Ibrahim Mubarak, a Right 2 Dream Too co-founder, was arrested last night and booked into the main jail after he and a group of advocates reportedly confronted police officers who’d been cracking down on some of the homeless folks who’d been gathering in recent weeks beneath the Burnside Bridge.
Mubarak—booked under his legal birth name, Keith Jackson—faces one count of interfering with a peace officer, a class A misdemeanor, and one count of trespassing.
Interfering with a peace officer is the same charge, ironically, that police and prosecutors are using to target nuisance crimes among the homeless, as the Mercury first reported. Because of the Mercury‘s reporting, the DA’s office yesterday acknowledged that police had mistakenly been applying the program to sidewalk violations. A memo telling police of the mistake also went out yesterday.
News of Mubarak’s arrest spread on Facebook through advocacy group Right 2 Survive. Trillium Shannon, a Right 2 Dream Too board member, posted that Mubarak and others had gone to the Burnside Bridge after hearing a steady drip of reports about police and private guards rousting the groups that had gathered under the bridge at night.
Update 7:30 AM: Here’s a <a href=”Update 7:30 AM: Here’s a link to video showing Mubarak’s arrest in the University of Oregon’s parking lot beneath the bridge and what led to it.
Update 7:30 AM: Here’s a link to video showing Mubarak’s arrest and what led to it.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=750757028269331&set=vb.291307830880922&type=2&theater”>link to video showing Mubarak’s arrest and what led to it. It shows private security guards taking pictures of people, for recordkeeping, saying they’re working “for the city” as well as the University of Oregon. It shows an officer asking Mubarak for his name and then invoking the university’s property rights by ordering everyone off the lot and onto the sidewalks. Mubarak was headed to the sidewalk, but slowly, and asking the officer to ask him nicely. And that’s when she had enough—and he was put into handcuffs and taken to a police car. Someone at the end says “Call Amanda Fritz.”
Yes, this confrontation occurred in the lot near the MAX tracks. But I also ride down along the waterfront every morning and night. And groups of homeless people have been gathering there, beneath the bridge, for weeks with their belongings—blankets, sleeping bags, packs, and sometimes shopping carts, only to thin out in recent days amid a noticeably stepped-up police presence.
The arrest comes more than a week after Right 2 Dream Too, the homeless rest area at NW 4th and Burnside, won the right to spend $846,000 on a new location as part of a complicated land deal approved by city council. The group had agreed to drop a lawsuit over the city challenging code fines and move to the Pearl, but developers in the Pearl fought that agreement. It’s their money that will finance Right 2 Dream Too’s move somewhere else. Willamette Week was first to publish a preliminary list of more than 20 potential locations turned up by a city-paid real estate broker.
Mubarak was released from jail overnight and is due in court at 2 pm.
One wonders how many of these homeless victimizing officers considers himself a follower of Christ.
“Interfering with a peace officer” is the catch-all charge that the police invent when someone questions what they’re doing.
If the charge isn’t dropped by the district attorney, it will be thrown out in court. Either way the cops have gotten what they wanted, which was to harass someone who was breaking no law.
I’d say ‘Keith Jackson’ should be happy, he wasn’t homeless last night.
Denis, I wonder if “the City” knows that PPS is taking pictures for “record keeping” for them… or if UofO knows?
The reason they are cracking down is because folks are causing damage to the buildings, slashing employees tires, throwing bottles at passerby’s, interfering with the other people who want to sleep (including severely beating up older homeless individuals) and leaving immense amounts of trash and drug related items behind.
While I do not agree with the sidewalk ordinance, the recent weeks have gotten out of hand. Many folks are just trying to sleep down there, and they are getting purposely pushed out by those who are aggressive and in the area specifically to do/sell drugs, not sleep. Until these activities became more prevalent, PPS and PPB did not need to frequent the area to this extent and crack down on something as small as hanging out in the private parking lot. But both private buildings are fed up with their employees being harassed and property getting damaged.
This reminds me of when I was five or six-years-old and my mother politely asked me not to touch the fragile figurine that was on the coffee table. I looked her right in the eye and touched it anyway. Again, she calmly asked me to stop touching it and warned me that I’d be in trouble if I did it again. I waited a few seconds and decided to touch it yet again, proud of myself for standing up to such an unreasonable, oppressive request. She then walked over to me and slapped my hand. I started bawling, indignant over the injustice of it all.
you think this would be good motivation to improve one’s life. maybe get a job, save up, move in somewhere with a roof over your head. but i doubt any of them will have the ambition
Frank, Ib has been homeless before, I am sure he understands what happened in far better detail than you do.
Adrian, do you know who owns those two buildings on either side of hte parking lot?
So, bullnose, when one of these homeless people applies for a job, what does he put down for a home address? How does he answer the questions about whether he’s ever been convicted of a crime or if he has his own transportation? I really don’t think getting a job is the slam dunk you make it out to be for someone who can’t even predict where he’ll be sleeping tonight.
Having worked over at the White Stag building,, I can tell you that the quality of the area has continued to go downhill over the past few months. I used to park there on the weekends when I was out in china town, but after I found 4 guys looking in my car windows, never again will I park there.
Patrick, in answer to your question, the owners of the properties around the parking area: Mercy Corp, UoO (glass area), UoO (Whitestag building) and The City. There is also a Saturday Market storage and office there. So, City, City, UoO, UoO, and Mercy Corp
Scott,
Thanks. I already knew, but I was wondering who else would realize that it was mostly city owned, and that that which is not city owned is owned by non profits and schools…
Mercy Corps’ involvement in this makes me wonder exactly how merciful they are.
If Mercy Corp was involved, I guess that they have much more experience at this than any of us do, and would defer to their wisdom.
From what I could tell in the video, all the police had to to was “disengage” and walk away and things would have gone back to normal. But the police have a serious problem of making too strong of show of force. They never know when to back off!!
The video shows exactly what we have been demanding from our police force- level headed professionalism.