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 THE CHASSE SCENE: This photo taken by an eyewitness shows emergency responders standing around a hogtied James Chasse Jr. IMAGE: JAMIE MARQUEZ |
[November 1st, 2006]
Beyond that, there are mostly questions.
Chasse, 42, died Sept. 17 after an encounter with police in the heart of Portland's chichi Pearl District. The schizophrenic man who was known to friends as "Jim Jim" was, according to one officer's testimony, "doing something suspicious or acting just, um, odd."
When Multnomah County Sheriff's Deputy Brad Burton and Portland Police Officer Christopher Humphreys approached Chasse, he ran and the officers ran after him. Portland Police Sgt. Kyle Nice was also nearby and responded.
Police estimate that initial contact took place at 5:18 pm. Chasse was pronounced dead by Providence Hospital staff at 7:04 pm. The events of that one hour and 46 minutes (the length of the movie The Usual Suspects) are already the subject of much debate in the city and will almost certainly be the subject of litigation.
Police Chief Rosie Sizer may be right to denounce those who plastered fliers with the officers' pictures and the incitement "Stop me before I kill again!" on telephone poles in Northeast Portland. That will only widen the rift between Portlanders and their police department.
But she was only half right when she urged in The Oregonian last week, "What would be productive at this point is a focus on the larger picture. Although this death is a tremendous tragedy, the real debate should focus on how our society is fulfilling its caretaker role for people who suffer from mental illness."
No one's saying that debate shouldn't happen. And Portland Mayor Tom Potter took an important step when he announced on Monday he wants to spend $500,000 to train patrol officers in crisis management.
But a review by WW of transcripts, reports and data from the police and medical examiner, along with other interviews, make it clear that this case still demands more scrutiny. And answers.
The incident should be probed further until a full picture emerges of the events that led to James Chasse's death.
"To place any of the burden on [Chasse's] shoulders or the mental-health system is a diversion," says Jason Renaud, a volunteer with the Mental Health Association of Portland. "Police brutality and mental-health reform are separate issues. By tangling them up, you won't solve either one of them."
Let's start with the question of "police brutality."
The official investigation concluded that Chasse died from "broad-based" trauma to his chest, caused solely when Officer Humphreys accidentally fell on top of Chasse. Chasse weighed 145 pounds. Humphreys outweighs him by about 100 pounds.
One month after Chasse died, the Portland Police Bureau said, "Based on all the information available at this time, evidence suggests that the pursuing officer landed on Mr. Chasse as they fell to the ground" and noted that the injuries were "consistent with [a] body landing on Mr. Chasse against [a] hard surface."
The bureau relied on the finding by the state's chief medical examiner, Karen Gunson, that Chasse was killed by "blunt force chest trauma" that was caused "by another person or a fall."
The Multnomah County district attorney's office presented a grand jury with this evidence and testimony from 30 witnesses. On Oct. 17, grand jury members cleared the officers of any criminal wrongdoing. The officers may still be subject to disciplinary action if a department review finds they violated any Bureau policies.
Some, however, balked at the ruling.
Oregonian columnist Steve Duin wrote in an online column on Oct. 21: "The veteran rugby player at The Oregonian was one of the first to ridicule the laughable assertion ... [Chasse] died because a cop fell on top of him, fracturing 16 of his ribs and breaking a total of 26 different bones in the front and back of his rib cage. If that's the way it worked, he said, a dozen rugby players would die every weekend out at Delta Park."
Portland lawyer Tom Steenson, who represents Chasse's family, hired one of the most experienced and storied pathologists in Oregon, Dr. William J. Brady. Already Brady has raised serious questions about the official explanation of events, based on the information in the medical examiner's report.
 Chasse in 2004 |
He expects to complete his own autopsy of Chasse in the coming weeks. Brady is also asking questions about the lack of injury to Chasse's joints and extremities, which are more fragile than the body's core and normally more susceptible to breaks.
According to Steenson, Brady is also questioning whether the location and severity of the fractures is consistent with someone falling on him. Brady believes they may have instead been caused by police violence.
If the medical nuances are difficult for a layperson to sort through, the inconsistencies in the eyewitness accounts are even more confusing.
Humphreys told investigators he didn't fall on Chasse. "I just went boom, down right on the ground," he said. "I fell on the sidewalk. I went right, right over and past him."
Burton couldn't remember exactly what happened. Nice reported, "It appeared that Officer Humphreys kind of landed slightly off the subject. Kind of half on his right side and half on the ground."
Police have said that even though the officers' accounts don't agree, the sum of the available information, which also includes interviews with witnesses (that have not yet been released to the public), points to Humphreys falling on Chasse.
Critics have pointed to the inconsistency in the cops' testimony as evidence the bureau is just trying to protect itself. But wouldn't it be even more suspicious if their stories matched up on every point?
Daniel Reisberg, chairman of the psychology department at Reed College, studies eyewitness testimony. He says there's no hard-and-fast rule about which witnesses to trust when they give differing accounts of the same event.
"Even if the witnesses are being totally honest and sincere, and as accurate as they can be, it's still possible—maybe even easy—for them to remember things differently," says Reisberg, who could offer no comment on the specifics of the Chasse case.
Memory, he says, is not just a video replay of what happened. It includes what one was paying attention to, a mix of what one sees and what one expects to see, and even information that one takes in after an event.
If Humphreys didn't fall on Chasse, how did he sustain his injuries? The only obvious answer is: from a beating.
There is no dispute that once Chasse was on the ground, police punched and kicked him repeatedly in their struggle to restrain him.
As uncomfortable as it is to talk about, officers do not appear to have encountered the kind, gentle Jim Jim whose persona has emerged from the recollection of family and friends since his death.
By all accounts Chasse was scared and fought back mightily—both before and after police tried to use a Taser on him.
"I've never seen anybody look at me like that with the sheer terror in their eyes," Humphreys recalled.
"He was pretty wild-eyed during the whole thing and, uh, just grittin' his teeth and snapping," Burton says. "He was just sort of blindly fighting as hard as he could."
Chasse's ferocity took the officers by surprise.
"He was twisting and turning so that it looked like he was possibly pulling his, uh, shoulders out of socket," Burton told investigators. "At one point he had his, you know, his legs facing the ground and his chest facing us, and then vice-versa and, and kicking and screaming."
According to their testimony to investigators, the officers struck Chasse as he tried to bite them while they were attempting to place him in restraints.
"As he's squirming around and not putting his hands behind his back and biting and kicking, um, I had, I punched him, I believe, once, maybe, maybe more in the, in the back.... At some point either before or after the Tasing I had used the knuckle of my right index finger and just sort of pressure-pointed his ribs for pain compliance," Burton told investigators.
"I don't see Mr. Chasse's head, but I see Sgt. Nice, uh, strike one time, one time with a closed fist," Humphreys told investigators. "Um, I didn't actually see where it landed, but it was up in the shoulder/head area."
And a little later, Humphreys continued, "I just see teeth as he's coming up. And I mean, his teeth are right on my arm. I pull my fist back and uh, uh, basically just use my forearm and I just draw it back and it strikes him across the face and then I come down with a closed fist strike across Mr. Chasse's face."
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 One anti-cop poster from Northeast Portland. |
Nice told investigators, "I looked down, and he had rolled up on his side again and gotten a hold of the cuff of my right pant leg with his teeth again. I pulled my right foot back and kicked him in the upper chest. I told him, 'Don't [bite] me.'"
Nice also described putting a knee into Chasse's shoulder blade in order to pin him down.
Despite those blows, state medical examiner Gunson told WW the injuries that killed Chasse were not consistent with the individual impacts of punches and kicks.
According to her findings, which the grand jury decision supports, the strikes by officers were incidental to his death and not the main cause.
In the coming months, the Bureau will review whether the officers' blows were an appropriate reaction to Chasse's behavior.
But even if they determine the entire incident followed policy, it doesn't controvert the astonishing fact, first reported by WW, that Humphreys is one of the department's top force users.
Last Tuesday, police released data on its officers' use of force to WW under a public-records request. After analyzing the data, WW on Wednesday broke the news on its website that only one other officer at the Police Bureau has used more force than Humphreys since the department started to track those figures a couple of years ago (see "Chasse Cop's History," wweek.com, Oct. 25, 2006).
According to the database, which includes more than 8,500 reports from 785 officers, Humphreys is No. 2, with 78 recorded incidents in approximately two and a half years. A further breakdown shows he is also among the top officers for striking suspects and for incidents in which suspects were injured. Of 17 injuries linked to Humphreys, two suspects were taken to a hospital.
Humphreys and 12 other officers make up a vastly disproportionate percentage of force incidents. Out of about 1,000 officers, the 13 are responsible for 10 percent of all use-of-force incidents, WW found. Police say it's unfair not to consider officers' assignments when comparing officers' uses of force.
Humphreys' supervisor says his numbers are higher than other officers' because he frequently arrests suspects in drug stings around the transit lines. After police completed their investigation, Humphreys resumed his duties.
Last Friday, both The Oregonian and the Portland Tribune reported the city had already paid out $90,000 last year to settle an excessive-force claim involving Humphreys. In it, Humphreys was accused of striking a man 30 times with his baton before he discovered the man wasn't the suspect he was after. Under the settlement, Humphreys and the other officers involved admitted no wrongdoing.
According to the Police Bureau's internal-affairs division, Humphreys, a seven-year department veteran, has seven complaints in his file dating back to 1999. He has two from this year, and before that the most recent one dates from 2003. At the same time, Humphreys also has 13 commendations or citizens' letters of appreciation in his file and was the recipient of the department's highest honor, the Medal of Valor, for helping to save four people from an apartment fire.
Even if Chasse's injuries were completely accidental, it doesn't explain why he never received the medical attention that might have saved his life.
According to a police timeline, Sgt. Nice called for a "Code 3 Medical respond for an unconscious male" about five minutes after the initial contact with Chasse. They thought perhaps he had suffered a drug overdose, Burton told investigators.
Medics from American Medical Response, the ambulance company that holds the exclusive county contract for emergency services, arrived in less than three minutes. They were on the scene, along with medically trained Portland firefighters, for the next 16 minutes.
According to a "Fact Sheet" on the incident released by police Oct. 17, AMR medics checked Chasse's vital signs and found them normal—his blood pressure 110/73, a pulse of 100 beats per minute and a respiration rate of 18 to 20 breaths per minute. They also reported Chasse fought them as they tried to render aid.
 Chief Rosie Sizer says we should be focusing on our mental-health system. |
Chasse family attorney Steenson says Brady believes it unlikely that Chasse's vital signs would have been normal, given the extent of his injuries.
Once medics had examined Chasse, Nice says he "had some conversations with the ambulance staff. I confirmed he was stable. ... They offered, they asked if I wanted him transported [to a hospital]. I said no, we have criminal charges on him."
AMR employees later declined to be interviewed by Portland police detectives about what happened. That's because under federal law they're not allowed to talk about patient information without a subpoena, says Randy Lauer, AMR's regional director of Oregon operations. They did testify, however, before the grand jury.
The protocol for medical response is that if a patient is unconscious, medics have his "implied consent" to take him to the hospital. But if the patient's legal guardian is present, the guardian gets to make the decision. According to the medical examiner's narrative, medics say they left the decision up to the officers.
David Lillegaard, who works near the Chasse scene at Rudy's Barbershop, didn't see the initial fight, but witnessed what happened right afterward from 20 to 30 feet away. He says Chasse appeared to be unconscious for at least part of the time emergency responders evaluated him.
"At one point I thought he was dead," says Lillegaard. "To me, from that situation, there didn't seem to be a reason not to take him to the hospital—just from the blood on the ground and the fact he was passed out."
Lillegaard also says officers nudged Chasse with their feet from time to time as if to check whether he was conscious.
Humphreys rode with Chasse to the Multnomah County Detention Center downtown and told investigators that Chasse did not complain of injuries. He said Chasse did talk, but "a lot of it was that same like a mumble, mumble, mumble...like a gibberish," Humphreys told investigators. "I get about halfway through his Miranda rights and, uh, he goes, 'What did I do, what did I do?'"
So, either Chasse had massive internal injuries that no one detected at the scene or they occurred later—sometime in the four minutes between the ambulance leaving and the officers leaving to transport Chasse to jail, hogtied in the back of the police car, or in the eight additional minutes it took them to arrive at the jail. (Though no one, so far, is suggesting that happened.)
Once he arrived at the jail, the county medical staff took one look at Chasse though a window in his cell and decided he wasn't in good enough shape for them to admit him. A jail nurse described him as "twitchy," which Steenson believes may be evidence he was having seizures.
County policy says the jail does not accept inmates who are in need of more than minor medical attention.
Humphreys and Burton once again loaded Chasse in the back of a patrol car. On the way to the hospital, it became clear something was seriously wrong with Chasse. Humphreys looked back at their prisoner and saw his arm was stark white.
They pulled over and tried to resuscitate Chasse. Medics arrived within five minutes but could not save him.
While many questions remain, one thing is certain: The death of James Chasse at the hands of Portland police has galvanized the community as few events in the city's recent history have—and many are using it as a touchstone to call for additional police training and mental-health services.
Among several hundred people who turned out for a public memorial last Friday at the First Congregational United Church of Christ was Bill Faricy of Southeast Portland, one of many in the crowd who had never met Chasse.
"It seems like the pattern we're supposed to accept is, about one civilian a year gets killed," he says. "I don't want to see this die down. I don't want to see it be another 'incident.'"
WW intern Alice Joy contributed to this story.
For physical force used to restrain suspects (such as "take downs," "pressure points" and "control holds," but not including just placing a suspect in handcuffs), Humphreys is tied for No. 2 among the 422 officers who reported using that type of force.
Among officers whose uses of force caused injury to suspects, Humphreys is No. 5 out of 413 officers who reported injuring suspects. Suspects were injured in 17 of his 78 incidents—that's more than one injury for every five uses of force and higher than the overall average.
The Portland Police Bureau's top 33 officers who reported using force since the department started tracking those statistics are responsible for 20 percent of all uses of force. They make up just more than 4 percent of officers who reported using force and an even smaller percentage of the overall department.
Dr. William Brady was fired from his job as the state medical examiner in the mid-'80s for selling tissue samples from bodies to pay for office amenities. He sued, and a jury sided with him, awarding him $300,000.
An extensive archive of local media stories about the Chasse case, as well as primary source documents and photos, can be found at mentalhealthportland.org.
wweek is doing a fantastic job....
it is high time that portland residents start the motion to recall the mayor.
reform can only happen when the top brass is removed and corruption/cover up is exposed
The following is from an article in The New Yorker by Malcolm Gladwell (who wrote "The Tipping Point") and is relevant to the situation in Portland. The full article can be read here: www.newyorker.com/fact/content/arti...
Fifteen years ago, after the Rodney King beating, the Los Angeles Police Department was in crisis. It was accused of racial insensitivity and ill discipline and violence, and the assumption was that those problems had spread broadly throughout the rank and file. In the language of statisticians, it was thought that L.A.P.D.'s troubles had a "normal" distribution—that if you graphed them the result would look like a bell curve, with a small number of officers at one end of the curve, a small number at the other end, and the bulk of the problem situated in the middle. The bell-curve assumption has become so much a part of our mental architecture that we tend to use it to organize experience automatically.
But when the L.A.P.D. was investigated by a special commission headed by Warren Christopher, a very different picture emerged. Between 1986 and 1990, allegations of excessive force or improper tactics were made against eighteen hundred of the eighty-five hundred officers in the L.A.P.D. The broad middle had scarcely been accused of anything. Furthermore, more than fourteen hundred officers had only one or two allegations made against them—and bear in mind that these were not proven charges, that they happened in a four-year period, and that allegations of excessive force are an inevitable feature of urban police work. (The N.Y.P.D. receives about three thousand such complaints a year.) A hundred and eighty-three officers, however, had four or more complaints against them, forty-four officers had six or more complaints, sixteen had eight or more, and one had sixteen complaints. If you were to graph the troubles of the L.A.P.D., it wouldn't look like a bell curve. It would look more like a hockey stick. It would follow what statisticians call a "power law" distribution—where all the activity is not in the middle but at one extreme.
The Christopher Commission's report repeatedly comes back to what it describes as the extreme concentration of problematic officers. One officer had been the subject of thirteen allegations of excessive use of force, five other complaints, twenty-eight "use of force reports" (that is, documented, internal accounts of inappropriate behavior), and one shooting. Another had six excessive-force complaints, nineteen other complaints, ten use-of-force reports, and three shootings. A third had twenty-seven use-of-force reports, and a fourth had thirty-five. Another had a file full of complaints for doing things like "striking an arrestee on the back of the neck with the butt of a shotgun for no apparent reason while the arrestee was kneeling and handcuffed," beating up a thirteen-year-old juvenile, and throwing an arrestee from his chair and kicking him in the back and side of the head while he was handcuffed and lying on his stomach.
The report gives the strong impression that if you fired those forty-four cops the L.A.P.D. would suddenly become a pretty well-functioning police department. But the report also suggests that the problem is tougher than it seems, because those forty-four bad cops were so bad that the institutional mechanisms in place to get rid of bad apples clearly weren't working. If you made the mistake of assuming that the department's troubles fell into a normal distribution, you'd propose solutions that would raise the performance of the middle—like better training or better hiring—when the middle didn't need help. For those hard-core few who did need help, meanwhile, the medicine that helped the middle wouldn't be nearly strong enough.
Quote: "I've never seen anybody look at me like that with the sheer terror in their eyes," PPB's Christopher Humphreys recalled.
If Humphreys wasn't such a simpleton, he'd damned
well realize what everyone of us out here do...that
James Chasse had such "sheer terror in his eyes"
because he saw an evil out-of-control thug with a
PPB uniform on that was kicking him to death.
Sorry, Humphreys. This is a NO BRAINER!
Wise up and get smart like the rest of us out here
and grab a mirror and look in it...then you'll see
why James Chase had such a look of horror in his
eyes.
All of us have the same sense of horror that guys
like you keep your job...to kill again. The only
question is....WHO?
I dunno. Portland seems to have a history of corrupt and goon cops. Yet the people keep re-electing the same political hacks who keep them in their jobs. Seems to me that Portlanders are getting excactly what they deserve!
Thank you WW for your article. I certainly hope someone steps up to the plate and makes the police officer responsible for his actions, instead of blaming it on social services or any one else. There have been far to many useless killings by police officers in this city and it is high time they be punished the same as any other individual would be. Maybe we need Adam Schiff and Jack McCoy to do the prosecuting.
Portlanders are shocked when incidents like this happen and yet elect an ex-cop as Mayor. How does one expect any reform to occur when the man leading the City is a product of the system they want reformed? Are people too obtuse to understand? Nothing is going to change with Police Chief Emeritus Potter running the City. How much does Potter get from his Police Pension?
Clearly the FBI needs to investigate PPB and get to
the bottom of this so obvious "cover-up" as it is
all too obvious Tom Potter/PPB/PPA are incapable of
being just and honest in this case.
Why did Chasse Die?
You may have answered your own question:
--------
"As uncomfortable as it is to talk about, officers do not appear to have encountered the kind, gentle Jim Jim whose persona has emerged from the recollection of family and friends since his death."
--------
Uncomfortable to talk about?
You mean ... the Truth!??!!?
In other words: It is now possible, and actually very likely, that Chasse was BELIGERANT and DANGEROUS and possibly POSING A DANGER TO OTHERS HAD HE BEEN RELEASED. Did cops use excessive force in restraining him that led to his death? Maybe, maybe not. BUT THE COPS WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN PILING ON HIM IN THE FIRST PLACE IF HE WAS SIMPLY WALKING DOWN THE STREET WHISTLING A HAPPY TUNE.
Listen, cops don't just walk up to people and pile on just because it's a sunny day.
Cops don't wake up every morning saying to themself "Gee, I wonder what I can do today that will result in me getting CALLED BEFORE A REVIEW BOARD!?"
Cops don't patrol up and down Broadway simply looking for innocent Liberals to confront (despite what WW wants to believe).
In fact, the city government is now run by a Loony Leftie ex-Police Chief (Potter). Potter, in turn, was head of the Portland Police for a long time. So, if there is any criticism about how the police are trained/disciplined, THE BLAME SHOULD BE ON POTTER'S LEGACY AND OTHER LIBERALS WHO RUN THIS CITY.
Yet, reading between the lines, WW is just dying to try to find a link between Chasse's death and the current administration of George W. Bush.
Sorry, WW, there's no link. Chasse's death has nothing to do with Bush,
nothing to do with Conservatives,
nothing to do with NeoCons,
nothing to do with Mannix,
nothing to do with the GOP,
nothing to do with rich white men,
nothing to do with oil interests
nothing to do with global warming
nothing to do with the spotted owl
nothing to do with Lars
nothing to do with Rove
nothing to do with 'da man'
nothing to do with the Chamber
... nor any of your other favorite targets, WW.
Deal with it: Chasse died because of an unfortunate set of circumstances that in a city of our size is bound to happen from time to time. I'm not apologizing for it nor defending it nor happy with it: It's just that your not going to solve anything by trying to blow it up into a larger conspiracy that it is not.
A SENSELESS KILLING AND IT LEAVES ME NAUSEATED.
Is it any wonder James ran from the police? After reading many of the articles about his death I think I might run if confronted by one of Portland's Finest Thugs. I seem to recall one officer saying that James looked away from them at one point and that this made the officer suspicious. I'm not sure I want to look Police thugs in the eye. It used to be that folks didn't go "downtown" for fear of getting panhandled. I think now folks should fear going downtown for fear of being murdered by the police.
On Nov 1st, 2006 10:16am an "Interested Reader" wrote:
"Actually, the injuries that killed [Chasse] were due to a large force that spanned his upper torso. If the injuries had come from kicks and punches, such as in a "beating," he would have had broken rib here and there, but the breaks wouldn't line up the way they did."
Just who are you to assert such a statement? What are your qualifications and credentials? Did you examine the body? I appreciate the criticism, but before you start libeling reporters who are informing the public and doing a service to our community, identify yourself. An anonymous critique is about as progressive as printing lies.
My guess is that you are of the conservative breed of asses who keep killer-cops employed. I might be wrong, but the tone of your comments makes me feel like you might want to reach out and hit somebody.
If you're going to defend murderers, show your face, let people verify for themselves your defense. Your lack of transparency makes me think you are afraid of exposing yourself to the truth: you know this is a case about police brutality and you just want to divert attention to semantics.
I'm quite disappointed, "Interested Reader," in your inability to watch yourself. Look in the mirror, look into your two eyes, and make sure you're not out on the war path to get someone because you sound dangerous brother.
Lesson to everybody: be responsible for what you do.
I see some concerned comments here, as well there should be. These questions over James Chasse's death need to be answered, not only for the family and friends he leaves behind, but for the entire community as well. I commend WW for writing this article. Thank you.
I also read other comments from people here defending PPB and finding fault with nearly everyone else, from Mr. Chasse himself to liberals to Steve Duin and Dr. Brady...
I question the motives of people who defend the police actions in situations like these. Spin it any way you like, but meanwhile, James Chasse is dead. And all of the rationalizations and excuses in the world are not going to change that fact, or the responsibility shared by PPB, AMR, and MCSO for Mr. Chasse's death.
Mr. Chasse was committing no crime. By their own admission, the police encounter with Mr. Chasse began because he was "doing something suspicious or acting just, um, odd." Which was it, suspicious or odd? Groping for excuses, officer? And that is the best you can articulate of the reasons that led to this man's death? And since when is it a crime to be "odd?" Not one of the many people in that area had called PPB to report that Mr. Chasse was causing any trouble there. No, there was no problem until PPB and MCSO showed up.
How officers initially approach individuals in situations like these can make all the difference. Officers that come across as threatening or heavy handed are asking for trouble from anyone, especially with someone with a mental illness.
And then the officers run after Mr. Chasse. Again, what crime did he commit? What probable cause or reasonable suspicion did they have? And why chase after someone who had not done anything other than being "odd" in the first place? And what justification was there for the use of force (that killed him)? Trying to subdue Mr. Chasse required those levels of force, the police say. Oops, we made a mistake. Now he's dead. But why use such ultimately deadly levels of force in the first place? It just doesn't add up. It does not take an expert to see that.
James Chasse's death was unnecessary and very tragic, for his family, his friends and even for all of those who did not know him personally. This truly hurts everyone.
In this awful series of events, we have seen, once again, how an innocent man lost his life at the hands of the state. What will happen next? There will likely be civil litigation in Federal court. The City, County and AMR will eventually settle the case(s) for large sums of money. No one involved will admit any wrongdoing. No one's career will be ended. I would expect the officers involved to get promoted at some point, too.
Not long ago, these PPB officers would have even received awards for their "heroism" in confronting Mr. Chasse, as others did (remember the awards the officers received after they shot and killed Jose Mejia Poot??). Mr. Chasse's death won't alter their careers one iota. This sort of thing has happened many times before.
While some police policies will change and some additional training will be added, understand that the same police, the same officers will be out there, too. Their mentality is not about to change, nor is the police culture they are a part of that allows these things to happen. All the CIT training in the world is not going to make a bit of difference when there are officers out there who do not value human life (not all officers mind you, but enough of them). Officers who are known discipline problems, officers use force excessively over and over, officers who are are blatantly racist, etc. All PPB cares about is covering their own behinds. All the Portland Police Association cares about is protecting their own, right or deadly wrong it makes no difference to them (have you read any of Robert King's comments lately?). So, unless our "leaders" are willing to step up and make some real changes in the type of people our police employ, the police culture and how they really do business, and have some genuine, meaningful accountability to answer to outside the bureau, then nothing will change. And other people will die. It is only a matter of time.
Perhaps many of us will eventually forget about Mr. Chasse and what happened to him on the streets of NW Portland.
Please, don't forget. Do something!! We owe it to James. Unless we learn from these terrible events, and KEEP DEMANDING real, meaningful changes (such as firing these officers, for starters), then we as a community are condemned to repeat this all over again.
And again.
It amazes me the amount of ignorance out there when I read some of these posts. Some of the readers seem very well educated too so it baffles me how certain people who seem to be so intelligent can still be so completely ignorant.
Chasse's is dead; there is nothing anyone can do about that now and it is an extremely unfortunate situation for everyone involved. However, just because someone dies while in police custody does not automatically mean that we should assume the police must have used excessive force.
Police are trained to identify certain deviances of the norm that the rest of the public probably would never notice. Cops do their jobs as a living, the rest of society does not. Believe it or not, criminals usually won't run up to the police and let them know they've just committed or are about to commit a crime. Police have to contact people in order to identify criminal behavior. Secondly, police officers have the right to temporarily detain a person if the officer(s) has "reasonable suspicion" that the person may have just committed, are committing, or are about to commit a crime. Case law supports reasonable suspicion for police to temporarily detain people who run from them. So the below reader needs to research a little better next time before getting on his/her high horse about, "what crime did he commit?"
Thousands of arrests are made by our local police every year based off of mere hunches which were built and supported by reasonable suspicion. The same type of reasonable suspicion these officers may have had of Chasse's at the time they wanted to contact him.
A grand jury unanimously exonerated these officers of any wrong doing so to say it is a huge cover up or conspiracy by the bureau is absolutely ignorant because none of the jury members were Portland cops.. Yes, I know that's hard to believe for some of you but its true.
Lastly, Chasse's put himself into a bad situation which ultimately lead to his death. Not only did he run from officers but he also fought with the officers after they caught up with him and subsequently bit one of the officers on the arm.
You can't have your cake and eat it too readers. If you expect to walk the lovely streets of Portland with your family without being raped, robbed, solicited for drugs, or murdered, then the police need to be able to do their jobs effectively without everybody Monday morning quarterbacking every move they make. I've had several police contacts downtown and you know what's amazing? They said hello, I said hello, they went on their way and I went on my way. Weird huh? I wasn't murdered, assaulted, unlawfully detained, arrested, pepper sprayed or tasered. Why is that? I don't have time to explain to you if you don't know the answer to that question.
We have a mental health crisis on our hands and all the blame has been shifted to the police for some reason. Crisis triage centers and mental health units are being shut down left and right due to budgeting issues so there is no place for the mentally ill to receive proper treatment. The police are the last safety net left of our government to not only protect the mentally ill from hurting themselves, but also to protect them from hurting other people. How about pointing fingers at our politicians for shutting these establishments down and causing the severely mentally ill to be wandering the streets and not receiving the proper treatment that they need? Food for thought...
To Chad:
I was a police officer (including locally) for years. I went through the BPST academy in Monmouth and I worked the streets. What's your street experience?
I did not witness the encounter with Mr. Chasse, however I have seen plenty of incidents where the officer's manner of initial approach to a subject made a situation much worse than it would have been otherwise.
It seems likely, given the standard (an unacceptable) ways that PPB and MCSO treat "street people," that their very manner of approach may well have caused Mr. Chasse to flee in fear from them. So while case law may generally support fleeing from the police as reasonable suspicion, what if the police caused the fleeing reasonable suspicion themselves? Please understand that the police can (knowingly and unknowingly) manufacture behavior in a subject that causes their subsequent reasonable suspicion to appear. Meanwhile, the subject really didn't do anything criminal at all.
And still not addressed is the bigger question, what crime did Mr. Chasse commit? Why, none at all. Who in the area reported Mr. Chasse as commiting a crime? No one. Would Mr. Chasse still be alive if he had not encountered PPB and MCSO. Yes.
The trouble with too many police officers is that they tend to treat too many people in the same disfunctional ways. Look at all the lawsuits against police locally over the years for excessive use of force. There is a pattern here. And an officer need not treat every person (even those they so clearly despise) as a fleeing felon or a life without value.
The PPB excuse for officer Humphreys having all those use of force stats because of his Tri-Met detail assignment is yet another deception. Just because Humphreys works Tri-Met does not entitle him to be more frequent in his applications of force. If that was true, then why don't a majority of PPB Tri-Met officers have the same use of force stats that Humphreys does?? Think about it. Meanwhile, one can still be a good police officer, and still do their job well, without having to resort to frequent uses of force.
As I wrote, one does not need to be some sort of expert to know that this situation with Mr. Chasse went terribly wrong, and there was no good reason for his death. Don't be fooled by arguments that police officers somehow know more than the public does, that justified the events that led to Mr. Chasse's death. Don't trust the offical line given, don't trust the excuses. Much of the justifications for Mr. Chasse's death come from those in authority, that have everything to gain by pulling the wool over your eyes and saving their own careers.
Meanwhile, the truth often gets lost in the process.
To someone,
well, first and foremost it seems that everybody who wants to argue a point about something the police always do wrong have ironically been a police officer themselves at some point. We could turn this into a pissing match regarding why your still NOT a police officer but that's not the point I'm trying to illustrate here for the readers.
There are many things that officers take into perspective when they are approaching various types of people. Did the officer just witness a hand to hand drug transaction prior to approaching that particular person? Does the officer have previous history with that particular person who they know has a history of violence against the police? Do they know that person has a warrant for their arrest and will probably flee? Believe it or not, the police often times contact the same subject multiple times per year too. My point is, your being very subjective here with the point your trying to make and you don't have all the facts in front of you because you don't know what that officers thought process or motive was at the time..
I also don't buy your argument, "maybe the police caused the fleeing reasonable suspicion themselves." Come on now... Law abiding citizens don't run from the police and you know that; criminals do. To turn that around and manipulate it into an argument that the police induce people to run is absolutely ludicrous. The only people that get nervous and run from the police are usually criminals who don't want to get caught. Enough said about that argument...
Your next argument, "Would Chasse still be alive if PPB and MCSO had not contacted him?" Yes, he probably would be. But so would every bank robber, rapist, and murderer who has been killed by the police while trying to flee from being apprehended.. So what's the point of your argument here? Should we expect our police to just stop contacting people all together and just sit in their offices until a call comes out? I'd give it 6 months and every rag on the street would be carrying guns, drugs, and weapons. We have an expectation of our police to do their jobs PROACTIVELY; part of their jobs is to make contact with people in public.. So again, your argument here is completely unfounded and irrelevant.
Your last argument I want to address is when you mentioned, "The trouble with too many police officers is that they tend to treat too many people in the same disfunctional ways. Look at all the lawsuits against police locally over the years for excessive use of force."
Pretty ignorant argument, welcome to the 21st century Mr. or Mrs. Someone... Maybe that is because people are extremely sue happy these days and they know that police departments tend to line their pockets deep? Let's look at the bigger picture here though about how many of the thousands of lawsuits which are filed against police departments every year for excessive force and yet are completely unfounded at the conclusion of the lawsuit. Do you know what percentage that is? I do, it's less than 2 percent. Did you know that the bureau responds to several thousand calls per year about mentally ill people? Do you know what percentage of the time the police have had to resort to using any force at all on these same people? I do, it's less than 5 percent of the time. This is an extremely impressive statistic in favor of the police but you don't often hear these types of statistics do you?
You said it yourself, don't let someone pull the wool over your eyes; and I'm very confident it's not our police departments or "public officials" that are doing so...
Hey PDX man:
"an unfortunate set of circumstances" ??? You should spend some time reading police reports or watching them testify.....the truth is they DO drive up and down Broadway looking for anybody to mess with, they DO beat people for no reason except because they CAN, they DO beat and assault people for NO GOOD REASON every day all day long, because they CAN and they are NEVER indicted or punished, or demoted or disciplined in any way..
Karen Soesbe
Former Portlander
Hello Chad,
Interesting that you first argue that, "Police are trained to identify certain deviances of the norm that the rest of the public probably would never notice. Cops do their jobs as a living, the rest of society does not." This implies that ordinary citizens are incapable of judging what happened (re: Mr. Chasse) simply because they are not officers themselves.
And then, when a former officer (me) disagrees with you, you reply with "well, first and foremost it seems that everybody who wants to argue a point about something the police always do wrong have ironically been a police officer themselves at some point. We could turn this into a pissing match regarding why your still NOT a police officer but that's not the point I'm trying to illustrate here for the readers".
If my leaving police police work was not the point you wanted to illustrate, then why did you bring attention to it by writing that? Apparently in an attempt to bring doubts to the others reading this. Nice tactic. But no matter, I know what I know. And one need not be an expert to clearly see that the incident involving Mr. Chasse went bad, which is the real issue here. You would have the readers believe something else.
All these points you mention in your second paragraph are irrelevant to Mr. Chasse's particular case. Why? Because there was no "hand-to-hand drug transaction" involving Mr. Chasse, no warrant for his arrest that the officers knew of, and I have not seen a prior history the officers may have had with Mr. Chasse playing a role in their decision to stop him on that date and time at that place. This is about Mr. Chasse and the circumstances created by the officers at the scene. You are bringing in senarios that did not occur in Mr. Chasse's case. Are you trying to obscure the facts?
You wrote, "My point is, your being very subjective here with the point your trying to make and you don't have all the facts in front of you because you don't know what that officers thought process or motive was at the time.. ." Chad, how do you know what I know, and what I don't?
You also wrote, "..your argument, 'maybe the police caused the fleeing reasonable suspicion themselves.' Come on now... Law abiding citizens don't run from the police and you know that; criminals do." Okay, then tell me Chad, why did Mr. Chasse run from the police then? Was he a criminal? Not that the officers articulated. Did Mr. Chasse have a warrant? No. Did the police observe Mr. Chasse committing a crime? No. You claim that only criminals run from the police. But that is not true in every circumstance. The incident with Mr. Chasse proves that, doesn't it?
Another quote, "To turn that around and manipulate it into an argument that the police induce people to run is absolutely ludicrous." I'm chuckling right now, but not at you, Chad. I wouldn't have believed that either if I had not had knowledge of it myself. There are officers who create their own reasonable suspicion, and even probable cause on occasion (but not very often, I would hope... ). I'll use a very old example (only to not discuss more recent events) and one you should be able to verify yourself if you don't already know about it - the Outsiders MC clubhouse raid where PPB officer David Crowther was killed. Remember that one? The police lied on their search warrant affidavit to get inside (because they "knew" the bikers were dirty), and officer Crowther had drugs in his pockets to plant inside the clubhouse to frame the bikers (I'm not a 1 percenter fan, but believe it or not, they do have rights. Don't lose sight of that, as these officers clearly did. That is when bad things happen). Officer Crowther was shot during the entry and killed. There was a heck of a scramble at the scene, other officers trying to get the dope off Crowther's body before the ME showed up and discovered what was not supposed to be there on him (they successfully removed the dope, commiting yet another crime). But that incident later blew up the whole PPB Street Crimes unit when the truth came out, their credibility was destroyed and officer Crowther's killer walked out of OSP a free man. So, things like this never happen, do they? The police don't manipulate of manufacture facts like these at times? I beg to differ. You seem to be working in the bureau someplace, am I right? Don't you know it's history? Get ahold of Debbie (or whoever is running PPB Records now, I think Debbie may have retired) and see if you can take a peek at the Crowther reports youself. I don't recall if the GO's will permit that, but try anyway. Records will still have them. You don't think anything like that has ever happened since, in lower profile incidents? Wow. Have you seen some of the IA cases?
Yet another quote, "Your next argument, 'Would Chasse still be alive if PPB and MCSO had not contacted him?' Yes, he probably would be. But so would every bank robber, rapist, and murderer who has been killed by the police while trying to flee from being apprehended.. ."
For one thing, in Oregon it is against the law for the police to shoot a fleeing felon simply because they are fleeing (sorry). That changed a long time ago. It is also up to a judge and jury to decide guilt, not the police. There are necessary reasons for that. And Mr. Chasse was not a "bank robber," "rapist" or "murderer." And so, we circle around back to the real matter at hand, the death of Mr. Chasse.
"Should we expect our police to just stop contacting people all together and just sit in their offices until a call comes out? I'd give it 6 months and every rag on the street would be carrying guns, drugs, and weapons."
What is a "rag," Chad? What is the difference between calling a person a "rag" and a "nigger?" You might not think so, but these terms are the same in that they are stereotypical and dehumanizing. Troubling when they come from our police. And all too easy a habit to get into when you dislike, even hate. Trouble is, no one group is made up of identical people. And all suspects are supposed to be innocent until proven guilty (didn't I hear that on a TV show? A pretty basic premise. That's why they are called "suspects."). Yes, officers do need to be proactive to do their jobs, but in ways that do not violate the rights of others. In ways that do not violate the law. And in ways that DO NOT KILL INNOCENT PEOPLE, Chad. Obvious, yes?
"So again, your argument here is completely unfounded and irrelevant." Yup Chad, I guess Mr. Chasse having rights under the law and as a human being, those were really irrevelant after all. Because he's now dead at the hands of the police. The very same police that are supposed to be out protecting us. Rights don't mean much when you're laying dead in the back of a police car, do they?
"Did you know that the bureau responds to several thousand calls per year about mentally ill people? Do you know what percentage of the time the police have had to resort to using any force at all on these same people? I do, it's less than 5 percent of the time. This is an extremely impressive statistic in favor of the police but you don't often hear these types of statistics do you?"
Well, that is impressive. Force used less than 5 percent of the time. I guess that makes up for the police killing a few mentally folks once in a while then, right? Okay, now I'm with you!
Stay safe, as they say. Disagreements aside, I really do mean that. Ten seven nine.
It sounds more likely that someone should look more deeply into AMR's role. My only medical training is as a Wilderness First Responder, but it seems very odd that someone with normal vital signs would be dead an hour later from injuries he had supposedly already recieved.
Hey Karen:
>>the truth is they DO drive up and down Broadway looking for anybody to mess with,
You mean criminals and wanted suspects? Yes they do! Glad you mentioned it. Seems like they're doing the job we paid them for.
>>they DO beat people for no reason except because they CAN,
"For no reason ..."?
Lies. You're full of sh*t and you know it.
>>they DO beat and assault people for NO GOOD REASON every day all day long,
"every day all day long"? How old are you ... 14? Only a juvenile would write that phrase like that. Listen, the truth of the matter is that you need more life experience. When you grow up you'll learn that the police are on your side, just like your teachers and your parents are right now but you're probably too young to realize it.
>>..because they CAN and they are NEVER indicted or punished, or demoted or disciplined in any way..
"Never" punished? Geez, you ARE too young to remember, aren't you! Either that or you're horrible with a search engine.
Just this year, former chief Derrick Foxworth was demoted for unethical activity on the job. It's been all over the news in the last month or so ... and if you were even half awake you couldn't have missed it. So where were YOU when all this news came out?
Other Portland cops reprimanded, demoted, fired or otherwise brought before a review board in recent years include: Chasse (have you forgotten the story you read already?), Doug Hill; Brian Simmons; Grant Bailey and Craig Hampton (who each ended up serving eight months in jail for unethical police action!); Steve Hollingsworth, Gabe Kalmanek, former Sgt. Ken Whattam, Sgt. Lawrence Baird; Commander Rosie Sizer, Matt Stimmel ... and the list goes on and on!
Does this mean the dept. is filled with crooks?
Hardly. What it means is that when cops DO cross the line ... they are caught! And in the end isn't that a measure of success? I mean, the mere fact that these are in the news in the first place means that they were caught!
But these are just the bad apples.
Most cops are good, hard-working defenders of public good and law.
The next time you feel like saying something like "never" and "every day all day long", perhaps you should first remember that everything you say on the Internet is a permanent, and so you might want to check your facts first.
Because although you don't check your facts, everyone else does. And you end up looking like the idiot.
To Someone,
First and foremost, I want to thank you for maintaining a sense of professionalism in your posts, despite our disagreements we've obviously had between us. I'm easily irritated when I see people lose all sense of respect for other viewers by posting ridiculous or condescending posts which only ends up degrading the actual website itself. This is the only reason why I am so inclined to write back to you.
You bring up some good points, but I wanted to address a couple issues I'm somewhat concerned about. In your first paragraph, you replied, "If my leaving police police work was not the point you wanted to illustrate, then why did you bring attention to it by writing that?" The only reason I brought this up to you was your initial post that you sent to me where you seemed to be challenging my experience level by writing, "I was a police officer (including locally) for years. I went through the BPST academy in Monmouth and I worked the streets. What's your street experience? I have plenty of street experience that I'd love to share, but I don't think it's the point of this debate and I had trouble finding any relevence in bringing it up.
I feel like many of my remarks to you were either completely misinterpreted or extremely manipulated.. In one of your initial posts, you told me that the police tend to be the causitive factor for why people may run from them. In reply, I advised you that you can't judge how police officers approach a certain individual because you are probably not aware of all the circumstances surrounding why they may be contacting that particular person so you shouldn't cast judgement. I was simply using the "hand to hand drug transaction" and the other various examples as just that; examples to prove my point...
You also wrote, "You claim that only criminals run from the police. But that is not true in every circumstance. The incident with Mr. Chasse proves that, doesn't it?" Actually it does not.. I belive that Mr. Chasse did commit a crime by biting an officer and resisting arrest. Yes, he was severely mentally ill but don't dismiss the fact that he was still arrested for assaulting a peace officer so that does actually make him a criminal. (Important fact that shouldn't be neglected)...
Another remark, "So, things like this never happen, do they? The police don't manipulate or manufacture facts like these at times?" Absolutely they do!, just like any profession has bad apples... I will be the first to call a spade a spade when I see it, but I'm not going to jump on a bandwagon of criticizing the police if the facts don't fully support it.. That seems to be the case here and again, the officers were exonerated in a grand jury, "unanimously"... Every profession has corrupt individuals; doctors, pastors, and definitely police officers... I do not automatically defend a police officer just because he/she wears a badge, there needs to be 100% accountability across the boards...
"In Oregon it is against the law for the police to shoot a fleeing felon simply because they are fleeing (sorry). That changed a long time ago." Hmmmm, struggling with that quote a little too because current Oregon Revised Statute still permits that unless you have some updated case law that I'm not aware of.....
Lastly, your one comment that actually did insult me was, "What is a "rag," Chad? What is the difference between calling a person a "rag" and a "nigger?" You might not think so, but these terms are the same in that they are stereotypical and dehumanizing."
That is about as subjective of a comment as a person could possibly make.. I'd rather have you ask for more clarification from me than to post your own one dimensional view of what is and to imply that it means the same thing as a "nigger". A rag is a commonly referred to phrase for a gangmember... Gang members come in all colors as you should know; Black, Hispanic, Asian, and Caucasian.. I referenced a "rag" because as you should already know being an ex-police officer, that gangmembers often carry guns...
I too will make this my final post and I'm willing to set aside our disagreements, as far apart as they may be from one another.. : - } Thank you for the interesting debate though...
Chad...You are clearly a man of soaring intelegence.
The fact that Mr. Chasse is reported to have attempted to bite the cops responsible for his homicide does not make him a criminal. The fact is: the police prevented Mr. Chasse any opportunity to defend himself to to any charges including: resisting arrest, assualt, or urninating or any other charge in a court of law...his case was summarized by cops; Nice, Burton, and Humphries, on the cold violent steets of Portland vigilante style.
On the other hand genius; the cops who admit that they were responsible for his death have no criminal charges pending against them. In fact, every heroic effort has been advance on their behalf to prevent them from having to speak publicly in the matter of Mr. Chasse's death. Clearly the city attorney, district attorney, Mayor, Chief of Police all know that there is no way that these cops could justify their violent beating of Mr. Chasse nor could they justify the complete disregard they deomonstrate Mr. Chasse nor their negigent conduct while Mr.
Chasse was in their custody.
Consider: there are photos of Officer Humphries retunting to the crime sceene of Mr. Chasses beating with a cup of coffee just after while Mr. Chasse was unconsious on the ground. And, the recording of his mocking tone while requesting medical attention for Mr. Chasse; "we've got one that's kind of twitchy..."
Anyone, who defends the actions of the cops in the Murder of Mr. Chasse is an police appologist. If the cops are innocent of any wrong doing as the Grand Jury has conculded then the Mayor, City, Police Bureau, and District attorney have nothing to fear of a Federal Investigation.
In fact; all these authorities should welcome and encourage a Federal Investigation to validate and vindicate their dilligent work on behalf of Mr. Chasse and the public. Perhaps you will join me in calling for a Federal Investigation?
Just to get the facts and clear up all the unanswered questions in the death of Mr. Chasse and the subsequent investigation.
It makes more sense to have a Federal Investigation than to burry this story. Or to condemn the public for demanding accounability. What do they have to fear? The truth will set everyone free.
Waitaminute PDX Man, wweek is trying to link this death to George W and neocons? You sir, are a deeply disturbed if you read that in THIS article. Besides, it's liberal-hatin' good ole boys like you who think there's a link between global warming and our societal acceptance of homosexuality.
I have seen cops have a spit second to react to someone who is violent and threatening. It is difficult to gauge whether the person is feigning a threat or really means it. I have seen police officers hurt in the Emergency Department because they have given a violent person the benefit of the doubt. Other times when they think that someone is threatened including themselves, they react. tough problem, but it happens.
>like you who think there's a link between
>global warming and our societal acceptance
>of homosexuality.
dear Concerned,
WHEN did I ever suggeset that?
You see, it's Liberals like you who make bipartisanship with moderates impossible. Instead of working towards a common solution and understanding, you're more interested in drive-by insults and bomb-throwing based on items that aren't even remotely based on fact. You burn oh so many bridges for yourself behind you and dissuade anyone from meeting you ahead. And then you have the audacity to turn around and wonder why you feel so frustrated.
Grow up.
The mentally ill do not fair well in stump town. I spent nearly 20 years reading how badly mentally ill
people are abused by the "man".Cops fear these folks
more than ebola,and will without much hesitation "re-
move the threat" The need for a mental health speciali-
st to intervene at these situations is paramount to
facilitate safe handling,and to avoid a common ending
closely resembling murder by paid public servents.
No, Mr.Chasse did not have to die; the poor lack of
training in crisis management killed Mr.Chasse by fear-
ful members of a department with reactionary tendencies
and elementary problem solving skills.
In the print version of the story, the wrong person is pictured with James Chasses name. I think the picture is of the man who took the pictures with a camera phone.
I witnessed James laying face down in his own blood tied like a pig yelling out belligerently in terror. I will never believe that his death was unavoidable. Considering that he was unarmed and mentally ill, I'm disgusted with the lack of accountability, and realize now that we are not safe around Portland Police, especially if we are less fortunate.
This article is not just about the death of James Chasse, it is about poor choices of people in a position of superiority. In every industry people make poor choices. The police department is no exception. Doctors and every other profession are help liable for their poor decisions. Citizens are held accountable for their poor decisions, and there are consequences for police officers also. The consequences should be upheld, officers should be held accountable, and punishment should be proportional to the mistakes they made. The ability to report police misconduct and abuse should be accessible on the police department or city website. It is very difficult to report police misconduct in Albany Oregon. It is a lot easier to report police misconduct in Corvallis Oregon. It should be mandatory for the police department to provide complaint forms to citizens without having to go directly to the police department. I have observed more reports of police misconduct in recent years, and I believe that could be due to changes in criteria for becoming a police officer. Maybe the standards for becoming a police officer should be higher. There is no excuse for highering an immoral person as an officer. If they don�t get the job someone else will take it. The truth is that one probably won�t higher a candidate that they know to be immoral, but when the contrary is brought to a superior�s attention it is a liability issue. That requires legal action to be followed through with, and it needs to be easy for citizens to file appropriate reports instead of made extremely difficult and challenging. Appropriate reports and follow-ups are necessary to improve the community, state, and country in general. No one should be excluded from the law, and it is too common to see exceptions due to higher socioeconomic statuses and in positions of authority.
"Oregonian columnist Steve Duin wrote in an online column on Oct. 21: 'The veteran rugby player at The Oregonian was one of the first to ridicule the laughable assertion ... [Chasse] died because a cop fell on top of him, fracturing 16 of his ribs and breaking a total of 26 different bones in the front and back of his rib cage. If that's the way it worked, he said, a dozen rugby players would die every weekend out at Delta Park.'"
Based on the above quote, it's clear that Steve Duin isn't a medical examiner and likely has no background at all in the medical field. (And if he does, remind me never to go to him for any kind of treatment.) Rugby players are hardly frail people.
"According to Steenson, Brady is also questioning whether the location and severity of the fractures is consistent with someone falling on him. Brady believes they may have instead been caused by police violence."
Well that's a little vague. As a medical examiner, it's his job to be specific. Police violence? #1 It's not his job as a medical examiner to determine who did the injuries, only what actions caused the injuries. #2 In every article I've read with statements from him, he never actually says specifically what kind of actions would cause those injuries. What kind of police violence? Punching? Kicking? Shooting? Stabbing? Specifics please!
"If Humphreys didn't fall on Chasse, how did he sustain his injuries? The only obvious answer is: from a beating."
Actually, the injuries that killed him were due to a large force that spanned his upper torso. If the injuries had come from kicks and punches, such as in a "beating," he would have had broken rib here and there, but the breaks wouldn't line up the way they did.
Don't your writers ever interview the appropriate professionals or read text books? If the title of your article is "Why Did James Chasse Jr. Die?" you may want to consider talking to various medical professionals about the difference between injuries caused by acute forces, such as punches and kicks, and the injuries caused by broad forces, such as having a heavy person fall on a smaller frail person. I'm quite disappointed by the level of research the Willamette Week writers do. Without such research and presenting all the information, you present a vary biased view of the story and spread ignorance (but then, that's what sells papers best, right?).