Two Portland police officers shined their flashlights Thursday night into a burgundy van parked beside Powell Park in Southeast Portland and tried to talk to the homeless man inside, but suddenly got “spooked” by something they saw.
They immediately retreated at least 30 yards back to a patrol SUV, a witness said.
Neighbor Kale Heily, who was heading back to his house on Southeast 22nd Avenue after walking his dog in the park, watched the police encounter as it ended with a shot that sounded as if it came from the area of the van, he said.
Then two officers fired a barrage of shots, Heily said, wounding the homeless man in the abdomen.
It was the second officer-involved shooting within 12 hours in Portland. Police said officers fatally shot an armed robbery suspect Thursday morning in Northeast Portland.
The homeless man was wounded but survived, police said.
They identified him as Don Allan Perkins, 56, and said he was recovering at the hospital.
Police recovered a “realistic-looking replica firearm” at the scene, they said.
Officers Bradley Clark and Roger Walsh, who have both been with the Police Bureau for 11 years and are assigned to its Central Precinct, were involved in the shooting.
Police Chief Michael Marshman and Mayor Ted Wheeler planned to address reporters about the two shootings and provide more information at 3:30 p.m. Friday.
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In the Thursday night shooting, police said two officers responded about 6:30 p.m. to a 911 call that reported a 56-year-old man was threatening to commit suicide. Dispatchers told police that the man was near the 2100 block of S.E. Lafayette St..
Heily said he saw two uniformed male officers first speak to another homeless man who lives in a tent on the east sidewalk of 22nd Avenue, closer to the intersection with Lafayette Street. The officers then walked north along 22nd Avenue and approached the passenger side of the burgundy van, parked o the east side of 22nd.
It was about half-way between Powell Boulevard and Lafeyette Street. A homeless man was living in the van along the park for about six months, neighbors said.
Heily said he thought an officer may have opened up the van’s passenger side sliding door. The officers were talking to the man and then “immediately abandoned” that spot and retreated behind another parked car and then to a parked police SUV.
One officer had his hand on his gun holster; the other had his gun out, pointing down, Heily said.
“Something spooked them in the van to make them retreat back and put on body armor,” Heily said.
The man in the van got out and was on the sidewalk, he said, taunting the officers, yelling “Come and get me! Shoot me! Kill me!”
The officers, with lights shining from their patrol car, yelled back to the man in the dark, something like, “Hey we just want to talk to you” or “Let us see your hands” and “What’s in your hands?” Heily said.
After a short lull, Heily heard a loud gunshot, which seemed to come from the area of the van. Seconds later, the two officers fired seven to nine shots in quick succession. Heily, who lives across the street, was home by then and captured some of the shooting on video on his phone.
The man collapsed between his van and a car parked in front. The officers ordered him to lie prone. Other residents startled by the gunshots heard police order the man to keep his hands up.
Heily said he heard the police ask, “Are you OK? Talk to us” and saw the man from the van stand up, holding his side. He was “doubled over,” and then lay down on his side in the street.
“He did the best to put his hands up,” Heily said.
Five officers approached the man and an ambulance arrived a short time later. The officers told the medics the man had a wound to the abdomen and a tourniquet had been placed around one of his arms, according to Heily’s video.
“From my perspective the police officers handled it professionally,” Heily said.
He and his fiancee, Amanda Lynch, said the man in the van had never caused any problems on the street. There had been a serious problem about a year and a half ago of homeless people camping in the park, but the numbers of campers have dropped.
Lynch described the man in the van as “a neighbor who doesn’t have a house right now.”
“He was very upset and agitated and was taunting the police, but I just feel like it’s very unfortunate,” she said.
Heily added: “He has a bit of a drinking problem. He’s sometimes yelling and loud, but I’ve never see him been really violent.”
Another neighbor, Zachariah Parson, said he had only heard some arguing before he heard four to seven gunshots, and the man wounded “holding his stomach.”
In the first shooting Thursday, police said they shot an armed robbery suspect.
The suspect had approached a man sitting in his car by the Portland Value Inn near Halsey Street shortly after 7 a.m. in Northeast Portland.
The suspect woke the man up by tapping on his window, the robbery victim told a Value Inn desk worker. The suspect showed a gun and asked for money, but the man in the car said he didn’t have any.
The suspect ultimately made off with only the victim’s Oregon food benefits card, the victim told the desk worker.
Officers responded shortly thereafter to a report of a car prowl at a nearby pet hospital. Officers started to search the neighborhood and found a man who matched the suspect’s description. He fled, said police spokesman Sgt. Pete Simpson.
Officers then found evidence of a break-in or attempted break-in at a neighborhood house, Simpson said. They sent in a police dog wearing a camera but didn’t find the suspect.
Simpson said officers found the suspect about 35 minutes later, however, and an officer shot and killed him in the 8300 block of Hancock Street about 9:30 a.m. Simpson didn’t initially have any details about the incident.
Police recovered a handgun at the scene that they initially thought was connected to the suspect. There’s no evidence suggesting the man fired at police, Simpson said.
— Maxine Bernstein
mbernstein@oregonian.com
503-221-8212
@maxoregonian
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