PORTLAND, Ore. – Unease about white supremacist activity in Portland deepened after the fatal stabbings of two men who tried to shield young women from an anti-Muslim tirade, and some people worry that the famously tolerant community could see a resurgence of the hostilities that once earned it the nickname “Skinhead City.”
The attack aboard a light-rail train happened Friday, the first day of Ramadan, the holiest time of the year for Muslims. Authorities say Jeremy Joseph Christian started verbally abusing two young women, including one wearing a hijab. When three men on the train intervened, police say, Christian attacked them, killing two and wounding one.
Court documents released Tuesday for the first time mentioned a fourth man who was the first to intervene and was not attacked, but they did not identify him by his full name.
Christian, 35, was defiant during his brief initial court appearance Tuesday, shouting: “You call it terrorism, I call it patriotism!”
He made repeated outbursts, saying, “You’ve got no safe place!” and “Death to the enemies of America!”