Adam Hinkle says he was banned from the MAX for 60 days by Trimet cops on Sunday after a cop told him he couldn't smoke on the platform, so he stubbed out his cigarette, and the cop's partner cop gave him a citation for "offensive littering."

Hinkle, who moved to Portland in January but lost his job in construction when the economy turned south, has been collecting cans to earn money. He says he was walking across the street, less than 12 inches outside the crosswalk on the MAX tracks at NE Holladay and 7th on Sunday afternoon, with his cans, when a Trimet car pulled up and two officers got out.

The officers asked him his name and told him there was no smoking on the MAX platform—"so I put it out on the ground, I mean, what else do you do when someone with a gun and a Taser is telling you you can't smoke?" says Hinkle. "And then the other cop said 'Hey, THAT's offensive littering,' and started writing me a ticket."

Hinkle, who is living at Transition Projects on NW5th and Glisan, says he is trying to get his life back together, and is waiting to get into permanent housing. "But this kind of stuff, it just makes it harder and harder to get a job, you know?"