Portland shooting victim graduated high school last month

PORTLAND — Authorities have identified the person killed in a shooting early Saturday in downtown Portland, Oregon, as an 18-year-old woman who had graduated from high school last month.

Portland Police said Monday that Makayla Maree Harris was killed in what is believed to be a drive-by shooting. Relatives told The Oregonian/OregonLive that she had graduated from Grant High School in early June and was the youngest in her family with six siblings.

Philip Humphrey, the Grant High coordinator for Self Enhancement Inc., remembered Harris as a “personality in such a small package.”

“I’m heartbroken waking to such tragic news,” he wrote Sunday. “My prayers go out to you daily & friends who love you. You deserved so much more than this.”

Harris was one of two people killed in four different early morning shootings Saturday in Portland that also injured multiple people. Oregon’s largest city has seen gun violence and associated homicide rates soar in the past six months.

Mayor Ted Wheeler called the rash of shootings a “pandemic” and said he would push hard for more officers and resources for the Portland Police Bureau, which has lost 125 sworn officers in the past year and faces news rounds of retiring officers in coming months.