Oregonlive.com reported that two men and one woman appeared before a federal judge on Wednesday in Portland to face federal charges of civil disorder connected with violence during this summer’s rioting.
A Seattle man is accused of launching a ball bearing with a slingshot during a downtown demonstration in July and striking a Portland Fire Bureau medic.
A Portland woman is accused of throwing a helmet that struck a police sergeant in the head last week outside the Police Bureau’s North Precinct.
A Kelso man is accused of repeatedly using a hammer to strike the glass above the front door of the Police Bureau’s East Precinct and elbowing an officer in the face in early August and then throwing frozen eggs and other objects at police three days later outside the Penumbra Kelly Building on East Burnside Street.
The specific charge of “civil disorder” is a rare one since, in the past, the federal government has been content to allow the states to pursue more specific charges in these cases. Jonathan H. Adler, a law professor at the Case Western Reserve University School of Law, wrote for Reason Magazine this summer, that property destruction and violence against others at protests on city streets “should be prosecuted by state and local governments, not the feds.”
However, since local and state authorities have been standing down, this represents a small first step to bringing accountability to people engaged in criminal acts.
Similar civil disorder prosecutions are now pending in Pittsburgh, Knoxville, Tenn., Boston, Mobile, Alabama, and Naperville, Illinois. It is expected that more such prosecutions will soon be undertaken as individuals are identified from video of the riots.
Again this is a small step in the right direction. A stronger step might include suing these people civilly for the damage they caused. If they are slapped with damages that will take a long time to pay off, then we might see a significant reduction in these kinds of actions.