TENINO, Wash. — Thurston County prosecutors are charging Tenino Mayor Wayne Fournier with misdemeanor assault after a female bartender said Fournier slapped a phone out of her hand in July.
Detectives said surveillance video taken around 1:30 a.m. on July 28 showed Fournier hitting the phone after a bartender at the Tenino Eagles club asked Fournier and his friends to leave.
She told police they had been disrespectful and were in a part of the bar off-limits to customers. The bartender said she was going to call police on the count of three, and that Fournier slapped the phone out of her hand when she got to the count of two, according to the police report.
Witnesses said after Fournier was told to leave, he began yelling, “Do you know who I am... I'm the f****** mayor of Tenino."
Fournier, who became Tenino’s mayor in 2016, did not reply to KING 5’s request for an interview.
Instead, his attorney Justin Kover released a one sentence statement: "We deny the charge of assault and will press Mr. Fournier's innocence as necessary."
Fournier is up for re-election in November. He is running unopposed. However, Fournier would not be re-elected if he withdrew his name, or if a write-in candidate received more votes.
He is also a firefighter for the City of Aberdeen.