Newly released body camera footage shows the minutes leading up to the death of Damon Lamarr Johnson, who died shortly after being physically restrained and handcuffed by police last month. Officers were dispatched to Johnson's North Portland apartment after a security guard at the property reported the man was exhibiting erratic behavior and dangling knives out his window.  

“This is tough to watch,” Portland Police Chief Bob Day said of the footage. 

Johnson struggled with Portland Police Bureau (PPB) officers for several minutes as they tried to handcuff him in his apartment around 10:30 pm on June 27. Police body camera footage shows Johnson, 52, was wrestled to the ground, where he lay face down with his hands cuffed and officers’ hands on his back. A few minutes later, Johnson was unresponsive. 

Paramedics arrived and performed CPR before transporting him to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

It’s unclear why officers arrested Johnson that night. Chief Day said the three responding officers–J.P. Duque Valencia, who's been with PPB nearly three years, Jason Epton, who's got two-and-a-half years with PPB, and Travis Wortman, who's been with PPB for nearly two years—made the decision to place Johnson in a police officer hold because they deemed him a threat to himself and/or others. 

Officers were dispatched to the Argyle Gardens apartment complex in the Kenton neighborhood on reports of a man flooding his apartment, smearing shaving cream on walls, and “hanging knives out the window.” Argyle Gardens offers transitional housing to people exiting homelessness.

A security guard for the apartment complex told police that water was spilling into the hallway from Johnson’s apartment, and he could be heard “grunting like a gorilla.” 

“He’s got serious issues. We need help down here,” the guard told police by phone as they were en route. 

What the footage shows

On arrival, officers found the door to Johnson’s apartment open, and Johnson with his pants around his ankles. It's unclear if they observed any weapons in the apartment. 

He appeared calm and alert, but somewhat incoherent as police asked him questions about the flooding. Johnson told officers his name when asked and declined their offer to help him move his bed, which had been flipped over. 

Officers, standing in the doorway, briefly convened, trying to decide whether to take Johnson into custody. They then entered and advanced toward Johnson, telling him not to resist as they attempted to handcuff him. “You’re under arrest” one officer said, as Johnson was restrained face down on the ground, with his hands forcibly held behind his back by officers. “For what?” Johnson asked, letting out screams of mental distress as officers struggled to restrain him. “I surrender!” Johnson cried out, as officers repeatedly told him to stop resisting. 

Officers observed Johnson's breathing had slowed significantly, causing them to panic, and check for a pulse. 

Paramedics entered the apartment about 10 minutes after the arrest was initiated and asked officers to uncuff Johnson. 

“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” an officer responded. “If we have to, then yes.”

An officer pressed the medic again. “Do you need it to bring him back or resuscitate him or anything?” 

A paramedic noted Johnson was non-verbal and needed to be moved to a gurney. “I don’t even know if he’s breathing,” the medic noted. 

Officers were reluctant to remove the handcuffs, asking the medics if Johnson had a pulse. An officer removed the cuffs as paramedics moved in to begin CPR. The video ends shortly afterward.

Investigation still underway

All three officers are still on administrative leave. Day told reporters Friday that the in-custody death is under investigation, and will be reviewed by the Police Bureau’s Internal Affairs unit, as well as the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office. 

A cause of death is still under investigation by the medical examiner’s office.

“This is a call we would classify as an ECIT,” Day noted, referring to the enhanced crisis level intervention team during the Friday afternoon press conference. He said one officer on scene did have crisis intervention training. 

Day acknowledged the circumstances of the fatal arrest—Johnson, a Black man, pinned down by officers until he became unconscious—that would likely draw comparisons to the deaths of other Black men at the hands of police. He declined to speculate on why the responding officers chose to initiate a police hold and arrest Johnson, considering he was non-combative and communicative upon arrival. 

As the city moves to expand Portland Street Response—the unarmed crisis response unit that handles calls involving people in mental distress—the police chief said he’d like for calls involving behavioral health issues to be handled by an agency with expertise in psychiatric crises, not police. 

“My desire is that law enforcement should not even have to be at these calls for service,” Day said Friday. “At the end of the day, this is not the appropriate response model.”

The emergency call came in around 10 pm, past Portland Street Response’s current operating hours. The call also didn't meet the metrics for PSR dispatch because it involved weapons.

During Friday’s press conference, Day declined to go into detail about PPB protocols for restraint. As noted by KGW, several police agencies have stopped using the type of restraint position Johnson was placed in while handcuffed, noting it has been a factor in more than 100 in-custody deaths. 

The body camera footage from the June 27 call was shared with Johnson’s family, as well as mental health organizations, the Portland Committee on Community Engaged Policing, and a group representing Portland’s African American community.

Portland city councilors also viewed the video. Councilor Sameer Kanal, who co-chairs the city’s Community and Public Safety Committee, said the incident is concerning, considering the city is still under a settlement agreement with the US Department of Justice, which was initiated after the federal government alleged a pattern of PPB using force against people with mental illness.

Johnson's death is unlikely to be investigated by Portland’s new Police Accountability Board. The Board which was just appointed, isn’t completely operational yet and isn’t yet taking cases for review.

“We’re going to be in the current imperfect system,” Kanal told the Mercury on Friday, but noted the incident will be reviewed by Internal Affairs, PPB’s homicide unit, and the district attorney’s office. “It’s not what I think the community wanted and has voted for… that doesn’t mean that it can’t be as good as it can be within that [system].”

Kanal later released a statement, critical of the Police Bureau’s release of edited and narrated body camera footage, and the Bureau’s response. (PPB did release what appears to be full, raw footage from different cameras to press earlier that day.)

“The short videos I watched today show no reason he should have died,” Kanal said in the statement. “Cases like this highlight why we need a public safety system that does not send police to these types of mental health crisis calls, and I am working to build that system.”

Kanal said he expects the Community and Public Safety Committee will be discussing the case, and it’s likely the Independent Police Review will review the findings of the Internal Affairs investigation.

This story has been corrected to note the Independent Police Review, not the Police Accountability Board, could review the incident.