Portland Police Sergeant To Precinct: If A Homeless Person Is Black, Just Shoot Them

A Portland police officer heads down the street while looking for a man who is alleged to have pulled a handgun on a Portland State University security officer when the officer approached him and another man in Portland, Ore., Monday, June 11, 2012. Police cordoned off and searched a parking structure near the campus but found no gunman. (AP Photo/Don Ryan)

Sgt. Gregg Lewis was fired last year for reportedly making several racist comments to his precinct in Portland, Oregon. Lewis’ comments were not publicly shared until this week when his termination letter was released by the Portland mayor’s office.

Lewis told about 20 other cops during a roll call meeting on Feb. 12, 2017, that if they come across a black homeless person to “just shoot them,” according to many meeting participants who were quoted in the letter obtained by Oregon Live.

Lewis made the remarks during a meeting with fellow officers in which he was leading a presentation about an officer’s authority to handle an intoxicated citizen who is in a private parking garage. Multiple officers who were in the room reported Lewis the next day, and many of their accounts are cited in the termination letter.

According to one account, the room went silent after Lewis’ comment. There was some nervous laughter in the room and another officer said “Oh my god!” Lewis reportedly “laughed, threw his hands in the air and said, ‘Fuck it. What do I care?’”

The reports made by several officers were all slightly different. One officer recalled Lewis saying, “Go out and shoot black people,” while another remembered him saying the remark with slight variations: “If they’re black and homeless shoot them or kill them.”

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