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At least for Doucette, 40, “It’s not about gender. A lot of it has to do with how you carry yourself, and with how well you know your job.”
On Sunday, after more than 13 years in law enforcement, Patrol Sgt. Doucette becomes Lt. Doucette.
She said she’s honored by the promotion, and hopes to one day continue up the ladder, despite working in a field that is still dominated largely by men.
One of only three women on the Brunswick force, Doucette said most of her fellow officers really don’t see gender as an issue.
“All they really want is somebody who can do the job and do it well,” she said. “You have to prove yourself, but I don’t think that’s gender … once you go to a scene and they realize you’re capable of handling yourself, you get accepted.”
“Lynne is a very bright woman,” Brunswick Police Chief Richard Rizzo said. “She’s bright, a hard worker and dedicated. Her officers really liked her as a sergeant, and they’ll like her as a lieutenant.”
A member of the Brunswick police force since December 2003, Doucette was previously an officer in Winthrop.
From 2006 to 2008, she was a member of the department’s Criminal Investigations Division and was assigned to the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency, working as an undercover agent from Cumberland County to Penobscot County.
She says now that while she doesn’t necessarily miss the assignment, she misses her colleagues in the MDEA.
A member of the department’s defensive tactics team, Doucette trains Brunswick officers and those from other departments in open-hand combat — pepper spray and the expandable baton, for example.
A member of the International Association of Women Police and the National Association of Women Law Enforcement Executives, she also writes for “Police Magazine” on such topics as “Tactics Training for Female Officers,” “Tips for Surviving Third Shift,” and “Welcoming Females into Law Enforcement.”
Some small departments in Maine have no female officers, Doucette said, while the national average falls somewhere between 10 and 12 percent.
“Sometimes I’ll go somewhere and a little girl will say, ‘Look Mommy, it’s a girl,’” she said. “There are no female role models in this field.”
Doucette credits groundbreakers like former Brunswick Police Detective Inez Dudley for entering the field when women were scarce and coping with severe gender struggles.
She holds an associate’s degree in criminal justice and is one course shy of a bachelor’s degree in public administration. She’s begun looking at master’s programs, she said.
“I’ll definitely continue up the ladder, and I’m educating myself to do so,” she said.
bbrogan@timesrecord.com
