This Week in the Mercury
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Cops Officers Identified in 2010's Sixth Police Shooting
Posted by Denis C. Theriault on Thu, Dec 30, 2010 at 2:00 PM
The Portland Police Bureau this afternoon identified eight Central Precinct officers involved in the shooting Monday of Marcus Lagozzino, a mentally ill man wielding a machete outside his parents' Southwest Portland home.
The shooting—which also included so-called "less-lethal" weapons like a Taser and beanbag shotguns—came less than a minute after officers first made contact with Lagozzino and just more than 20 minutes after his mother called 911 to warn that her 34-year-old son was threatening "suicide by cop."
Police officials previously declined to specify how many times Lagozzino was shot. But today spokesman Sgt. Pete Simpson said in a release that he was hit at least three times. Officer Bradley Clark, a four-year veteran, fired his AR-15 rifle four times. He has been placed on paid leave until a Multnomah County grand jury weighs the case, a process expected to begin next week.
Simpson says Lagozzino is recovering from gunshot wounds to his chest; the Oregonian is reporting Lagozzino's condition has been upgraded from critical to serious.
Police officials also said that officers Ralph Elwood and Scott Foster, with 14 and 17 years in the bureau respectively, fired a total of seven beanbag rounds. And Officer Jamin Becker, with the bureau just two years, also Tasered Lagozzino once.
The bureau also identified the supervising sergeant, David Michaelson, and the three officers providing cover as the shooting unfolded, Sergeant Rick Stainbrook, Curtis Pak, and Daniel Spiegel.
The police shooting in Portland is the sixth this year—all of them involving men dealing with mental illness and/or addiction issues—and the third within a four-week span that began in late November. If Lagozzino survives, he'll be the only one of this year's shooting victims to do so. One of the other five, Craig Boehler, was ruled to have died of smoke inhalation after a fire erupted during a shootout at his mother's home.
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