PORTLAND — The city of Portland will take three police officers off protest duty while they’re under investigation for allegedly using excessive force against ACLU legal observers and journalists.
The city didn’t release the officers’ names. The move is part of an agreement the city reached with the ACLU, journalists and legal observers who sued the city over the alleged police use of excessive force, The Oregonian/OregonLive reported.
The negotiated pact, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Portland, says the plaintiffs agreed not to pursue an immediate motion to ask a judge to find the city in contempt of a September court order that prohibited Portland officers from “arresting, threatening to arrest or using physical force” against journalists or legal observers. The city had agreed to the terms of the September preliminary injunction after facing a lawsuit filed by six journalists and legal observers.
Tuesday’s four-page agreement acknowledges only that the plaintiffs claimed the city violated the injunction on several occasions in August and September.
Those claims include the dislocation of ACLU legal observer Kat Mahoney’s shoulder when police allegedly picked her up by the handcuffs during an Aug. 9 arrest and an officer’s alleged grabbing of ACLU legal observer Stasia Brownell by the throat and throwing her to the ground as she and another legal observer filmed the officer’s arrest of Mahoney.
The alleged claims also include encounters with independent journalist Maranie Staab who said police pushed her in the back Aug. 10 while she tried to leave an area as ordered, used force against her on Aug. 16 in retaliation for filming an officer and used force against her on Sept. 29 when she was filming an officer pepper-spraying a protester.
The plaintiffs provided the city with video evidence of their allegations and were prepared to pursue a contempt motion against the city but decided to resolve the matter through negotiations, according to court records.
The city, by entering into the agreement, doesn’t admit liability or admit that any of the allegations are true.
The city is continuing to investigate them, the agreement says.
