August 21, 2019
Page 7
Tensions
Ease after
Protests
C ontinueD From p age 3
States Center, a racial, gender and
economic justice group, said the
right wing rally was a bust.
“Portland won today, and far-
right leaders like Joey Gibson and
Joe Biggs lost,” Ward said in a state-
ment.
In an interview, Ward said Biggs’
groups cut short a planned five-hour
rally after only one hour and left.
“The white nationalist, alt-right
coalition that came to Portland was
denied what they sought to create,
which were large-scale civil distur-
bances,” Ward said.
While antifa protesters get a lot
of attention, Ward said there were
many others who came out to op-
pose the right-wing groups. He also
praised police and city officials for
their actions.
“What I saw yesterday was the
first step in Portland really putting
together a citywide response,” he
said.
Mayor Wheeler said at a Satur-
ap p hoto /n oah b erger
A man tussles with protesters against right-wing demonstrators following an “End Domestic
Terrorism” rally in Portland Saturday.
day evening news conference that
Biggs and anyone espousing hate or
violence was not welcome.
“We do not want him here in
my city. Period,” Wheeler said.
The mayor said Portland was
targeted by “a rising white nation-
alist movement” and a growing
sense of fear in the country, and
that because Portland was a pro-
gressive community, it would al-
ways be at or near ground zero of
the battle.
More than two dozen local,
state and federal law enforcement
Altered Mug Shot before Judge
C ontinueD From p age 3
and right cheek, and though police
suspected Allen of being involved
in four bank and credit union
heists, none of the tellers said the
man who robbed them had tattoos
on his face.
The digitally altered photo of
Allen without the tattoos was pre-
sented by police to the bank tellers
for identification with the photos
of five other, similar looking men.
The witnesses were not told about
the photo adjustment made, but
some of them picked out Allen
nevertheless.
Jules Epstein, a law professor
at Temple University and leading
national authority on eyewitness
testimony said in his 40 years as
a lawyer and law professor, he
had never seen such a blatantly
suggestive example of a photo
lineup, a standard law enforce-
ment tool that is under ongoing
scrutiny.
Epstein also said police were
“increasing the risk of mistaken
identity” by their actions.
Allen’s defense attorney Mark
Ahlemeyer argued that the judge
should throw out the positive wit-
ness identification of his client,
claiming police altered the photo
to remove the facial tattoos so Al-
len could more closely resemble
surveillance images and eyewit-
ness descriptions of the thief.
A still image from bank surveil-
lance footage shows the suspect in
question wearing a baseball cap
and black-rimmed glasses, but no
facial tattoos.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Paul
Maloney argued the photo ma-
nipulation was done “to make
Mr. Allen blend in—so his photo
wouldn’t stand out,” adding po-
lice’s actions were “prudent” and
“appropriate.”
Detective Brett Hawkinson
was the officer who gave the or-
ders to remove the tattoos in the
image and he testified such action
is considered “standard practice
among investigators,” though no
protocols exist to instruct Port-
land police to alter photographs
and no documentation of the al-
teration was recorded, beyond the
photo itself. He added that Allen
could have used makeup to cover
the tattoos in the commission of
a crime.
Portland police’s failure to
document the photo changes and
reasons for doing so goes against
federal guidelines when it comes
to adopted standard protocols of
how to handle photo arrays to
lower the chance of influencing a
witness, even unintentionally, the
Oregonian reported.
U.S. District Judge Marco A
Hernandez said he plans to issue
a written ruling soon, which could
set a precedent on police practices
for future cases in Oregon and the
beyond.
agencies, including the FBI, were
in the city on Saturday to help
keep the peace.
As of early afternoon, most
of the right-wing groups had left
the area. But hundreds of people
remained downtown and on near-
by streets, and there were tense
skirmishes—of which some drew
blood--mostly between antifa pro-
testers and right-wing rallyers,
throughout the day.
Joey Gibson, the Vancou-
ver-based right-wing Patriot
Prayers founder was also present
at the Saturday rally, one day after
facing a felony riot charge for an
incident on May 1 in Portland.
Gibson, who organized sim-
ilar rallies in 2017 and 2018 that
erupted in clashes, appeared in
court on Monday and vowed to
fight the charge.
Western States Center Deputy
Director Amy Herzfeld-Copple
called the charges against Gibson
and his co-conspirators “welcome,
if overdue.”
--Associated Press contributed
to this story.