The ACLU of Oregon has repeatedly claimed that the Portland Police Bureau’s heavy-handed tactics at protests over the last year have been unconstitutional. Now, it’s asking a federal jury to agree.
On Wednesday morning, the civil rights group planned to file the first of a handful of lawsuits against the city. All involve controversial strategies the bureau has used to quell the protests that have become commonplace in the Trump era.
The first suit deals with the “kettling” tactic police used on demonstrators at a massive June 4 protest. By surrounding and detaining a large group of protesters and others downtown, and demanding to photograph their IDs, the ACLU believes the PPB violated their constitutional rights.
“They were detained unlawfully, in violation of their Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment rights,” ACLU of Oregon Legal Director Mat dos Santos tells the Mercury. “Portland police indiscriminately detained and arrested between 200 and 250 people without meeting the basic constitutional requirements: reasonable suspicion and probable cause.”