More than a dozen activists headed downtown last January, protesting what they said was brutality by the Portland Police Bureau (PPB) during Donald Trumpâs recent inauguration and calling for then-Police Chief Mike Marshman to get canned.Â
âI think itâs an important issue thatâs absolutely worth standing up for,â said one woman who was arrested that day. She and a few others were standing in front of a TriMet bus when a squad of cops dressed in riot gear sprinted toward them from behind. Video footage shows that as the woman slowly walked away, one officer grabbed her arms from behind and slammed her, face-first, to the ground.
Three months earlier, activist and police critic Jessie Sponberg was one of many protesters at City Hall raising hell about a new police union contract signed under then-Mayor Charlie Hales. Officers pepper-sprayed Spongberg, who was yelling at the cops and filming the chaos. Then one officer shoved Sponberg down a small flight of stairs.Â
âThe cops knew who I was and that I had a press pass,â he says about the October 2016 incident.
In both instances, officers were cleared of wrongdoing by their supervisors, who found the use of force was allowed under bureau policy. But both incidentsâalong with othersâare referenced in a scathing new report that calls into question whether Portland cops are being trained to properly defuse tense situations.
Years after the US Department of Justice (DOJ) found the bureau had systemic problems with de-escalation and use of force, the PPB still faces the same issues, according to a just-released assessment from a group of Chicago academics tracking Portlandâs progress.
âWe carry substantial concerns regarding the PPBâs training and implementation of non-force and verbal techniques,â reads the report from the so-called Compliance Officer and Community Liaison (COCL) team being paid to monitor the cityâs settlement with the DOJ. âThere appears to be large-scale confusion regarding the intent of de-escalation within the Bureau and the confusion has yet to be adequately rectified through training and the evaluation of force events.âÂ
In the January incident near the TriMet bus, the involved officer said he violently threw the woman to the ground because he did not want her âto be able to attack or interfere with other officers around that were making arrests.â
The COCL report notes âthe chain of command review finds the officer to be within policy, though the video and officers reports do not appear to support this finding.â
âAlthough there is a governmental interest in clearing the streets, that interest and the actions taken against the community member do not appear balancedâ with the low-level crimes she was arrested on, the report concludes.
The woman, who didnât want to be named for fear of backlash from cops and employers, tells the Mercury she has no clue why she was deemed a physical threat to the officer: âTo me, that just sounds like some ridiculous pretense theyâre trying to create.âÂ
Though heâs not specifically named, the COCL finds that Sponberg was not a threat and didnât âimpede law enforcement function,â when he was thrown from the steps of City Hall. Instead, he was âexpressing extreme verbal discontentâ while filming the scene, COCL leader Dennis Rosenbaum writes. Yet the PPB decided cops were justified in pepper-spraying and shoving him.
âWe believe the force was unreasonable,â the report says, contradicting the PPBâs account. âThe strength of the push does not appear to correlate with the officerâs stated objectiveâ and violates bureau policy.
âIâm glad that an independent review came to the exact same conclusion that I did as I was lying on my back,â Sponberg tells the Mercury. âGod damn that was excessive.âÂ
The COCL report also documents multiple incidents in which officers âaccidentallyâ used TASERs on people. A PPB supervisor wrote in one of the cases that three such accidental deployments âwere within policy and consistent with DOJ Settlement Agreement and best practices.â
The COCLâs response: âWe donât believe either of these statements are true.â
The report also documents an incident where an officer yelled, âYou need to [expletive] stop or you may be shotâ and âIf you donât stop, youâre going to get [expletive] hurt.â The officer and their supervisor found, wrongly according to Rosenbaum, that this was an example of appropriate de-escalation.Â
The COCL says the issue comes down to how Portland cops are instructed. During training sessions the group observed last month, they found instructors âundercuttingâ the policies they were there to teach: One instructor âemphasized that de-escalation should be used âwhen time and circumstances reasonably permit,â underscoring the notion that this is not a required set of behaviors,â the report says, noting that other agencies devote entire days to de-escalation tactics. âThe COCL has found it to be an uphill battle to get the PPB to treat these issues as important.âÂ
Itâs been hard to get a response to the COCLâs damning findings. PPB spokesperson Sergeant Chris Burley referred the Mercuryâs request for comment to Captain Bob Day, head of the bureauâs training division. Day didnât respond to our inquiry. Neither did Mayor Ted Wheelerâs office. Rosenbaum, who wrote the report, said he couldnât discuss the details, but will be taking comments during a public meeting in Portland on Monday.Â
The details in the COCLâs report all stem from the tenure of former Chief Mike Marshman and Acting/Interim Chief Chris Uehara (who took over temporarily after Marshman retired in August).Â
Chief Danielle Outlaw was sworn in earlier this month after leaving her post with the Oakland Police Department. Time will tell if the PPB under Outlaw fares any better in the eyes of those tasked with keeping the bureau in line with the federally mandated settlement agreement.