PORTLAND—More than 150 rounds were fired into a Northeast Portland apartment complex on the night of July 31.
Portland police responded to the shooting around 11 p.m., closing off streets of the Goodrick-Spencer Apartments and Scruggs Townhomes in Portland’s Montavilla neighborhood. At least 8 occupied apartments and 7 cars were hit by the wide spray of bullets. It is unknown whether the cars were occupied at the time of the incident.
One woman hit in the arm was taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. She is expected to recover.
Apartment resident Aragon Marks said he helped the woman as she waited for paramedics to arrive, “I ran inside and grabbed my medic bag and I applied a tourniquet to her arm. It looked like she was shot once and I got the bleeding to stop.”
Marks said this was not a usually dangerous area until recently. On July 27, another shooting in the area resulted in the death of Mister Ford, 19.
Marks and neighbor Kemoh Sulimani appealed to city leaders for more officers to prevent further shootings. Others living in the complex voiced concerns that protests downtown and increased violence have stretched police thin.
“They had like a gang violence task force that are no longer funded which is unfortunate because as soon as that defunding happened all of this really peaked up,” Sulimani said.
Formerly known as the Gang Enforcement Unit, The Gun Violence Reduction team was disbanded by the Portland Police Bureau in June. In July, Portland police reported responding to more than 60 shootings, a 129 percent increase from July of last year.
Both Marks and Sulimani said they will move out since they no longer feel safe in their homes.
Portland Police say if anyone has any information about the shooting, they are asked to call police non-emergency at 503-823-3333 and reference case number 20-238571.