National News: Homeless Endangered Across America

Murder Suspect Led Officers To Body

PORTLAND, OR. -- A suspect in a Portland slaying led police officers to a man he stabbed to death, according to an article on kptv.com.

    Calvin Stubblefield, 54, walked into Central Precinct offices and directed officers to a homeless camp near North Dixon Street and Larabee Avenue, according to the article.

    Officers found the body of a 36-year-old man in the camp and that he had died of several stab wounds.

    Stubblefield has since been taken into custody and has been charged with one count of murder and booked into the Justice Center Jail.

Man Arrested For Feeding Homeless

Scheduled For Trial

 ORLANDO, FL -- A Central Florida man arrested for feeding homeless people in Orlando is scheduled to go on trail later this month for violating the controversial ordinance, Orlando’s Local 6 News reported.

    Eric Montanez, 21, was recently charged with illegally feeding the homeless under the ordinance that bars feeding groups of people in parks without a special permit, Montanez is the first person arrested under the ordinance.

    Montanez plans to continue to feed homeless groups every Wednesday at Lake Eola in Orlando, despite the ordinance.

    Those who support the ordinance claim that feeding homeless people in city parks leads to a spike in crimes.

    Montanez’s trial is set for June 25.

City Investigates Death Of Homeless Man As Murder

SANTA MONICA, CA-- Santa Monica police were quoted by CBS that the death of an apparently homeless man found lying on a bench in Palisades Park next to the Senior Citizens Center was being investigated as a homicide.

    The body of the 37-year-old man was found in the 1500 block of Palisades Park.  The man apparently died as the result of blunt force trauma to the head.

Group Claims LAPD Officers Beat Homeless Woman

LOS ANGELES -- A group which monitors the Los Angeles Police Department Tuesday accused four officers of punching and kicking a petite homeless woman, dousing her in pepper spray and then carrying her hog-tied to a police car, according to AP wire reports.

    A spokesman for the Los Angeles Community Action Network said in the article that the beating happened in downtown Los Angeles, and claimed the officers “brutalized a woman for about 10 minutes near the corner of Sixth and Stanford streets,” just a few blocks from the LAPD’s Central Station.

    According to the sources quoted in the article, the woman is clearly a homeless resident with some mental disabilities who was known to downtown residents, although not by name.

NY Court Find Panhandling is Free Speech

NEW ROCHELLE, NY -- : A homeless man who argued that begging is a form of free speech — after he was arrested for asking a policeman for a dollar in a New York suburb — has won his case, according to AP reports.

    By invoking a 15-year-old federal court decision that said New York’s loitering law violated First Amendment constitutional protections, 36-year-old Eric Hoffstead got New Rochelle City Court Judge Gail Rice to dismiss his case.

    The 1992 case applied specifically to enforcement in New York City and the state law, which prohibits begging in a public place, had never been changed. But when Hoffstead, who has been arrested 20 times in Westchester County, north of New York City — read about the decision, he urged his lawyer, Carl Birman, to use it.

    Rice’s ruling echoed the 1992 decision.  Hoffstead was still in the county jail on Thursday because he faces a trespassing charge in a separate case.

Group  Of Homeless People In Fresno Forced To Move

By CHP

FRESNO, CA --Homeless people who were recently moved out of “tent city” will have to find somewhere else to live, according to KFSN-TV.

    About 2 dozen homeless people living underneath the overpass on Ventura and G Streets were kicked out of their homeless encampment Monday morning by the California Highway Patrol.

    The group had been given three days to clear their belongings. It’s unclear whether the encampment will break up and relocate.

Homeless Pedestrian Hit by Police Car

SANTA CRUZ COUNTY, CA --Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s are investigating an officer that hit a homeless person on Highway One, according to kion46.com. 

    The pedestrian was crossing illegally at Highway One near Costco in Santa Cruz.  That’s when a police officer hit the man with his car. The man was rushed to a hospital and is reportedly uninjured.

Copyright Homeless Grapevine, Cleveland Ohio Issue 81 June-July 2007