interim chief in January 2025. The City Council unanimously confirmed him as the city’s 38th police chief six months later, saying he had already begun to turn the department around.
“This is where I want to end my career,” Barnes said at the time.
Barnes’ dream abruptly ended about a year later, days after a July 26 shooting at Seattle Center killed three people and injured at least four others. When the gunfire broke out, Barnes was in Dallas attending the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives conference.
Wilson and the Seattle Police Department faced intense criticism for their bungled response after the shooting, including a communication breakdown between city officials that left residents in the dark for five hours about what happened.
Barnes also faced scrutiny for his absence, and had a heated exchange the next day with a journalist who asked about reports he spent many weekends visiting family in Chicago.
At Wilson’s request, Barnes submitted his letter of resignation four days after the shooting. He received nearly $600,000 in a settlement agreement with the city. As part of the settlement, Barnes agreed not to sue the city.
In an August interview, Barnes disputed allegations that his out-of-town travel interfered with the department’s response to the shooting. He also dismissed criticism that his out-of-state travel to visit family or attend law enforcement-related conferences affected his overall job performance.
In a statement posted Tuesday on LinkedIn, Barnes said his work at MissionRT would help police agencies be “prepared to respond, equipped to make sound decisions, and able to adapt while remaining accountable to the communities they serve.”
“Community members deserve clear explanations of a technology’s purpose, its limits, and the safeguards governing its use,” Barnes wrote.
A pair of audits released last week by the city auditor’s office and the city’s inspector general for public safety raised questions about the Seattle Police Department’s use of surveillance technology last year, when Barnes was still chief.
The city auditor’s office report revealed Seattle police for months accessed and recorded internal city traffic camera streams that were not available to the public, despite a Transportation Department policy barring its cameras from being used for law enforcement purposes.
The inspector general’s report found Seattle police did not develop a criteria or guidance on how they would use privately owned cameras before launching a program last April to integrate them into the Real Time Crime Center.
The technology behind the crime center — along with the Seattle Police Department's Tasers, body-worn cameras, automated license plate readers and digital evidence management system — is made by police tech giant Axon.
Before launching MissionRT in 2024, Richard Coleman was president of Axon Federal, where he sold the $3.4 billion company's products to federal agencies like the U.S. Forest Service and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
It's unclear if the company has ever contacted Seattle police about their products. There are no records of any contracts between the city of Seattle and MissionRT. Representatives for the Police Department did not immediately respond Wednesday evening to an inquiry.
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