Let's make this abundantly clear:

Keaton Otis shot a police officer twice. The officers deployed their tasers, and Mr. Otis made the decision to pull his gun and start shooting. It is very unlikely they stopped to think about Mr. Otis' race before they opened fire.

Forty rounds (sounded closer to 25-30 to me) each from 8 officers (don't know how many there are there) doesn't surprise me at all as a trained reaction to hearing two gunshots.

Mr. Otis made a very, very poor choice. We are very fortunate that he did not kill a police officer.

It's sad that Keaton Otis made a decision that cost him his life and injured a police officer but judging by this Jimenez character, I'd say there's a pattern emerging.

Good comment about that guy's character, Suburban Porn King! :)

'"I think it was a racial thing," Jimenez said, when asked why the police might have shot Otis. "There are a lot of black people being killed by the police recently."'

This ... ahem ... ill informed youth has not a clue about the story, the news in general, his brother's friends' doings, and generally living a decent life, apparently.

I find that quote to be quite irresponsible and incendiary.

"D" who the hell are YOU to judge? Have PPB/PPA's Image Enhancement Committee given you the task to judge anyone's
CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT to opine what they feel about their friend's surprising death? For me, the young man knew the now deceased young man personally, and as far as I can tell, you do not, did not and will not now...it's all bias, prejudices, and mindset or groupthink that is driving your commentary and it's disregarded as being sound and viable on that basis (by me).

Not much of a character witness, to be honest.

Sorry for your loss, Jimmy. It's tough to lose a friend and tougher when they go out in a way that's out of character for the person you knew. Smoke a bowl for his memory, sure... but for his honor and how you knew him, maybe tone down your overall use... chin up, eyes open.

Jimenez, Otis, and their entire tribe of misled juveniles illustrate an all too common cycle of young people who have no concept of the requirements to function as an upstanding member of society. Much of this problem can certainly rest on the parents of these full-grown children. It perplexes me that the parents and families of these people who have been killed by the Portland Police seem to be carelessly absent for most of their lives until a city-paid settlement looks to be on the horizon. All of a sudden, the police are racist killers and the gun-wielding victim is a saint! I'd like to see a critic's reaction if someone took a shot at them. Maybe they would find enough time to put down their granola long enough to counsel the gun out of the shooter's hand.



The facts are as follows:



1) [COMMENT EDITED—UNSUBSTANTIATED RUMOR]

2) Otis ran from the Portland Police.

3) Otis didn't comply with the commands of the Portland Police.

4) Even though Otis was being zapped by a more forgiving way of controlling a criminal, he pulled out a gun and shot a cop twice before he met his inevitable end.



Call me obtuse, but I will go as far as assuming Otis didn't have a concealed weapons permit.



For once, I'd like to see the citizens of Portland stop "keeping Portland weird" and start keeping Portland law abiding. We need to support our Police Officers! There are good cops, and terrible cops. Just like any group of people. So set down the bowl you're smoking for your homies, go back to school, get a job, and STOP BREAKING THE LAW!!

Hey, LIVINGINTHEREALWORLD. I think you've got something there! "Keep Portland Law Abiding," has a real ring to it! ^___^

As for Jimenez... *sigh*. Can we invest more money in education please?

I would invest in kickin' Jimmy's drop-out, bong-water stinkin', vandalized his own school, punk-ass. He got jumped by a bunch of "African American guys" but little Jimmy harbors no ill will. It's the Portland Cops that are racist.

Any he must have been real tight with Mr. Otis, given that he hasn't seen him in a year.

And then there were three. Aaron Campbell, Jack Collins, and now Keaton Otis. Three very different cases, with identical outcomes, a mentally ill person dead at the hands of police.

The video of this shooting is incredibly disturbing and confusing. I'm not going to rush to judgement, but we don't really KNOW anything yet, except the following.

A young black man with no criminal record is dead. He is dead at the hands of the HEAT team, which has been accused multiple times of racial profiling.

A HEAT officer has stated publicly that race is “a factor I’d consider” in deciding who to pull over. We know that in the days before the killing, the police took a very public and humiliating spanking. (Chasse settlement, Sizer firing, Mayoral chastisement). We know that it's human nature to become angry and over-reactive when someone is humiliated. We know that the police union has always fought against civilian oversight and drug-testing following officer involved shootings. We know that after the Aaron Campbell shooting, the Grand Jury demanded serious police reform.

That's really all we know right now. We need a full, open and timely investigation, completely released to the public. We need to adopt the Albina Ministerial Alliance's demands for police reform. We need Mayor Adams and Chief Reese to prove they mean it when they talk about serious changes in the Bureau. They have a golden opportunity to prove they mean what they say right now.

And oh dear god, we need to quit having police be the first responders in a mental health crisis. Psychiatry and medicine often talk about the "magic bullet" cure. I don't think this is what they meant.

My heart goes out to the friends and family of this young man. My heart also goes out to Officer Burley, his family, friends and colleagues. I truly pray that you make a full and fast recovery.

Rabblevox: Great points.

newidea: Money for hands on education and new approaches to education in general aren't free. Of course public schools need to try new approaches, but they also are dealing with incredibly low budgets and there's only so much you can do with that.

Rabblevox,

You failed to mention that we also know a cop was treated for gunshot wounds to his groin, and that a gun was recovered at the scene. If the bullet ballistics of the recovered gun match the bullets that hit the cop (assuming they were recovered), then somebody likely shot the cop with a caliber of weapon not issued to PPB officers.

The kid is human, and...a kid. How many of us have had a REALLY bad day and gone immediately for a bottle or a bowl? Maybe I'm crazy, but I think finding out the police pumped 20 bullets into a friend qualifies as a PRETTY FUCKING BAD day. ( not as bad as Keaton's, though)

Jiminez sounds like a nice but immature young man. No one ever told him not to tell everything in his head to a reporter. And some want to pillory him?

Please, this story is sad and disturbing on many levels. Creating scapegoats out of victims, or teenagers, or police, at this point is not only counterproductive, it's insulting to people who want to know the facts before passing judgement.

Here are the facts I want.
All video and audio evidence evidence.
All Officer involved statements.
Full crime scene report. (including vehicle, ballistics and trajectories, officer positioning, shot sequence, etc)
Full coroner's and medical examiner's reports.
All 1st-hand witness accounts.

AND.....

A drug screen on all involved officers. I am not accusing. But in every other profession where public safety or trust is involved, a drug test is mandatory after any incident, and sometimes randomly.

We drug-test baseball players. We drug-test airline pilots, surgeons, school teachers, bus drivers and carnival ride operators, but we can't test police? REALLY??? They have one of the most stressful jobs imaginable, and they are as prone to addiction as anyone else.

The police should be proud and bold about being drug-free . If they are not, then we have a problem. Why have the police resisted post-shooting drug testing? (let me repeat, I'm not accusing. I sincerely hope that all officers involved could pee in a bottle tonight and come back clean).

And I want to see this quckly. Mayor Adams, Chief Reese, the city needs a full, fast, honest, and open accounting now. If you stall, or spin, you will have lost a vital chance to regain the public faith.

I'm willing to keep an open mind for now, but my trust level is low. You have both promised deep and serious police reform. Now is when you begin.

@bruce,
I did not talk about Officer Burley's gunshot wounds. Nor did I talk about Keaton Otis' gunshot wounds because I don't know anything about either, other than Otis is dead, and Burley is in the hospital. I want the details, I want the facts. I want to see the crime scene and ME report.

Until then, all I can do is be sad, because this was truly tragic. And I continue to pray for the family and friends of both Otis and Burley.

So all the armchair CSI wannabees need to review the evidence and draw their own conclusions? If you begin with the belief that PPB officers are hell bent on executing the mentally ill and african americans, why would you believe their investigation is going to disprove anything? It's like the JFK assasination, or the 9/11 truthers: it's impossible to disprove consipracy when the theorists are unmoved by the facts.

this jimmy jimenez is pathetic. don't call him a kid because he is 18, which makes him a legal adult. all the crap comments & excuses he made shows that he is a lowlife moron & accepting them only condones his poor behavior.
the mother of keaton otis demonstrated she has class by extending her well wishes to all the officers involved. may she find peace as she continues her life without her son.

it will be really sad if the progressive outcome of this incident is what otis' mom is asking for, ie the right of parents to incarcerate their children against their will once they have been attached to the label of being mentally ill. the intersection of liberty rights and the sometimes awful behavior of miserable people is a really problematic arena but the solution is not a return to the hideous old days where parents/shrinks/cops could get you locked up without the due process accorded to someone who just committed mass murder. (the only reason it stopped happenning is the aclus limited efforts ran into the fact that its really expensive to lock people up in loony bins so they stopped doing it mostly to save money