News Last week's forum in Portland at the Q Center on gay bashing revealed that many members of the LGBTQ community feel uncomfortable reporting bias crimes to the police. Days after the June 2 forum, the state Department of Justice is announcing the establishment of a confidential bias crime reporting system for anyone who's been targeted as a result of their race, gender, religion and sexual orienation. ...   More

News When Mayor Sam Adams and new Police Chief Mike Reese rolled out their revised police budget last month, they said it was all about preserving public safety in Portland by keeping cops on the streets. "This budget is about protecting the operational integrity of the Portland Police Bureau," Reese was quoted as saying in a news release. "Units like Mounted Patrol and Cold Case are what Portlanders ...   More

News It's easy to get complacent about gay issues in a progressive town like Portland. The mayor is gay. Our queer community is legion. But at last night's GLBTQ Community Forum on Gay Bashing, it was hard to sustain the illusion that Portland is a magical paradise free of hate-based crimes. With shaky voices, local queers Birch and Jeffrey told their story of being assaulted by a group of men yelling ...   More

News Last week we posted about City Commissioner Dan Saltzman's plans to beef up drug testing for Portland cops before Mayor Sam Adams took over the police bureau last month. After today's news conference on the Keaton Otis shooting, we asked Adams whether he plans to take up Saltzman's initiative to make drug testing part of the ongoing contract negotiations with the police union. Adams said ...   More

News Portland police today released audio from their fatal shooting last month of 25-year-old Keaton Otis as well as documents (PDF) from the investigation into what happened during the May 12 traffic stop in the Lloyd District. At a news conference this afternoon, Chief Mike Reese handed out this diagram of the scene and answered questions about the incident, in which Officer Chris Burley was shot ...   More

News A Multnomah County grand jury has found no criminal liability in the Portland police's fatal shooting of Keaton Dupree Otis. The May 12 shooting death of the 25-year-old Otis during a traffic stop in the Lloyd District was the third fatal shooting by Portland police this year There have been no criminal indictments in any of those shootings, which has been the case involving every grand jury ...   More

News City's Hall's Citizen Review Committee on police today released its final report (PDF) on alleged bias by Portland cops. There are some pointed words about police and police oversight. But the report, three-and-a-half years in the making, contains nothing groundbreaking. Overall, its recommendations fall along the lines of "let's communicate more and improve what we're already doing." The ...   More

News The Portland Police Association announced today it has two candidates heading for a runoff to be president of the 900-member union. Officer Daryl Turner got 44 percent of the 671 votes cast. Sgt. Doug Justus got 39 percent. A third candidate, Officer John Grable, did not make the runoff. Ballots in the runoff election will be counted July 21. Whichever candidate wins the election, there's ...   More

News Portland Police are offering a reward of up to $1,000 to anyone with information that leads to an arrest of two suspects who beat up and shouted homophobic slurs at a group of gay men as they left a bar May 30 on SW 11th and Stark. The two suspects are described as two white men in their late teens or early 20s. Both men have dark hair and are between 5-foot-9 and 6 feet tall. Attorney General ...   More

News Tomorrow is the day the Portland Police Association tallies the votes in a runoff election to pick its next president. But one of the final two candidates to head the powerful union, Sgt. Doug Justus, is already predicting his opponent, Officer Daryl Turner, will be victorious. "I think probably Daryl will win because the guys want an officer," Justus says. "They kind of like the fact that ...   More