Man, possibly former Portland police officer, apparently struck by train in Washougal

The body of a man who apparently had been struck by a train was found Monday morning in Washougal, BNSF Railway spokesman Gus Melonas said.

Crew members aboard a train heading from Camas to Washougal spotted the man’s body near Sixth Street on the south side of the tracks at about 10:30 a.m., Melonas said.

The Oregonian reported that the man hit by the train was Washougal resident Dane Reister, a former Portland police officer who was fired from the agency in 2013. Portland Police Bureau Sgt. Pete Simpson said Monday that the bureau had been notified of Reister’s death, but declined to answer any further questions. The Washougal Police Department also declined to release any information about the incident Monday.

Reister was fired from the agency after he critically injured a man with live rounds from a shotgun he mistakenly thought was loaded with less-lethal beanbag rounds. He was facing assault charges in the shooting.

The train whose crew found the body is not the train that hit him, Melonas said. “BNSF police indicate that it appears as if the body was struck by (an earlier) train. … However, other circumstances appear to be involved.”

Melonas declined to expand on the other circumstances, but said that BNSF officers and local police are investigating the incident.

The train whose crew discovered the body had one locomotive and three cars hauling general freight, Melonas said.

On Sunday, another person was struck by a train just west of Wishram in Klickitat County, Melonas said.

In that incident, a man was hit near a private crossing just before 7 p.m. and was alive when emergency personnel took him to a Portland hospital, Melonas said. His condition was not known Monday.