By Stuart Tomlinson
The Oregonian
PORTLAND — The man who shot at a police officer before killing himself in a Southeast Portland home’s backyard late Tuesday night was a former gang member who had escaped from a halfway house in January.
Quintrell Shaimon Holiman, 26, died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head as police surrounded him and used high-volume speakers to call for his surrender. The Oregon Medical Examiner’s Office ruled his death a suicide.
Holiman escaped from the Northwest Regional Re-entry Center in Northeast Portland on Jan. 29 after his transfer from the federal prison at Sheridan in October, according to the U.S. Bureau of Prisons. He was serving a 33-month sentence for being a felon in possession of a firearm after a December 2012 conviction.
In June 2007, Holiman was sentenced to 60 months in state prison for attempted first-degree assault in connection with an April 2006 gang-related shooting outside Jefferson High School.
He was 17 at the time of the shooting.
Sgt. Pete Simpson, Portland Police Bureau spokesman, said Holiman was a member of the Hoover gang.
At the time of his death, Holiman also faced a misdemeanor warrant for failure to appear in Clackamas County.
Simpson said Portland police officers didn’t know of Holiman’s background Tuesday night when they stopped in the parking lot outside Shimmers Gentlemens Club at Southeast Foster Road and 82nd Avenue.
When the two officers assigned to the police bureau’s gun task force and gang enforcement team arrived at the strip club, several people who were in the parking lot immediately headed into the bar.
A short time later, Holiman emerged and ran off when Sgt. Ken Duilio and Officer Steven Wilbon approached him, police say. As Duilio and Wilbon took up the chase, Holiman fired at Wilbon. Neither the officer nor the sergeant returned fire.
Holiman ran north into a residential area of the Foster-Powell neighborhood. The chase prompted Portland reverse 911 calls beginning at 11:20 p.m. to request that residents living between Southeast Holgate and Woodstock boulevards remain inside behind locked doors.
Mia Brown and her boyfriend, Jon Todd, knew something was going on outside when they heard sirens and saw blue lights flashing around their house at Southeast 79th Avenue and Raymond Street.
Brown’s cell phone rang. She answered to hear a computer-generated voice informing them of the police activity.
The bureau’s tactical team was called to the scene.
Meanwhile, the police bureau’s airplane circled the area equipped with a thermal imaging camera. Its crew spotted a person in the backyard of a home in the 7900 block of Southeast Raymond Street.
Crisis negotiators tried to communicate with the man using a loudspeaker. When they did not receive a response, they deployed two less-than-lethal rounds at a fence near the man.
Between the two rounds, police heard what sounded like a muffled gunshot. Tactical officers then deployed a stun grenade near the man’s body. When he did not respond, officers and a police dog approached and found Holiman dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
“It was like a war zone,” said Brown, whose house is just west of where Holiman was hiding. She could see the bright red pinprick lights of laser-sighted weapons from police playing across neighbor Lein Nguyen’s fence and house.
When the first shots rang out, Brown dropped to the floor and crawled away from the window.
“I didn’t want to get shot,” she said. “There were cops surrounding our house.”
“It was loud and different for sure,” Brown said. “But the police certainly had a good handle on it and seemed to be organized quickly.”
Jerry Strealy, who lives down the block from where the incident unfolded, said there have been numerous police foot chases through the neighborhood.
About a year ago, Strealy said his house was surrounded by police as they searched for a suspect. “I woke up, and the guy was standing at my bedroom window,” he said.
Tuesday night he heard at least one loud explosion nearby, most likely from the police flash-bang grenade.
“I thought a meth lab had blown up,” he said.
Simpson said the gang enforcement team has linked Hoover gang members to a string of shootings in the past few months.
Gang team investigators, Simpson said, are also aware of social media posts suggesting Holiman did not commit suicide but instead was shot by police.
After Holiman’s death and subsequent threats to police, additional officers will be assigned to the gang enforcement team, Simpson said.
Police request anyone with information about Tuesday night’s shooting and Holiman’s death contact Detective Chris Traynor at 503-823-0449 or christopher.traynor@portlandoregon.gov.
Wilbon, an eight-year police bureau veteran, and Duilio, a 20-year veteran, have been placed on paid leave for the rest of the week. Simpson said the leave is standard after a shooting incident.
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