Portland Police have been slashing tires and smashing windows of unsuspecting vehicles at protests this week. Tonight they were caught on camera slashing tires of a the Black Lives Matter snack van at a protest near the east precinct. The van was clearly creeping along at a snail's pace when officers started telling pedestrians to get away from it so that they could slash all four tires. The legality of this is questionable at best since the van clearly posted no threat to the officers. This was not like a high speed pursuit where they would be justified laying down spike strips. This was literally just a van full of snacks slowly rolling down the street in the direction that the PPB told everyone to go.
Earlier this week, journalist Zippy Lomax's car was violently assaulted by the police in southeast Portland (see source link above article). That incident was also caught on camera and like the snack van, Lomax's car was moving very slowly down the street in the direction the police wanted it to go. In that case they smashed out her back window with a baton before slashing all four tires. She told reporters that she is now traumatized because of the incident. Portland Police Chief Chuck Lovell avoided addressing Lomax's vehicle specifically when questioned by a local TV station. Lovell just said that in general, officers might disable a vehicle that poses some sort of danger to them.
Is this the new normal for the Portland Police? Is every vehicle in motion near a protest in danger of having all four of its tires slashed? These were innocent and peaceful vehicles that did nothing wrong.