Deschutes County District Attorney John Hummel announced that Ian Cranston was charged with the crimes of murder in the second degree, manslaughter in the first degree, manslaughter in the second degree, assault in the first degree and two counts of unlawful use of a weapon in the shooting of 22-year-old Barry Washington on Sunday, September 19. The Bend Police Department arrested Cranston Thursday evening on a no-bail warrant, after a grand jury indicted Cranston.
Hummel said Cranston shot Washington after he complimented Cranston’s fiancé, leading to a brief scuffle between the two. Washington was arguing with one of Cranston’s friends when he was shot. Bend Police Department arrested Cranston shortly after for second degree manslaughter, and he was released after paying 10% of a $100,000 bail on Sunday. Washington’s family and many community members were outraged with Cranston’s initial charge of manslaughter rather than murder, and that he was freed hours after the shooting.
“I’m confident that murder is the correct charge, but if you commit murder intentionally, you’ve also killed someone recklessly,” Hummel said at a press conference on Thursday. “We sought the murder conviction in this grand jury, we’ll be seeking a murder conviction at trial. But if you do the greatest crime, you’ve also done the lesser crimes.”
Hummel said he’d received hundreds of calls and emails over the past week regarding parallels the case had with the history of racist violence in America, namely the murder of Emmett Till.
“Our country has a disgraceful history of denigrating, prosecuting and lynching Black men for talking to white women. Over the last week, literally hundreds of people called and emailed me to remind me of this history. I responded to every one of you,” he said. “Racism didn’t only happen back then. And down there. It happens right here. And right now.”
“If we obtained sufficient evidence to prove that this shooting was at least partially motivated by race, we will go back to that grand jury and ask them to add the charge,” John Hummel
The grand jury did not charge Cranston with a hate crime, but Hummel said there’s an ongoing investigation of Cranston’s motives. He said the public has been helpful collecting evidence, particularly the activist group Central Oregon Peacekeepers, and asked anyone with relevant information to send it to his office or Bend PD.
“If we obtained sufficient evidence to prove that this shooting was at least partially motivated by race, we will go back to that grand jury and ask them to add the charge. I determined we did not have sufficient evidence at this point to present it to the grand jury,” Hummel said. “That was a tactical decision made by myself. If we presented it now and the grand jury said no, the state doesn’t have enough evidence, then that case is done. And if we gathered more evidence later, we couldn’t go back.”
Cranston’s arraignment was scheduled for Friday at 1:30 pm.
Updated Friday at 3:30 pm
Cranston’s plea hearing was scheduled for December 6 during his arraignment on Friday afternoon. His lawyer said they are ready to enter a not guilty plea, but Deschutes County Circuit Judge Beth Bagley said that isn’t decided at arraignment.
The arraignment was played on loudspeakers outside of the Deschutes County Courthouse to a crowd. A disturbance erupted between activists and Central Oregon Daily News over their airing of video of the shooting provided by Cranston’s fiancé. Activists and community members criticized the news station for releasing the video without permission from the family. They deleted the video off their website on Friday.
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First, it is the FBI that will / is looking at this case as a possible federal defined hate crime, not John Hummel.
Second, the grandstanding announcement is pure politics as Hummel is seeking a job change in Oregon – possibly U.S. Attorney.
That said – and what “evidence” did the “peacekeepers” – Hummel’s pet social anarchist group – provide his office? Camera shots of the suspect’s and his girlfriend’s Facebook pages? With both FB accounts now inaccessible those cannot be verified – as pointed out in a past article in the Source.
There are numerous video security cameras in the area the shooting took place and the Bend Police Department has / is in the process of securing any footage available. That is evidence.
And Hummel mentioned nothing about the recent swarming by the “peacekeepers” of the offices at Central Oregon Daily News – which had management call 9-11 for police assistance to clear the area and to provide safe passage in and out for their employees.
Citations issued? Unknown but unlikely as Hummel is already on record tossing criminal trespass citations involving “his” peacekeepers out – even when the property owner states he / she wants the violators to leave or be cited…then leave.
It is also absurd for the DA to claim he was involved in the tactical arrest of the suspect. He may have asked how the warrant was going to be served but other than that – again…grandstanding.
This DA is so compromised and conflicted that today he offers the two murder suspects in the Bend double homicide are “innocent until proven guilty” – and in the same breath offers the suspect in the Washington murder case is clearly guilty now, well before his first court appearance and / or the trial.
Look for a motion for a change of venue regarding the Washington case because of how poorly the DA has behaved from Day One – the same behavior possibly used in an appeal if the suspect is found guilty.
But John Hummel won’t care – he has already given his departure speech –
I always believe that in Gods eyes were all created equal, just because a black man was involved and murdered in this doesn’t necessarily make it a racial, Washington was not, innocent in all of this, somebody provoked this altercation, and Washington should’ve left the guys girlfriend alone this had nothing to do with a black man talking to a white woman BS!!
You don’t think Black people make derogatory comments about white people in public? Or is that OK also?
If Cranston used the N-word I’m sure it was out of anger, people say and do stupid things when they’re angry and drunk not that they actually believe what they’re saying, we have all done it!!!
This all started because a man approached another man’s woman multiple times which always ends bad no matter what your skin is.
Cranston deserves to go to prison for this no doubt about it, but this all could’ve been avoided had Washington went and found a woman that wasn’t attached to another man!!
So you liberals can just keep pushing the race card, saying Oregon has a nasty history of racism blah blah blah blah, so sick of it, two lives were lost here, Cranston is going to be in jail for at least 20 years, and Washington is not only dead but his parents are destroyed over this, when you add alcohol it changes everything, common sense goes out the window, so stop making this political people.
What’s next? murder charge not good enough? Maybe BLM and and Antifa will come burn Downtown Bend to the ground because of their Fake political oppression, paid off by George Soros and the Democratic Party to cause chaos!!
going out there and having a vigil, protesting, and causing chaos at City Hall over this just makes things worse, let’s take race out of this!!! two MEN downtown had an altercation, one man died because the other man shot him!! let’s just leave it at that!!! If it were two white guys, there would hardly be a story on it!! It’s ridiculous!!!
God bless Washington’s parents I am sorry for their loss this should’ve never happened, nothings worse than losing a child
What happened to Barry is absolutely heartbreaking. I know the pain of losing a child. We all want to live in a non racist community. Do people realize that every time race is brought into the equation unnecessarily it’s setting us back? Treat people equally. I don’t see a hate crime here at all. Just a pissed off drunk lunatic. Some people love to jump on the racist bandwagon right away without knowing the facts. Why? I think it makes themselves feel as though they are virtuous. This is nothing more than their own ego speaking. I’m not saying there’s no hate crimes. But every time? C’mon!