Police are investigating an armed confrontation between a motorist who pulled a handgun and at least two pedestrians dressed in black and armed with what appear to be assault rifles that erupted Thursday in the middle of a residential street in North Portland.
It’s unclear what started the standoff, but videos circulating on social media show the resulting confrontation between people in a crowd and the motorist, Joseph Hall, who remains hospitalized.
The tense encounter unfolded during a weekly march called Justice for Patrick Kimmons, a 27-year-old Black man shot and killed by police in downtown Portland in 2018 after he shot and wounded two other men.
Armed confrontation in North Portland
Confrontation at North Alberta Street and Michigan Avenue, May 6, 2021.
Hall, 53, said he’s a handyman who was headed home from his repair work at a nearby apartment complex when he swerved on Alberta Street to avoid a moped that cut him off.
He said he then noticed the moped following his truck and a man screaming on a handheld radio to stop his truck.
When he reached Michigan Avenue, Hall said another vehicle blocked his path “and all of a sudden I have three or four people around me” with what to him looked like AR-15s and AK-47s.
Hall said he grabbed hold of a non-lethal handgun that can shoot hard pellets to try to get the people to clear the way and hadn’t realized there was a march until people circled his truck. He said he heard a woman outside on a megaphone yelling at the crowd to let him go, but the people continued to block his truck and call him a “Nazi.”
“They’re screaming and yelling at me, claiming I was out there trying to run people over. That’s when I discovered a march was going on,” he said. ”I was trapped. A vehicle in front of me trapped me in. I couldn’t go forward or around.”
Hall is seen on video standing outside the driver’s seat of his red pickup, his door open, holding the firearm, while a man standing in the street points a rifle at him at North Alberta Street and Michigan Avenue.
Hall can be heard yelling: “You have about five seconds to lower that weapon,” as others respond that his truck is a weapon.
Hall said he stepped out of his pickup and someone snatched the keys from the truck. When he went around to the back of the truck, he said several people in the crowd remained hostile and pointed handguns and rifles at him.
He said he then pulled his .38-caliber pistol from his pants and headed into the fray.
“I’m trained in the military to walk towards the threat and fight your way through the threat,” said Hall. He said he served in the U.S. Marines and U.S. Army and has a concealed weapons permit out of Columbia County.
The videos capture when Hall headed to the back of his truck and confronted the crowd as two men dressed in black point rifles at him. One of the men holding a rifle pushes Hall down as others in the crowd yell, “Get his gun!”
People then tackled, punched, and kicked him, according to Hall and the videos.
Hall said his .38-caliber gun popped out of his hand and was stolen. People also stole other guns from his truck, he said. He called 911 and said he was told police were monitoring the situation.
An ambulance was sent and he was taken to Legacy Emanuel Hospital, where he’s being treated for a dislocated shoulder, broken left clavicle and five broken ribs, he said.
“All I wanted to do is leave,” said Hall, who has faced threats on social media. “I work with all race, creed, color, everybody. I will not sit back and let anybody that’s out there on social media call me anything other than what I really am. I’m a human being. My life was threatened.”
But judge for yourself and watch the full video of the confrontation.
Additional sauces:
https://www.oregonlive.com/crime/2021/0 ... treet.html
https://nypost.com/2021/05/08/portland- ... d-protest/
What exactly is going on in Portland, Oregon?
How comes it that they errect their own checkpoints now and what implications does this hold for the future? Does that man if you get in the wrong street, wrong checkpoint you'd be attacked by some vigilantes or militas if you look at them the wrong way? Or have the wrong name... and so on.
What do you think happened there?
EDIT: Video link updated.
DDDD
