See why neighbors say this man didn’t go quietly, when the police came to the door asking about his whereabouts – and what was necessary to get him to surrender …
“Loud-hailing” the suspect that SERT officers thought was in this well-kept looking Lents Neighborhood house didn’t work, neighbors say.
Story and photos by David F. Ashton
There was little news coverage after a warrant service in the Lents Neighborhood – a couple of blocks from the shuttered Marshall High School – on January 27. But, the event proved to have quite an impact on neighbors who watched events unfold that morning.
“When I came outside, I saw a lot of people out in the street,” recounted 50-year resident John Welch. “There were many police officers.”
This is one of the many windows broken when SERT officers lobbed tear gas into the residence.
Starting about 11:30 a.m., members of the Portland Police Bureau (PPB) Special Emergency Reaction Team (SERT) gathered around a house in the 4000 block of SE 91st Avenue, Welch said. “For the better part of an hour, they called out, telling the man to come out.”
A man and woman exited the residence – but not the man for whom police were looking. “They kept trying to coax him out – but, nothing.”
Officers with the Gang Enforcement Team test their gas masks before heading into the now-empty house to search for evidence.
After warning the suspect they were about to gas the house, Welch said SERT officers fired ten or twelve tear gas canisters into the house. “They shot them from all sides of the house.”
Even the tear gas barrage didn’t work – at first.
Witnesses say, after the house was tear-gassed, the wanted man stuck his head and body out of the upper window, and appeared to be gasping for air.
“After about 15 minutes, the guy stuck his head out the upper bedroom window, coughing,” Welch reported.
PPB Public Information Officer Sgt. Peter Simpson later said that SERT officers were executing a search warrant as part of an ongoing investigation into a gang-related shooting that occurred in the Fall of 2011.
“The Gang Enforcement Team is the lead investigation unit on this case. The suspect is in custody, and nobody suffered any injuries during the warrant service.”
Police say the took this man, 25-year-old Demarko Herbert Streeter, into custody – only after they gassed the house in which they found him.
Days later, Simpson named 25-year-old Demarko Herbert Streeter as the individual apprehended. MCDC records show that Streeter remains in custody at the Multnomah County Inverness Jail on a charge of Parole Violation.
© 2012 David F. Ashton ~ East Portland News
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