Somehow this escaped the Twitter conversation accompanying this morning’s OPB mayoral debate: But candidate Charlie Hales, in attempting to burnish his public-safety bonafides, made a stunning gaffe in describing the May 2010 police shooting of Keaton Otis that couldn’t have come at a more awkard time.
Hales referred to Otis—without mentioning his name—merely as a “gang member” who shot Officer Chris Burley “in the leg.” Otis, of course, was anything but a “gang member.”
He was a young African-American man in a mental health crisis who’d been trailed by gang detectives and pulled over apparently because he was wearing a hoodie and was slouched in the driver’s seat of his car. Police say Otis fired two bullets, hitting Burley, as the stop exploded into a standoff, but he was also struck by 23 bullets. (The officers involved were all cleared by the city’s Police Review Board last fall.) Almost since the day Otis was killed, the Albina Ministerial Alliance Coalition for Justice and Police Reform has been holding up Otis’ death as an example of racial profiling.
Hales’ mistake came as an aside. Hales was talking about how he’d done a ride-along with Burley, as well as other officers, to illustrate his concerns over gang violence in Portland. But while it’s been some time since Otis’ death, his name remains front and center in the accountability community.
On Monday, in front of City Hall, protesters denouncing an arbitrator’s decision to reinstate Ron Frashour (the cop who shot Aaron Campbell) also invoked Otis’ name, along with Trayvon Martin’s, in raising questions about the worth of police accountability and cultural sensitivity in Portland.
Hales’ campaign, when I rang them up, offered to have Hales call me this afternoon to talk about what he said and what he meant.
Update 1:30 PM: “I’m sorry if I offended anybody by not knowing all the particulars,” Hales tells me, also saying “we should clarify that” and that he doesn’t have “encyclopedic knowledge” of every police shooting. Even after going over the particulars, Otis’ case—and the resulting outcry over profiling—didn’t really ring a bell with Hales.
He says he was only trying to make the point that Burley, even after being shot, maintained an “impressive attitude about reaching out to young people. … That’s an attitude I want to see in the bureau.”
Still, his mistake upset some community leaders who expected a prospective police commissioner to have known more about a shooting that need not have happened at all if Otis had either gotten help beforehand or hadn’t been pulled over because of something like his hoodie.
“He should have checked his facts,” says JoAnn Hardesty, a former state lawmaker and member of the Albina Ministerial Alliance Coalition for Justice and Police Reform.
Burley, who was providing backup for the gang detectives who initially thought Otis was “suspicious” because of his clothing and the fact that he was driving a car that didn’t “fit,” has since become close with Otis’ mother. He told KGW a year after the shooting that “Keaton didn’t have to die.” If only he’d gotten treatment sooner.//
Listen to the whole debate at OPB’s website, or watch it on TV Friday night.
Commenty Colin, Jan 10: “Tell me if I’m remembering this one wrong, but it seems like you’re deliberately obfuscating”Otis pulled a gun out of his glove box and shot at officers” with a general “eruption of gunfire.”
Chuck Garabedian, Jan 10: “You forgot to mention Keaton Otis had an unregistered gun in the car, which was fired, presumably by Otis. That’s more germane to the story than his mental health.”
I’m….not really concerned with Mr. Hales impugning Keaton Otis’ good name. He was driving around with an unregistered gun, and shot a police officer! How can you wail that he was “anything BUT a gang member” as if he wasn’t a monster?
Here, Reymont:
http://www.kgw.com/home/Portland-officer-r…
“Not a day goes by that Burley doesn’t think of 25-year-old Keaton Otis, a young man plagued by mental illness who had a gun and chose to use it that day.
Police said when they pulled Otis over, he wouldn’t follow commands and swore at them. An officer tasered Otis twice, then Otis reached for his gun and fired, hitting Burley once in each leg.
Police fired back, killing Otis. Burley said a year of meeting with Otis’ mother has opened his eyes to a different man.
“(Otis’ mother) told me that the young man I met on May 12, 2010, was not the young man she had raised,” Burley said. “The true Keaton was hidden behind the mental illness and the true Keaton was not violent.”
Burley said Otis’ mother tried to get her son help, but couldn’t.
“She went to doctors and said, ‘My son is not doing well. I need to get him help, I’m afraid for his safety,'” Burley said. “I can’t help but wonder what might have happened if one of the doctors might have listened.”
Burley and Otis’ mother meet every month now, along with other community members, to discuss ways to improve the mental health system for people who need it, like Otis.”
Reymont made my comment for me.
If you’re a young guy who keeps a gun in his car and shoots at cops over a traffic stop, being assumed to be a gang member just kinda comes with that territory, so “anything but a gang member” is undeservedly hyperbolic.
I’m glad you reflexively champion the lil’ guy and hold PPB accountable, and racial profiling is a big part of why law-abiding black citizens still legitimately fear the police, but c’mon: Otis shot at cops and was legitimately fired upon under the circumstances, even if you think the initial pull-over was BS.
“his name remains front and center in the accountability community.”
HOW ELSE SHOULD OFFICERS RESPOND TO BEING SHOT AT? THIS IS ABSOLUTELY NOT A CASE OF FAILED POLICE ACCOUNTABILITY. THE OFFICERS ON THE SCENE BEHAVED COMPLETELY APPROPRIATELY. IF YOU WANT TO GET INTO A DISCUSSION OF HOW SOCIETY FAILED THIS GUY, YEAH SURE… BUT DON’T GO IMPUGNING THE WRONG PEOPLE.
“Wait, what did you just say? How dare you call me a rapist! I’m SEXUALLY ASSAULTING you. I’m ANYTHING BUT a rapist, and I frankly think you should apologize for your insensitivity.”
Please try to familiarize yourself with some knowledge of gangs and perhaps rethink your theory.
There’s a difference between sick and sin which courts recognize and officers everywhere, and Portland’s are no exception, have a routinely hard time discerning.
See – Get mayoral candidates on record about police accountability.
It’s not essentially about Otis’s “good name,” the way I see it. There’s a far broader relevance to this that has to do with racist stereotypes and profiling in general. Otis turned out to be violent when provoked by police, by their own account, but none of this would have even happened if Officer Foote hadn’t profiled Otis as “kind of look[ing] like he could be a gangster” because he was black, wearing a hoodie, driving a Toyota, and being generally “suspicious” even though he hadn’t done anything wrong at that point. A lot of people have admitted they agree with Geraldo on all this crap, and think it’s okay to hold people of color to any number of double standards. And crucially important discussions of the many incidents like this that should be taking place instead become dominated with debates over bigoted stereotypes, which in effect bolster racial profiling. Many people get beaten and killed over this. Does it turn out that a certain number of them had a concealed gun? Of course, how could it be otherwise?
@J_RENAUD: AT WHAT POINT BETWEEN BEING SHOT AT AND RETURNING FIRE SHOULD THESE OFFICERS HAVE DISCERNED THE DIFFRENCE BETWEEN “SICK AND SIN”? I’M REALLY CURIOUS AT HOW YOU IMAGINE THESE CIRCUMSTANCES PLAYING OUT DIFFERENTLY AFTER THE DECISION TO STOP THE CAR WAS MADE.
Yes, racial profiling is bad.
What’s going on with this post is just another example of our culture’s compulsion to take undeserved umbrage at statements from people we don’t like to begin with.
Hales over-generalized in a tangential statement. It might be hurtful to Otis’ family/friends/defenders, but is it really a newsworthy gaffe?
@3: Being assumed to be a gang member “comes with the territory” of keeping a gun in the glove box and shooting at officers? But the officer who ran his plate and followed him assumed he was likely a gang member (which he was not) BEFORE they knew he had a gun and would use it. So, more to the point, being assumed to be a gang member “comes with the territory” of driving while black and wearing a hoodie. And calling him a gang member after the fact just makes it easier for people to accept that this kind of thing happens. You honestly don’t see the broader problem with these kinds of assumptions, even now?
So, of which gang was he a member?
The police were totally justified in fatally shooting a man who shot at them. Charlie Hales was not justified in calling Keaton Otis a gang member because he was black.
You know, you can be mentally ill and in a gang at the same time. It happens.
If you’re a young man, regardless of race, circling around Lloyd District with a loaded gun, there’s a better than average chance you’re involved in some kind of gang activity. If I recall correctly, the police that pulled Otis over where in the area because of increased gang activity in the area.
Gotcha!!! politics really raises the level of discourse.
@13: If you’re making the assertion that he was in a gang, the burden of proof is on you (or Hales, but on his part the claim was apparently just a revealing mistake) to provide the grounds for that claim. Supposed “better than average chance” based on circumstantial evidence doesn’t cut it when you’re claiming someone was a specific type of criminal.
“If I recall correctly, the police that pulled Otis over where in the area because of increased gang activity in the area.”
Even assuming that’s true, so what? When you’re holding a hammer, everything looks like a nail?
@ geyser, jesus. “Otis turned out to be violent when provoked by police.” Pulling someone over, even if it’s somewhat or even entirely racially motivated, isn’t provocation to attempted murder. Ever.
Maybe in some part of Mississippi in the 1920’s, but not outside Portland’s Llloyd Center at 3 in the afternoon.
There’s no burden of proof geyser. The world isnt your little courtroom. I dont care if he was or he wasn’t and i assume the police didnt bother to investigate if he was after he started throwing shots.
What Hales (who I won’t be voting for, btw) said doesn’t rate on the gaffe meter. Take offense to it if you want. I assume you have the free time.
@Denis, regarding your comment above: http://www.lmgtfy.com/?q=retcon&l=1
Link for prior comment – http://www.mentalhealthportland.org/?p=150…
@15: I didn’t mean they provoked Otis to fire a weapon, just that they provoked the entire incident in the first place on the deeply problematic grounds discussed here.
@16: Of course there’s a burden of proof when you accuse someone of something, even in a conversation. If I call you a liar, the burden of proof is on me to explain what lie(s) you told; it’s not up to you to prove you’re not a liar. I don’t “take offense” to what Hales said; I object to that particular kind of casual statement on moral grounds because it’s importance of a lot of bigger problems in this city and this country with race and escalation of violence. My free time really has nothing to do with that.
That 2nd to last sentence ended up a bit garbled but whatever, people will either get what I’m trying to say by this point, or they won’t. Enough soap-boxin’ outta me for one day.
“@15: I didn’t mean they provoked Otis to fire a weapon, just that they provoked the entire incident in the first place on the deeply problematic grounds discussed here.”
If only Burley’s mother hadn’t had a boy, this whole thing could have been averted. Someone file a civil suit against her womb.
Yer an asshat.
Hales may have been incorrect in calling Otis a gang member, but it wasn’t some kind of major gaffe. He WAS pulled over by gang officers on the suspicion that he was involved in gang activity, and he DID shoot at officers.
I am more interested in the fact that Hales is willing to address head-on the major gang issues Portland is facing currently (as of March 26, there had already been 30 gang shootings in 2012) rather than just giving it lip service like Sam Adams and the other mayoral candidates.
Dennis – the big issue here isn’t Hales mistakenly calling Otis a gang-member (which, again, while wrong is at least understandable). Instead, it’s that Hales is highlighting the work of an officer like Chris Burley – who, by all accounts, is exactly the type of person the Portland Police department needs – as a model for the type of police work he would like to see done. Burley, who voluntarily worked for the mental health mobile crisis unit after being shot by a mentally ill person, and who has since gone back to trying to work with gang members to stop the violence.
The Mercury and the typical Portland progressive-types give the Portland Police a lot of grief, usually deservedly so. But the Police do play a vital role in our community, it’s encouraging to see a mayoral candidate willing to invest the time and political capital into actually learning about what is going on in the streets, why there has been such a huge flare-up of gang activity, and what *good* cops out there are trying to do about it.
I’m much more interested in that. But instead, you’re trying to make an issue out of something that’s really not an issue at all. Sigh. Typical.
I do not believe Keaton shot Burley. I do not believe he had a gun. I think Burley was shot by friendly fire. It’s easy to blame the “gang member” or the mentally ill.