Portland police disperse protesters Saturday night, riot declared Friday night

portland

Reports by media including AP and CNN said:

In Portland, Oregon, about 70 demonstrators assembled outside Portland Police Bureau’s East Precinct Saturday night.

When the group pushed two dumpsters into the street at around 10:30 p.m., police declared an unlawful assembly and officers moved in. There were no arrests and no reported injuries.

The police called the demonstrators a “hostile crowd” and said officers acted because they were concerned the marchers would block the precinct’s doors with the dumpsters and set fires in them.

“Many in the group wore helmets, body armor and had heavy backpacks, which was consistent with the characteristics of those intent on criminal behavior,” police said in a statement.

The confrontation outside the East Precinct, on Southeast 106th Avenue, came a day after police declared a riot on a night that saw downtown Portland hit with destructive fires, smashed windows and spray-painted storefronts following Friday’s fatal police shooting of a man at Lents Park in Southeast Portland.

Police in Portland said Saturday they arrested four people after declaring a riot Friday night when protesters smashed windows, burglarized businesses and set multiple fires during demonstrations.

Police said they dispersed the crowd so firefighting crews could douse fires before they spread in extreme fire hazard conditions.

The vandalism downtown came after the police shooting earlier Friday and also was part of vigils and demonstrations already planned for the night in the name of people killed in police shootings nationwide. They include 13-year-old Adam Toledo of Chicago and Daunte Wright, a Black man in a Minneapolis suburb.

Deputy Police Chief Chris Davis told reporters a white man in his 30s had been shot and killed in Portland by police. The man was pronounced dead at the scene in Lents Park, a leafy, residential neighborhood of the city.

Two officers fired a 40mm device that shoots non-lethal projectiles, and one officer — an eight-year veteran — fired a gun, police said in a statement. Police identified the officer who fired his gun as Zachary Delong. He is on paid administrative leave, authorities said.

Davis did not know if the man who died had pointed a weapon at the officers and did not say how many shots were fired. A witness who spoke to reporters at the scene said the man, who had removed his shirt and was blocking an intersection, appeared to be in a mental health crisis.

The police investigation into the shooting was hampered by a crowd of “fairly aggressive people” who showed up at the park within two hours of the shooting. Those arrested could face charges ranging from assaulting a public safety officer to criminal mischief.

There were no reports of injuries to police.

As investigators worked the scene of the shooting and huddled over a covered body, nearly 100 yards (91 meters) away, a crowd of more than 150 people — many dressed in all black and some carrying helmets, goggles and gas masks — gathered behind crime scene tape, chanting and yelling at officers standing in front of them.

“We’ve had to summon just about every police officer in Multnomah County to keep this group far enough away … to preserve what we refer to in our business as the integrity of the scene, so that nobody who shouldn’t be in there goes in there,” Davis said, adding that deputies with county sheriff’s office were also helping.

The crowd later marched through the park, ripped down police tape and stood face to face with officers dressed in riot gear. Police left the park around 3:30 p.m., and the crowd eventually stood in a nearby intersection, blocking traffic and chanting.

Police said they had used pepper spray on protesters in order to keep them away. Some people hit officers with sticks and chased them as they were leaving, police said in a news release. Officers deployed smoke canisters and then used a rubber ball distraction device, police said.

Portland has been the site of frequent protests, many involving violent clashes between officers and demonstrators, since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May.

Over the summer, there were demonstrations for more than 100 straight days. Earlier this week, a crowd set a fire outside the city’s police union headquarters following recent fatal police shootings in Chicago and Minneapolis.

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler has decried what he described as a segment of violent agitators who detract from the message of police accountability and should be subject to more severe punishment.

Wheeler visited the Friday shooting scene and issued a statement urging Portland residents to “proceed with empathy and peace” while the investigation unfolds.

Todd Littlefield, who lives near where the shooting happened, told The Oregonian/OregonLive that he went to the park after he heard gunfire.

Littlefield said he saw several officers standing behind trees and their cars, ordering a man to show his hands.

Juan Chavez, an attendant at a nearby gas station, said he saw a man standing in the middle of the intersection, blocking traffic, with his shirt off. He appeared to be unstable and disoriented, Chavez told the newspaper.

Police then showed up, and the man entered the park before Chavez said he heard two gunshots.

Portland Fire & Rescue was called to extinguish at least two fires that had been set along SW 4th Avenue, the police said.

As in cities across the U.S., protests erupted in Portland late last spring over the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police and expanded to include demands for police accountability and prosecutorial reform in the cases of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Elijah McClain and other Black victims.


GET COUNTERCURRENTS DAILY NEWSLETTER STRAIGHT TO YOUR INBOX


 

Support Countercurrents

Countercurrents is answerable only to our readers. Support honest journalism because we have no PLANET B.
Become a Patron at Patreon

Join Our Newsletter

GET COUNTERCURRENTS DAILY NEWSLETTER STRAIGHT TO YOUR INBOX

Join our WhatsApp and Telegram Channels

Get CounterCurrents updates on our WhatsApp and Telegram Channels

Related Posts

How Can you!

Without radical action, there is no “reforming” ingrained issues of supremacy and racism in the US Image: Several hundred people march on Flatbush Ave. in Brooklyn on Friday to protest…

The Rittenhouse Verdict

Fanon had written that the colonized belonged to a higher cognitive category than the colonizer for a simple reason: The colonized have to be able to think of themselves and…

Join Our Newsletter


Annual Subscription

Join Countercurrents Annual Fund Raising Campaign and help us

Latest News