Driver unhurt after shotgun blasts; Portland police allege racial motive

Marc W. Schaffer, 52, of Portland, was arrested and booked into the Multnomah County Detention Center on four allegations: second-degree attempted murder, first-degree attempted assault, first-degree bias crime and second-degree criminal mischief. Those are the booking charges announced by police, not independently confirmed prosecutor filings or convictions. Schaffer is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.⁠1

The encounter began with a report of someone carrying a gun in the 6700 block of North Commercial Avenue, in the Piedmont neighborhood. Police place the North Precinct response at 11:03 a.m. KPTV described the location as near North Rosa Parks Way and North Commercial Avenue. The incident occurred on October 31, 2026; the response time is not an independently established exact time of the shooting.⁠1⁠2

While officers were on their way, dispatchers relayed additional callers’ reports that the suspect was firing shots. Officers approached and ordered him to drop the shotgun. He complied, police said, and was taken into custody within seven minutes of the first unit being dispatched. Officers recovered the shotgun and seized it as evidence. That seven-minute interval measures dispatch to custody—not the time from the first shot or necessarily the first emergency call.⁠1

The Enhanced Community Safety Team, which investigates shootings, then examined what had happened before officers arrived. Investigators determined that the suspect had fired at least two shotgun shots at a passing driver. That is a minimum count, not confirmation that exactly two shots were fired. Police said nobody was injured.⁠1

The police account identifies Schaffer’s statements as the basis for evidence of racial motivation. But the release does not disclose his exact words, identify the driver’s race or explain whether the two knew each other. Those omissions leave readers with the investigators’ assessment of the statements, rather than the statements themselves.⁠1

The distinction between the driver’s race and the race the suspect perceived matters. In its release, the Portland Police Bureau describes Oregon’s bias-crime framework as addressing criminal acts that target people because of a perceived protected characteristic, including race. The allegation here concerns what investigators say influenced Schaffer’s actions; it does not establish the driver’s actual race or amount to a judicial finding about motive.⁠1

The reported lack of injuries does not contradict allegations of attempted murder or attempted assault: those allegations concern what police say Schaffer tried to do. Nor does the absence of injury settle whether the evidence supports either charge. The bureau says its shooting teams treat gunfire aimed at community members as attempted murder cases. That investigative approach is not itself a court’s determination of intent.⁠1

The immediate outcome is clear in the police account: a recovered shotgun, an arrest and no reported injuries. The next legal steps are not established by the available public information. There is no independently verified Schaffer-specific prosecutor filing, arraignment date, custody or release decision after booking, or defense response. That does not establish that no filing exists; it means the announced booking allegations should not be presented as a confirmed court case.

The criminal-mischief allegation also comes without an explanation of the property damage police believe occurred. The charge alone is not a basis to infer that the passing vehicle—or any other particular property—was hit or damaged.⁠1

The consequential questions now are what charges prosecutors will pursue and what evidence will support the alleged attempted killing and racial motivation. The police release, published at 4:47 p.m. Pacific daylight time on October 31, sought information from people who had not already spoken with investigators. Anyone providing information was asked to reference case number 26-316621 and direct it to the Enhanced Community Safety Team.⁠1