Updated: 6:05 pm October 19
The family of a man shot and killed by police downtown Thursday, October 15 is grieving and seeking more answers after the death of a loved one they say needed mental health treatment.
Family members of Eric Hurtado, 36, gathered downtown on Sunday to grieve and remember him. Hurtado was killed on October 15 after police say he used a box cutter to assault and injure two people. According to Portland Police Bureau reports, Central Precinct officers were dispatched to the 700 Block of Southwest Alder Street shortly after 4:30 pm on reports of a suspect “actively assaulting and threatening people.”
The first officers to arrive reported an attack in progress and opened fire, shooting Hurtado. He was transported to a hospital, but died from his injuries. A Husky brand utility knife with a broken blade was found at the scene.
While scant details have been released by police, they say two men who were attacked by Hurtado were also hospitalized with serious, but non-life-threatening injuries.
Hurtado grew up in the Mojave Desert town of Yucca Valley, California. His family said they had been trying to get him back to Southern California to be closer to them, but because he had recently been released from prison, he couldn’t leave the state immediately. They wanted to help him get the mental health treatment he needed.
A dispatch incident summary from October 15 described the call as an “assault with a weapon.” By 4:50 pm, with a swarm of police vehicles descended on the blocks between SW 5th and Park Avenue, first responders from Portland Fire & Rescue initially described the scene as a “multiple victim traumatic scene in downtown portland.”
Portland’s Bureau of Emergency Communications, which handles the region’s 911 system, declined to release the 911 call audio or transcript, citing an active police investigation.
The attacks appear to be random. Bystanders told KATU news that a man was running into businesses “crying and yelling.”
Kate Bolling of Wines on Broadway said Friday that a man barged into her bar Thursday afternoon around 4 pm, and appeared to be in extreme mental distress, screaming and asking for a gun he thought she had for him.
“I got him to leave pretty quick and he ran out into the street, and then took a right on Alder,” Bolling told the Mercury. “About 10 or 15 minutes after that, he was running down the middle of Broadway against traffic.”
The wine bar owner said she’s not certain, but fairly confident the man in her shop was the same person who was shot by police shortly afterward.
The man left behind a Nike brand fanny pack with toothpaste and deodorant inside. She said her building’s security guard tried to find him and give his belongings back, but couldn’t immediately locate him.
Shortly after he left the wine bar, it’s believed Hurtado ran toward a nearby hotel, where he stabbed someone with a utility blade, before entering St. Honoré bakery and cafe, attacking an employee there.
The officer who shot Hurtado is on administrative leave, in line with Portland Police Bureau’s (PPB) standard policy. The names of the officers involved have not yet been released, nor has body camera footage from the incident. PPB typically releases details about the officers involved two weeks after an incident involving deadly use of force.
This is the second fatal shooting by PPB officers in less than a month. On September 24, Portland police officers, working in conjunction with other law enforcement agencies, shot and killed 39-year-old Eddie Todd Campbell and a police K9 in the parking lot of a Southeast Portland motel. Campbell, who had a gun pointed at officers, was the suspect in a homicide in Gresham earlier that day.
Thursday’s incident marks the fourth deadly use of force by PPB so far this year, and the third fatal shooting.
This story will be updated.
