January 2010

This family photo of 23-year-old Timothy Douglass shows him before his hospital stay for a heart condition, and before his death Friday. His death sent his brother Aaron Marcell Campbell into a suicidal bender, their family members say.

Campbell was shot by Portland police early Friday night in front of the Sandy Terrace Apartments.

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The incident began about 4:30 p.m. at the Sandy Terrace Apartments on Northeast 128th and Sandy after police showed up on a welfare check on a call of a suicidal individual armed with a gun. Police were able to get a woman and three children out of the apartment before convincing the man to walk out.

Police said they made contact with the man and that shots were fired, but police said nothing else.

“We are not releasing any additional information right now,” said Detective Mary Wheat, spokeswoman for the Portland Police Bureau. “Shots were fired and the person is deceased, and we’ll be releasing more information throughout the weekend.”

While police were tight-lipped about the incident, two witnesses said they saw a man come out with his hands up and appeared to be cooperating with police. But they said police shot the man with a beanbag gun and then in the back with a shotgun.

“He had his hands up, just like this,” said Kenny Boyer, demonstrating.

Last Thursday attracts thousands of people to a Northeast Portland street during the summer but city officials said they might shut it down.

Officials say the monthly art event on Northeast Alberta has gotten expensive for taxpayers and has become a burden for neighbors.

The art is the upside to the event but many neighbors are dismayed about the lack of parking and huge crowds that force the city to close down blocks of the street because of public safety concerns.

Also, the behavior of some people irritates neighbors.

“When you see people urinating in somebody’s truck, or in their garbage can or something like that, it’s a little upsetting,” says Jeanine Douglas, who is a resident on Northeast Alberta.

Now that the city tab for things like traffic control totals up to $10,000 a month, City Commissioner Amanda Fritz says Last Thursday has gotten too big for that kind of subsidy and too big to be run so loosely.

“There’s any number of different ways we can continue it but be slightly different, or we could figure out how to stop it,” says Fritz.

Second- and third-graders from Glenfair Elementary are banding together to help those in Haiti.

They'll be doing a can drive from Saturday, Jan. 30 through Tuesday, Feb. 9. Students will canvas neighborhoods around the school, wearing specially-made shirts that were donated to the school, and asking for can/bottle donations. All of the money they get from the deposits will go directly to Mercy Corps.

Photo credit: A girl stands in an orphanage being used by U.N. children's agency UNICEF for Haitian children separated from their parents after the Jan. 12 earthquake, in the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2010. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)