The Select Board voted last Wednesday night to allow Police Chief Dennis King to promote two of his department members, effective May 4.
Both lifelong Marblehead residents, Eric Osattin and Andrew DiMare were promoted to lieutenant and sergeant, respectively. King said, “Both have shown a commitment to other things that you do on the job than just traditional duties.”
Osattin, who earned a degree in business management from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in 2002, was appointed as a seasonal police officer in 2004, served as a 911 dispatcher in 2005, became a “permanent intermittent” police officer in August 2005, then was appointed as a full-time officer in November 2006.
In November 2014, Osattin was promoted to the rank of sergeant and assigned as the officer in charge, or shift commander, of the midnight and evening patrol divisions. He has also been assigned and appointed to various roles within the department, including: unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) unit commander, department-wide systems administrator, detail assignment officer and more.
Osattin is also a Massachusetts Licensed emergency medical technician (EMT) and United States Coast Guard (USCG) credentialed mariner.
King said Osattin’s promotion was “really perfect timing.”
“Probably overdue if you were to ask him, but perfect timing in that, you know, 11 years as a sergeant, you are a supervisor that has seen literally everything in a smaller town like Marblehead,” King said. “Sergeants and lieutenants, quite frankly, see things and often manage things together, so I think this is a great opportunity for him to go to that next level.
“A little bit of my experience with him, which makes me confident in making this recommendation, is he’s a leader, makes decisions that are sound, and he’s willing to defend and knows that in a time of crisis, the worst thing you can do is not make a decision.”
King added that Osattin’s actions as supervisor have been “beyond exemplary.”
“They’re always sound, and he is willing to go above and beyond, and that’s really important,” he said.
DiMare, who earned a Bachelor of Science in criminal justice from Roger Williams University in 2015, graduated from Reading Police Academy in August 2016 as a member of the 25th recruit officer class.
He has served as one of the department’s field training officers (FTOs) since the program’s formal inception in 2021, although he has been training others for his entire career. He is also Advanced Roadside Impaired Driving Enforcement (ARIDE) certified and is a valued trainer for the citizens police academy, where he teaches about traffic stops, operating under the influence enforcement, use of force and the Mobile Interactive Learning Object (MILO) simulator.
DiMare is also a member of the department’s drone unit and, according to King, “passionate about learning how new technology can be used and adapted to modern policing.”
“(DiMare) might say that he’s interested in being an officer that is interested in the law, and making sure our streets are safe by holding people accountable. Those are all things that we want to do, but he’s also the person that is willing to lend a hand to another officer in need, and he does that as an FTO,” King said.
He added that, with his decade of experience, DiMare is absolutely “ready to become a supervisor.”
There will be a formal promotional ceremony later this summer to honor both Osattin and DiMare, and King said other officers will be sworn in at that time as well.
