Downtown Portland businesses have paid a heavy price for the city’s politicians’ refusal to prosecute rioters, and their refusal to allow police to put a decisive stop to the riots. Now a business owner is suing the City of Portland for this negligence. From KATU2:
PORTLAND, Ore. — A downtown Portland jewelry store owner intends to sue the City of Portland for its handling of protests in late May.
Noha Kassab, CEO of Kassab Jewelers, said her family-owned store was was broken into and looted early in the morning on May 30. This was during the beginning stages of what would lead to more than 100 days of protest in Portland.
“I started looking on my phone to see who was in my store, it was bunch of people going into the store, broke glass, it was the most painful, disheartening experience I ever faced,” said Kassab.
The store owner said they are still calculating the costs, but estimates $2.5 million in damages…
“I’m not someone who came to this country with money. I came with an American dream. To see my American dream destroyed and it could have been preventable, is disheartening,” said Kassab.
Kassab filed tort claim notice with the city in mid-September. She alleges Portland leaders, “failed to plan or prepare for, and failed to adequately protect, downtown businesses.”
The storefront on Southwest Broadway is the company’s flagship location. They also have jewelry stores in Lake Oswego and Washington Square Mall.
“I hope to let the city know the amount of pain they have caused for failing to protect the businesses...
Let’s hope this lawsuit, and others like it, are expensive enough to motivate Portlanders to vote smarter in the future.
The second lawsuit is from Patriot Prayer leader Joey Gibson. From The New York Post:
The leader of the far-right group Patriot Prayer is suing the district attorney of the Portland, Oregon, region who is prosecuting them for rioting last year while refusing to charge left-leaning protesters who have been engaged in often violent demonstrations for months.
Patriot Prayer leader Joey Gibson and Russell Schultz are due in court Oct. 26 for trials stemming from a May Day 2019 riot, The Oregonian reported.
They were among six men accused of inciting a riot between the right-wing group and left-leaning Antifa outside a Northeast Portland pub. The other four pleaded guilty and were sentenced in January.
Gibson and Schultz accused Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt of unfair prosecution in a federal suit filed Friday. The suit claims that Schmidt is selectively prosecuting them based on their political beliefs, because he is refusing to dismiss the single felony riot allegation against them in light of his new policy.
Schmidt announced last month that his office wouldn’t pursue riot charges against most of the hundreds of people who have been arrested in Portland protests in recent months. He specifically said rioting charges would not be prosecuted unless accompanied by another crime.
Not mentioned in the article is the fact that Patriot Prayer never actually set anything on fire, never smashed windows, never destroyed any statues and never defaced any property. BLM rioters have done all these things, and few (if any) of them were prosecuted.
This case will show us if there is still justice in this country. Personally, I don’t have much faith in the courts when it comes to matters such as these.
In the meantime, we can take satisfaction that Oregon Governor Kate Brown’s intended actions against the Proud Boys, where she deputized over 50 Oregon police officers as federal agents, specifically to prosecute conservative activists, has backfired against her and her buddy, Portland mayor Ted Wheeler. From The Daily Wire:
The United States Attorney for Oregon, Billy Williams, said Wednesday that the Oregon State Police will remain federal deputies, despite Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler’s pleas.
Mayor Wheeler asked the U.S. Attorney’s office and the Department of Homeland Security to rescind the federal designation earlier this week, well before the designation is due to expire, out of concern that federal deputies could charge Portland’s protesters with federal crimes for assaulting officers, attacking federal buildings, and fomenting unrest.
The mayor’s office issued a statement noting that they’d “asked the U.S. Attorney’s office to withdraw the designation.”
“A key feature of the designation is that anyone who assaults a federally deputized official could be subject to federal charges,” the statement added, per Oregon Live. “Fortunately, I am confident the Multnomah County District Attorney will continue to prosecute anyone who assaults or otherwise harms police officers or others.”
It would be satisfying if the deputized agents ended up arresting Antifa/BLM activists instead of the intended (conservative) targets.
Unfortunately, I don’t think Kassab’s lawsuit will be decided in her favor. Courts have long endorsed the concept of prosecutorial discretion, which applies here.
The unpleasant reality is that prosecutors of Schmidt’s ilk, bankrolled by the Soros Machine, are elected by their constituents, who pretty much are in agreement with their decisions. So if justice cannot be obtained through legal channels, there are other ways to accomplish it, and you know what those are.
Hey, I read your blog a long time ago, glad you’re still up. Sad more hasn’t changed but Trump was a start at least.
Portland is a cluster fuck of failure, the majority of Portland’s population is also to blame for electing the politicians they do.
It’s looking like Portland is going to elect an all-out Antifa mayor to replace Wheeler. So things are really going to deteriorate here in the future.