PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Luana Elliott spent a portion of her Thursday morning outside the Portland Police East Precinct building, the site of recent unrest from protesters that have turned into riots a handful of times — including Wednesday night.
Elliott wasn’t there to protest. She was there to clean up the plaque outside the police precinct, the plaque “in honor of all good police officers that have died in the line of duty,” she said. “Thomas Jeffries is a really good man.”
Jeffries was shot to death while on duty July 20, 1997 by a man sought for shooting a child earlier that night. He was 35 and was survived by his pregnant wife.
“That’s why I am here. I cleaned the plaque up and I can’t believe this is going on,” she said. “For this to happen here in a quiet neighborhood, there’s a community center across the street. A lot of these officers are good police officers. They just want to do their job. They want to protect.”
Portland police declared a riot Wednesday night once a group of people cracked the glass front doors to the precinct. The group proceeded to barricade the doors and set a fire. Shortly after, police used tear gas to disperse the crowd along with other crowd control munitions. PPB said during the dispersal, someone in a truck attempted to run over several officers.
Eight arrests were made overnight, police announced later in the day. Charges included rioting, interfering with police officers, criminal mischief, disorderly conduct, attempted assault of public safety officers, reckless driving and resisting arrest. One person arrested is from Kentucky, while another is from Minnesota.
Elliott is fed up with the violence and mayhem.
“If you are in a communty in Portland you need to stand up and help me stop this. This is not the Black Lives Matter, this is antifa and other groups,” she said.
“This has got to stop. It’s losing the message for any good.”
Residents in the neighborhood
Eric Detrick realized he was in the middle of a protest Wednesday night as police and protesters pushed down Southeast Stark.
“It’s pretty wild, woke up and got about a couple thousand people out there protesting and rioting,” he told KOIN 6 News. “It’s crazy. I never thought I’d see it in the back yard or the front yard.”
Detrick said he’s not against protests, and he said he trends down the middle when it comes to such things. But one of his neighbors, Tanya, was strongly opposed.
“I don’t agree with what they’re doing. I think the police are good,” she said. “It’s really just a bunch of nonsense and it makes the regular people like me scared and nervous.”
Tanya said the rioting in her neighborhood is “totally ridiculous.”
Detrick agreed. “It blows my mind. I’m kind of surprised it lasted this long.”