Horrifying hate crime in Portland: Two Good Samaritans stabbed to death on a MAX train

Hor­ri­fy­ing does­n’t even begin to describe how awful this is:

Port­land Police and wit­ness­es say a triple stab­bing aboard a MAX train Fri­day after­noon may have been reli­gious­ly moti­vat­ed. The stab­bing was report­ed around 4:30 p.m. as the train pulled into the Hol­ly­wood Tran­sit Cen­ter sta­tion in North­east Port­land. Two peo­ple have been pro­nounced dead and anoth­er has non-life threat­en­ing injuries.

Mul­ti­ple wit­ness­es told KATU the sus­pect was hurl­ing racial insults at two women, at least one of whom was wear­ing a hijab. Police would­n’t con­firm their ages, but referred to them as “girls” and “young women.” Sgt. Pete Simp­son with Port­land Police added the sus­pect appeared to be act­ing errat­i­cal­ly, and was­n’t nec­es­sar­i­ly focused on anti-Mus­lim insults dur­ing the attack.

Two men who came to the wom­en’s defense had their throats slashed by the sus­pect, Sgt. Simp­son said.

Trag­i­cal­ly, both Good Samar­i­tans have died, but the sus­pect who alleged­ly mur­dered them has been caught and is in police custody.

Wit­ness­es say the inci­dent began when the unknown assailant began ver­bal­ly abus­ing the two young women on the train.

“[The sus­pect] said, ‘Get off the bus, and get out of the coun­try because you don’t pay tax­es here,’ [he said he] does­n’t like Mus­lims, they’re crim­i­nals,” Evelin Her­nan­dez said.

The police account offers more detail:

This inves­ti­ga­tion start­ed on Fri­day May 26, 2017, at 4:30 p.m., when North Precinct and Tran­sit Police Divi­sion offi­cers respond­ed to the report of a dis­tur­bance on an east­bound MAX train at the Hol­ly­wood Tran­sit Sta­tion involv­ing a male who stabbed two oth­er people.

Mul­ti­ple offi­cers respond­ed to the area and, while enroute, learned that the sus­pect got off the train and was leav­ing the area on foot towards Prov­i­dence Med­ical Center.

Offi­cers and med­ical per­son­nel arrived at the Hol­ly­wood Tran­sit Sta­tion and locat­ed three stab­bing vic­tims. Offi­cers began imme­di­ate med­ical treat­ment to the vic­tims at the scene until med­ical per­son­nel arrived. One vic­tim, an adult male, died at the scene.

The oth­er two vic­tims were trans­port­ed by ambu­lance to a Port­land hos­pi­tal, where one was pro­nounced dead and the oth­er was treat­ed for injuries that are not expect­ed to be life-threatening.

The sus­pect was locat­ed by offi­cers and tak­en into cus­tody. The sus­pect received med­ical treat­ment and was turned over to Homi­cide detec­tives. Pre­lim­i­nary infor­ma­tion indi­cates that the sus­pect was on the MAX train yelling var­i­ous remarks that would best be char­ac­ter­ized as hate speech toward a vari­ety of eth­nic­i­ties and religions.

At least two of the vic­tims attempt­ed to inter­vene with the sus­pect and calm him down. The sus­pect attacked the men, stab­bing three, before leav­ing the train.

Wit­ness­es described to police two young women, pos­si­bly Mus­lim, who were on the train at the time of the dis­tur­bance and attack, but left pri­or to police arrival. The young women have not been iden­ti­fied but one was described as wear­ing a hijab.

Detec­tives would like to speak to them, and any oth­er peo­ple who left the scene, as they may be wit­ness­es to this incident.

Police say they don’t yet know if the sus­pect has a men­tal ill­ness or sub­stance abuse prob­lems that may have caused or con­tributed to his evil behavior.

As men­tioned, detec­tives are request­ing that any per­son who saw the inci­dent or has any per­ti­nent infor­ma­tion to offer con­tact them. Detec­tives can be reached via a non-emer­gency line — 503–823-3333.

The Port­land office of the Fed­er­al Bureau of Inves­ti­ga­tion says it stands ready to offer assis­tance to the Port­land police and will con­duct its own inves­ti­ga­tion if there is evi­dence fed­er­al law was bro­ken — which it seems there is.

“The FBI is aware of the attacks tonight, and we are offer­ing any resource that may assist Port­land Police in their inves­ti­ga­tion,” said the statement.

“We will cer­tain­ly be look­ing at the facts and evi­dence as the inves­ti­ga­tion unfolds to deter­mine whether there is any poten­tial fed­er­al vio­la­tion. At the core of the FBI’s mis­sion is the belief that every per­son has the right to live, work and wor­ship in this coun­try with­out fear. Hate and big­otry have no place in our com­mu­ni­ty, and we will not allow vio­lence in the name of hate to go unanswered.”

Respond­ing on behalf of the City of Port­land, Com­mis­sion­er Eudaly said:

The city of Port­land has a heavy heart right now, and our thoughts and prayers go out to the fam­i­lies and friends of the deceased and injured. This is an espe­cial­ly sad and dis­turb­ing inci­dent. Peo­ple lost their lives or were injured because they stood up to hate.

We need to offer our heart­felt sup­port to the two women and oth­ers who were tar­get­ed. The courage of the peo­ple who stood up for them is a reminder that we as a city need to stand togeth­er to denounce hate. Thank you to the coura­geous wit­ness­es who helped police locate the sus­pect before more peo­ple were hurt; thank you to the first respon­ders and med­ical per­son­nel who arrived quick­ly to admin­is­ter aid; and thank you to the police for appre­hend­ing the suspect.

These are trou­bling times across our city, our coun­try and the world. We can­not let this divide us. We need to unite against all forms of vio­lence and hate. Our dif­fer­ences should be a cause for cel­e­bra­tion, not some­thing that foments hate.

I’m ask­ing every­one to reach out and con­nect with your fam­i­lies, your friends and your neigh­bors. Let’s all stand together.

The Coun­cil on Amer­i­can-Islam­ic Rela­tions is ask­ing Don­ald Trump to per­son­al­ly denounce this hate crime and renounce Islam­o­pho­bia and racism in all forms.

“Pres­i­dent Trump must speak out per­son­al­ly against the ris­ing tide of Islam­o­pho­bia and oth­er forms of big­otry and racism in our nation that he has pro­voked through his numer­ous state­ments, poli­cies and appoint­ments that have neg­a­tive­ly impact­ed minor­i­ty com­mu­ni­ties,” said CAIR Nation­al Exec­u­tive Direc­tor Nihad Awad.

“Only a strong state­ment from the nation’s leader will send a mes­sage to big­ots that such acts of vio­lence tar­get­ing racial, eth­nic or reli­gious minori­ties are unacceptable.”

Awad also urged local Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ties to step up secu­ri­ty mea­sures dur­ing the month-long fast of Ramadan, which began tonight. CAIR is offer­ing Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ty lead­ers free copies of its book­let, “Best Prac­tices for Mosque and Com­mu­ni­ty Safe­ty.” The book­let may be request­ed through CAIR’s web­site.

Ear­li­er this week, CAIR con­demned the mur­der of an African-Amer­i­can Bowie State Uni­ver­si­ty stu­dent by a sus­pect who is a mem­ber of a white suprema­cist group on Face­book called “Alt-Reich Nation.”

A vig­il is planned for Sat­ur­day night at the tran­sit cen­ter. We urge read­ers in the Port­land area to try and attend if at all possible.

Resist the dark­ness, we must, with every­thing we have.