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Police Surround, Detain 100 Protestors,
While Courts, US DOJ Finds Problematic Policing
Reporter Seeks Justice, Mayor Wants to Relax State Spying Standards

The ACLU and allies including the Oregon Justice Resource Center (OJRC) put out a statement shortly after the new kettling incident, noting the courts only protected individual officers from liability for their participation in a Bureau-approved tactic. The rulings do not address whether kettling is constitutional. In the statement, the groups called on the DOJ to investigate the PPB's protest tactics. Incidentally, of 100 people detained, only 13 were arrested (Oregonian, March 14).

In another lawsuit by OJRC, federal Judge Marco Hernandez contemplated what remedies to apply to the City, having found late last year they violated his order against the misuse of less-lethal weapons at a June protest. The current proposal is to require officers who carry such weapons ("grenadiers" and others) to wear body cameras (Oregonian, January 16). Portland Copwatch cautions that use of police cameras at protests would apparently be in violation of ORS 181A.250's provisions not to "collect or maintain" information on people's social, political or religious affiliations. PCW is officially neutral on the use of body cameras, but we advocate relying on community recording of officers rather than the other way around.

The DOJ's report about the City's violations of the 2012 Settlement Agreement (see DOJ article in this issue) listed incidents taking place in 2020 where officers (a) fired less lethal rounds at a person who was blocks away from a protest at the Justice Center after they engaged in a "furtive conversation," and (b) more generally used force against people who merely disobeyed orders to disperse. The PPB's rules say a person has to be engaged in "active resistance" before force is justified. The DOJ also questioned the Bureau re-defining violence when saying officers pushing a crowd with batons used "control against resistance" instead of baton strikes. Much has been made of the DOJ arguing that the Mayor should not have banned the use of tear gas (even though it wasn't strictly a ban), but the feds explained their concern was that the Settlement Agreement says any changes to PPB policies have to be cleared by the DOJ.

In an opinion piece published January 10, the Oregonian revealed they filed a complaint on behalf of Beth Nakamura, a reporter who was "gratuitously shoved by a Portland policeman with his baton." They also say photographers Dave Killen and Mark Graves were hit by police less lethal weapons, including pepper balls and tear gas. The piece implies Killen is working on a criminal complaint against protestors in Salem who pushed him down and says nothing about either man filing police misconduct complaints.

In related news:
--Public defenders are asking that federal charges of "civil disorder" be dropped against a protestor, based in part on the statute's racist history aimed at putting down the civil rights marches of Martin Luther King, Jr. (Oregonian, January 24).
--Officers dropped 38 calls to 911 in August in violation of Bureau policy; the City said protests were to blame (Oregonian, January 24).
--President Biden reversed last September's Justice Department memo calling Portland an "anarchist jurisdiction" (Oregonian, February 27).

There have also been sporadic protests in 2021, including some against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement buildings in South and NW Portland which were met with police violence from federal and local cops. The Bureau claimed officers didn't need crowd control training last year because they were getting "on the job" training. They now say they're giving updated training to all officers, It is not clear whether that will reinforce the ongoing tactics or move toward de- escalation.

Protest Report: Who Proofreads This Stuff?

In February, the City released a report from the National Police Foundation looking at Portland Police protest tactics. As the group is DC-based and made up mostly of retired officers, it's not surprising that most of the report focuses on how to keep doing command-and-control and weapons-based responses. There are a few recommendations to listen to the community more often. The legitimacy of the (very expensive) report is thrown into question, though, by their referring-- twice--to the death of George Floyd as a police shooting (Floyd famously died after an officer kneeled on him for 9 minutes) and cites a protest at Portland City Hall... in Portland, Maine.

May, 2021
Also in PPR #83

Portland Copwatch
PO Box 42456
Portland, OR 97242
(503) 236-3065/ Incident Report Line (503) 321-5120
e-mail: copwatch@portlandcopwatch.org

Portland Copwatch is a grassroots, volunteer organization promoting police accountability through citizen action.

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