[conspire] Federales in Portland?

[Ruben Safir]

> 
> From my POV I'd prefer that statues of Columbo wouldn't be put down,
> but well, I'm not in the position to say what's right for people
> that have suffered discrimination and abuses for centuries.
> 
> So I'd say that my opinion doesn't matter 

Well my opinion matters.  Columbus was a great man who changed history
and deserves all the accoids he has ever gotten, although in Spain they
give credit to his second in command.

http://www.oregonlive.com/crime/2020/07/city-multnomah-county-detail-violence-cost-of-repairs-damage-in-response-to-dont-shoot-portlands-motion-to-restrict-tear-gas-less-lethal-weapons.htm


City details Portland protest violence, damage, cost of repairs in
response to motion to restrict tear gas, crowd control weapons
Updated Jul 07, 2020; Posted Jul 07, 2020
17

Photos filed by Police Bureau, Multnomah County Sheriff's Office
1.3k
shares
By Maxine Bernstein | The Oregonian/OregonLive

Portland police and Multnomah County sheriffs deputies have filed court
documents that give a day-by-day accounting of their protest response
over the last six weeks, including dozens of videos that show violence
downtown, photos of broken windows to courthouses and businesses and a
list of more than 100 fires set.

They estimated repair costs to public buildings approaching $300,000 so
far and $4.8 million in property damage to businesses.

The inventory was among more than 100 pages submitted to U.S. District
Court by the city and county to answer a lawsuit filed by Dont Shoot
Portland. The nonprofit group seeks to further bar use of tear gas,
pepper spray, foam-tipped rounds and other less-lethal weapons as crowd
control measures at protests.

This case is not about the thousands of people peacefully protesting,
Deputy City Attorney Naomi Sheffield wrote. It is also not about hateful
words or anti-police protests. The City and PPB support protestors
expression, regardless of content. This case is about the ability of PPB
to respond to a nightly deluge of dangerous objects thrown and launched
at them and at occupied buildings, nightly fires, and widespread
criminal activity.

U.S. District Judge Marco A. Hernandez on June 9 issued a temporary
restraining order restricting Portland police from using tear gas except
if lives or public safety are at risk. He amended the order on June 26,
adding less-lethal weapons to the restrictions and outright banning the
use of an ear-splitting warning signal.

Dont Shoot Portland has asked the judge to sanction the city for
allegedly violating his orders and extend the restrictions by granting a
preliminary injunction. A hearing is set for next Thursday and Friday.

Portland Police have demonstrated that they cannot be trusted to utilize
these riot control munitions without court intervention, wrote the
groups attorney, Juan Chavez.

After reviewing some of the citys and countys filings, Chavez said
Tuesday, The city spent a lot of time highlighting the criminal
behavior. They could have charged people responsible but havent and
instead have used a lot of force against peaceful protesters in the
crowd. I think theyve made our point for us.

Police have arrested more than 200 people in the protests since late
May, court records show.

Attorneys from the city and county argue that the violent circumstances
merit tear gas use. The Police Bureau and Sheriffs Office rules now in
place as well as a new state bill limiting tear gas to declared riots
provide sufficient guidance, they contend.

Plaintiffs condemn the Citys (a)ttempts to pit the actions of bad
protestors versus good protestors, Sheffield wrote. But that is exactly
what PPB is obligated to do -- facilitate the First Amendment rights of
persons engaged in peaceful protest and address persons engaged in
criminal activity.

At the same time, city attorneys proposed draft language if the judge
decides to issue more constraints.

It would make clear that officers cannot use tear gas and so-called
less-lethal impact rounds against people engaged in passive resistance
and cannot fire, launch or toss them indiscriminately into a crowd or
when escape avenues arent available. But officers could use them to
respond to a specific threat of physical harm to officers or others,
when reasonable.

The city also proposed additional limits on one of the categories of the
less-lethal rounds: rubber ball distraction devices. They can deliver
either blasts of light, sound and 180 rubber balls within a 50-foot
radius, or a cloud of pepper spray.

They could be used to stop or disrupt a group of people committing or
about to commit a crime or people engaged or intent on physical
resistance, according to the citys proposal. Or they could be used to
defend officers or others when other methods of force arent reasonable
or likely to harm uninvolved people.

The city cited a 2001 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that
found tear gas use by Eugene police was constitutional after police
warned protesters and there was no dispute that a small group in a crowd
had become violent.

Without the ability to use hand-tossed tear gas or pepper spray
canisters, rubber ball distraction devices or less-lethal launchers that
fire tear gas or foam-tipped projectiles, paint, powder or pepper spray
rounds, law enforcements ability to disburse an unlawful assembly would
require more significant physical force, Sheffield wrote.

Multnomah County was added as a defendant in Dont Shoot Portlands
complaint and its attorneys and sheriff filed papers supporting the city
and the Police Bureaus opposition to a preliminary injunction.

Andrew Jones, senior assistant county attorney, argued that the new
House Bill 4208 that bans tear gas use except when a riot is declared
and after warnings are given to disperse, gives Dont Shoot Portland the
protection sought.'

***

The city enumerated violence or threats to police and others on nearly a
nightly basis since May 29 since hundreds and sometimes thousands of
people have gathered to protest police brutality and systemic racism
after the death of George Floyd.

Many of the rallies have been peaceful, but police have declared civil
disturbances and riots as smaller groups of people have regularly thrown
objects, broken windows, spraypainted graffiti and targeted the Justice
Center downtown, nearby buildings and businesses and police offices in
North Portland.

Portland police said in the court documents that they have spent about
$7 million in overtime covering demonstrations through July 1.

The Police Bureau has requested staffing help from Oregon State Police,
the Multnomah County Sheriffs Office, Salem police, Port of Portland
police, Clark County Sheriffs Office, Washougal police and Vancouver
police, Deputy Police Chief Chris Davis said.

The city filed videos of people smashing windows, lobbing flares and
setting fire inside a Justice Center office late May 29. Another video
from June 25 shows flames shooting from a dumpster pressed against a
business complex that houses the bureaus North Precinct as the precincts
side doors were blocked with wooden beams and its security cameras
spray-painted to conceal footage.

The dumpster flames and a firework that landed on the precincts roof
prompted police to use tear gas to clear the crowd, according to Tony
Passadore, who was the nights incident commander.

One video showed a motorist stepping out of a car on Southwest Third
Avenue in downtown late on July 3 and aiming a handgun at the federal
courthouse as observers shouted, Gun! Gun!

Police also submitted videos of people tearing down plywood protecting
Central Precinct on the north side of the Justice Center, fires set
outside the Justice Center and federal courthouse, bottles and fireworks
lobbed at officers and videos of people breaking into downtown
businesses and rushing in to steal merchandise.

The city filed a spreadsheet identifying 144 fires that were reported to
emergency dispatch from May 29 through the morning of July 2 attributed
to the civil unrest.

Each police incident commander and a half-dozen leaders of Portlands
police Rapid Response Team squads or Mobile Field Forces filed sworn
statements describing what force they ordered or used, by date.

They and sheriffs supervisors also described changing tactics since the
installation of a fence after the May 29 incursion into the Justice
Center, which houses the downtown jail, the Sheriffs Office, courtrooms
as well as Central Precinct.

The fence was supposed to minimize police presence and protect the
Justice Center, attorneys wrote. But some people responded by trying to
dismantle it and threw objects over it.

The Police Bureau moved officers out of sight to try to reduce tensions,
police said in their sworn statements, but some people got past the
fencing and finally police had the fencing removed.

Then some protesters began vandalizing the Justice Center including
breaking windows, spray painting cameras, spray painting walls, and
pulling plywood boards off of windows in order to break them, police Lt.
Franz Schoening wrote in a statement. On multiple nights individuals
also blocked or locked the doors to the Justice Center from the outside.

***

Repair crews have been called to repeatedly fix broken windows at the
Justice Center and the Multnomah County Courthouse and third-party
vendors have been hired to board up the Justice Center portico, handle
the fencing and haul away debris, county property manager Michael Crank
said in the documents.

As of June 29, county repairs have cost $113,820, but the expenses are
expected to exceed $284,000 with outstanding invoices to fix broken
security cameras, windows, lights and the cost of putting fire retardant
material on external plywood, Crank said. As of Friday, 15 more windows,
for example, were broken at the main county courthouse, he said.

Fire medics reported responding to more than 42 protesters who have been
injured, according to Fire Lt. Damon Simmons. Some needed to go to a
hospital and others asked to be left alone. Among the reports: eye
irritation caused by pepper spray and injuries reported during arrests,
police pushing crowds or police firing less-lethal weapons; and injuries
caused by objects thrown by other protesters.

More than 32 officers also have been injured, many from items thrown at
them, including rocks, glass bottles, frozen water bottles, soup or beer
cans, fireworks, bricks and steel pellets from sling shots, the court
papers said.

One fire medic was struck in the stomach by a rock launched about one
city block away, Simmons wrote. The front of an officers uniform caught
on fire and another officer required stitches after being hit in the
face from a projectile, according to the city.

While not every such incident has resulted in force from law
enforcement, there has been a constant presence of threatening, violent,
destructive behavior from individuals in the area of the Justice Center
for more than a month, with no end in sight and no sign of improvement,
sheriffs Deputy Carey Kaer wrote.


> http://linuxmafia.com/mailman/listinfo/conspire
-- 
So many immigrant groups have swept through our town
that Brooklyn, like Atlantis, reaches mythological
proportions in the mind of the world - RI Safir 1998
http://www.mrbrklyn.com 

DRM is THEFT - We are the STAKEHOLDERS - RI Safir 2002
http://www.nylxs.com - Leadership Development in Free Software
http://www2.mrbrklyn.com/resources - Unpublished Archive 
http://www.coinhangout.com - coins!
http://www.brooklyn-living.com 

Being so tracked is for FARM ANIMALS and extermination camps, 
but incompatible with living as a free human being. -RI Safir 2013