A man, who neighbors knew only as Brent and say had ongoing mental health issues, prompted a standoff with police Friday at his St. Johns apartment. After an approximately three-hour standoff, the man started a fire in his apartment and was taken into custody.
Saturday morning, the Portland Police Bureau identified the man as Brent Lusted, 63.
“He’d been texting me for sometime wanting to form some sort of citizen patrol because too many cars were being broken into,” said Steven Stroud, who lives two floors above the man. “He’s tired of being victimized and the damn cops don’t want to do a … thing about it.”
Stroud said Lusted drinks a lot and struggles with his mental health.
An apartment is engulfed in flames after a standoff between an armed resident and police in Portland’s St. Johns neighborhood on Feb. 17, 2023. The man was taken into custody uninjured.
Jonathan Levinson / OPB
Officers were initially called to the building on reports Lusted was throwing objects from his balcony. When the officers arrived, they saw a man holding a rifle and backed off. Police said they heard multiple gunshots from the apartment.
Several blocks around the Schrunk Riverview Tower Apartments were blocked off Friday afternoon as police were concerned the man might shoot from his balcony.
“Officers believed that this situation was an extreme public safety concern as it was an armed subject barricaded in an elevated apartment firing a rifle,” police said in a press release Friday evening.
Residents said the apartment building, which is managed by Home Forward, the housing authority for Multnomah County, is generally well run and safe, but that the surrounding area has had problems with car robberies and drug dealers.
Stroud said he called police recently because a car in the building’s lot was being broken into and the police drove by, shined their spotlight and kept driving.
“Had they popped right in they would have caught two heroin dealers and the other guy in the act working on this vehicle. Half the dash was on the damn floor,” he said. “They could have stopped and gotten out of the car, or even just pulled into the damn parking lot.”
Stroud said Lusted wanted to set an RV on fire that residents believed drug dealers were living in.
“He’s just fed up,” Stroud said. “We’re all tired of it. He’s tired of it. No faith in the police whatsoever. What do you do when you make a call and watch them drive on by when the day before you got half your shit stolen, which he had.”
Patricia McKay, a retired middle school drama teacher, lives two floors below Lusted. She said for the past few days, he had been throwing objects off his balcony and some landed on hers. First, they were smaller items like pizza boxes and a jacket. McKay said it escalated to larger and harder objects like batteries and sofa cushions.
McKay said Lusted was yelling that he hated Home Forward.
“I do know he had a package stolen from the front of his door so he was mad about it, that they weren’t doing enough,” McKay said. “I think he just couldn’t process things well. I think he had some issues that he needed help with.”
She said Lusted had been hanging flyers around the building about the person who allegedly stole his packages, including threats that he was going to kill him.
A Portland police vehicle responds to an armed standoff with an armed resident at an apartment in St. Johns on Feb. 17, 2023. The man was taken into custody uninjured.
Jonathan Levinson / OPB
McKay, who was in ROTC in Texas and has fired high powered rifles, said Friday she heard what sounded to her like a single .22 caliber round being fired. Portland police said several rounds were fired throughout the duration of the standoff.
Saturday morning, police said they did not find a firearm in Lusted’s apartment, only a BB gun. Portland Police Bureau Spokesperson Sgt. Kevin Allen said officers weren’t sure what sounds they might have heard coming from the apartment.
“We were surprised that it was a BB rifle as multiple officers believed that it appeared from their vantage points to be real, and they heard sounds from within that resembled gunfire,” Allen said in an email to OPB. “We do know that he was throwing objects around and breaking things, so that could have been the source of the sound.”
Allen said officers have to make decisions with the information available to them and err on the side of caution.
Just before 5 p.m., a fire billowed from a balcony at the Schrunk Riverview Tower. Shortly after that, police reported they had arrested Lusted. Residents said they saw him handcuffed and appeared uninjured. Friday evening the police bureau said he was taken to the hospital as a precaution. Lusted has been charged with four counts each of first degree arson, unlawful use of a weapon, and menacing.
Stroud said Lusted’s heart was in the right place wanting to make the neighborhood safer, but “he’s not doing it the right way, that’s for damn sure.”
“Cops don’t seem to care,” Stroud said, frustrated at the lack of services for the lower income and disabled residents. “There’s nothing mental health will do.”