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Video shows confrontation between off-duty fire lieutenant, suspect before stabbing

Police are searching for the man they say stabbed the lieutenant while he was celebrating his wedding anniversary

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Jayati Ramakrishnan
The Oregonian, Portland, Ore.

PORTLAND — Newly-released video footage from a Portland bar shows an apparent fight between a Portland fire lieutenant and another man on Saturday night, moments before the man allegedly stabbed him.

On Monday, KGW News posted security video footage from Kingston’s Sports Bar and Grill, a bar on S.W. Morrison Street near Providence Park. The footage appears to show the fight that preceded the stabbing.

The off-duty lieutenant, whose name police and fire officials have not released, was at the bar celebrating his wedding anniversary with his wife and friends when a man walked into the bar and stabbed him in the upper torso and upper arm, authorities say.

Video footage, which shows the encounter from two different angles, shows the suspect walking by the front of the restaurant and appearing to look in the window toward where the fire lieutenant is sitting. He then walks into the bar, approaches a table at the front, and appears to start speaking to someone who’s out of view of the camera. He then starts to walk away, but as he does, a man from the table whose face is blurred out gets up, knocks over a chair and confronts the suspect, then shoves him. Video from a different angle shows that the man, apparently the fire lieutenant, pushes the suspect up against the wall. Video is not clear, but the suspect appears to make a stabbing gesture toward the lieutenant, then walks out of the bar.

According to Portland Fire & Rescue spokesman Laurent Picard, the stabbing was “unprovoked.” When she called 911, the lieutenant’s wife told dispatchers that her husband had randomly been stabbed by a stranger. The lieutenant is 53 years old and a 23-year veteran of the Portland Fire & Rescue Bureau.

Police said the suspect fled after the stabbing, running eastbound on West Burnside Street. The lieutenant was conscious and talking when police and fire arrived, and was taken to the hospital and released later that night.

Police have described the suspect as a man in his mid-20s, between 5 feet 4 inches and 5 feet 8 inches tall, weighing 170 pounds, with a black crew cut, unshaven face, olive-colored skin and wearing a black-hooded sweatshirt and black pants. He was initially described as wearing a white glove.

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©2020 The Oregonian (Portland, Ore.)

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