The national shutdown during the early days of the Coronavirus Pandemic put many people out of work and families struggling to make ends meet. One such family is the focus of this true crime.
The father was said to be a hard-working man who did whatever he could to provide for his family. He worked in real estate, had once owned a furniture store, renovated homes, worked as a handyman, he collected recyclables, and sold discarded pallets.
He’d worked out a deal with the manager of a big box store to take away their broken pallets. This unwritten agreement was not compliant with the big box store corporate office business protocols. In the same parking lot as the big box store was a recycling center, where he turned in his collected recyclables for cash.
This 49-year-old man was no angel, he’d had scrapes with the law. He’d stand his ground and wouldn’t back down from an argument.
The real estate firm hired to manage the property where the big box store and the recycling center were located hired a security firm to ‘police’ the area. With so many people out of work, the line at the recycling center had become long and, at times, unruly.
The security firm claimed to only employ security guards who were licensed to carry a weapon. News sources reported that the security firm work environment leaned toward violence rather than de-escalation.
A former security guard supervisor said he quit the company because they glorified violence.
Even though the firm stated all of their guards were licensed to carry a weapon, the guard in this true crime was not. In fact, he’d been working for the firm, unlicensed yet carry a weapon for ten months—at trial he said his application to become a licensed armed guard had gotten lost in the mail.
A representative from the recycling business warned early on that the armed guards keeping a watch over the patrons of their business could be a combustible mix. In an email she sent to the CEO of the real estate firm, she predicted …
“An unintentionally violent confrontation.”
On that fateful day, the scrappy man and his wife of 30 years went to the big box store to purchase flowers. The (unlicensed) armed guard spotted them as they exited the store. He drove his company vehicle to where the couple had parked their vehicle and blocked them.
Because the man was supposedly on a watch list generated from the security company, the guard told him to get out of his vehicle—he was under arrest. In the state where this occurred, private security guards could arrest similarly to a citizen’s arrest. Once they put restraints on the person, then the security guard should wait for law enforcement to arrive and take over.
Before anyone notified the police of an arrest, the security guard pepper sprayed the couple through an open window then attempted to incapacitate the man and force him from the vehicle. The tension escalated. The security guard stood in front of the vehicle, pointed his weapon at the man and demanded the man get out of the vehicle. When he didn’t, the guard shot the man through the windshield. He didn’t survive his injuries.
At his trial, the security guard said, the man inched his vehicle forward toward him and when he fired his weapon, he believed the man was about to run him down.
The jury found the 30-year-old former security guard guilty of murder in the second degree with a firearm, guilty of unlawful use of a firearm, guilty of unlawful use of mace, and guilty of recklessly endangering another person.
The county circuit judge sentenced the shooter to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years.
After the trial ended, the widow of the deceased man filed a wrongful death civil lawsuit against the security firm, the real estate firm, and the former security guard. She won the lawsuit. The jury awarded her over $20 million.
Source: U.S. District Court, County District Attorney, Oregon Live – The Oregonian, Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB), CBS KOIN 6
All data and information provided is for information and research purposes only and not intended to malign any religion, ethnic group, club, organization, company, or individual. Criminal cases may have been appealed or verdicts overturned since I researched the case. All information is provided on an as-is basis.
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