The Short, Unhappy Life of Hunter Means
Hunter Means was Portland’s youngest homicide victim in the bloody, record-setting year of 2021. He spent the last two of his three months in the hospital, and died there in June.
By August 17 of 2020 Portland police had lost the blocks directly around their central precinct and the federal courthouse to antifa rioters and their criminal allies; the worst place to find trouble was in the vicinity of the police station. On that evening a group styling themselves antifa security beat a harmless man into a coma in the no-go zone.
Youtuber Drew Hernandez was on scene and recorded the chaos of stupidity and violence leading up to that assault. Graphic content:
Marquise Love, wearing a stab vest labelled “security” from a job he had held for a couple months before, capped off the night by getting up a running start and kicking the head of Adam Haner, sitting beaten and dazed in the street, placekicker style. With Haner in a coma Love was briefly on the lam, and on social media, lamenting he might soon go to jail for “fighting a racist”, following the ruse antifa had up within minutes of the attack on their social media.
Haner came out of his coma and Love, who has a lengthy rap sheet including domestic violence, was eventually sentenced to 20 months in prison after “negotiations” with restorative justice practitioner Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt, for one count of third degree assault and one count of felony riot (a charge the DA had previously announced he would decline to prosecute in the case of “racial justice protesters”).
The resolution of this case resulted after months of pretrial negotiations and a judicial settlement conference.
The victim, law enforcement, the court and the state are in agreement that the resolution of this case is appropriate.
By pleading guilty to one count of assault in the third degree and one count of felony riot, Love admitted that while being aided by another person, he caused physical injury to the victim and that he and others engaged in tumultuous and violent conduct and created a grave risk of causing public alarm.
Throughout the case, the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office communicated with, listened to and involved the victim in the pretrial negotiations and subsequent resolution.
Although the victim did not attend today’s court hearing, in an interview with media on August 19, 2020, he said he is not seeking vengeance against Marquise Love and that he hoped Love would learn from what happened.
I was at the intersection of 4th and Taylor an hour and a half before Haner was beaten, and recorded some very young black would-be thugs, boys and girls, jumping a white antifa boy who was defending a homeless man they had been harassing. The gang of kids appeared on the scene late in the summer, beating and robbing the weak and sometimes fighting among themselves. They had some relationship to the antifa security gang and would be on hand for the attack on Haner and his girlfriend.
Five days later on August 22 Proud Boys and antifa counter-demonstrators faced off violently on streets abandoned by police–Mayor Ted Wheeler had announced ahead of time police would not intervene in the anticipated brawl. Among the many things I recorded was a man threatening to return with his “Glock” to deal with a handful of Proud Boy antagonists:
His name is Dakota, and I recognized him as a regular presence during the riots, when he made the news two days after the rally after being arrested for assaulting an employee leaving the federal district court (antifa by that time had turned their attention from the police station to the courthouse next door, refocusing and reinvigorating their siege as a campaign against Trump’s feds). Again he was threatening to return with a gun.
A Portland man has been charged for forcibly assaulting and intimidating a federal worker near the Mark O. Hatfield Federal Courthouse, U.S. Attorney Billy J. Williams announced.
On August 24, Dakota Kurtis Means allegedly began following an employee around 5:30 a.m. while yelling obscenities. Court documents say he was carrying a black paintball rifle and told the employee “it’s a paintball gun now, but it’s going to be an AR later.” U.S. Marshals Service deputies arrested the 20-year-old a short time later.
Means was charged with forcibly assaulting, impeding, and intimidating a federal employee while engaged in or on account of the performance of their official duties — a Class A misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in federal prison.
He pleaded not guilty at his first court appearance on the same day as his arrest. A one-day jury trial is scheduled to begin on October 27.
His unfortunate face is unmistakable.
On that same August 22 Portland police released photos of the antifa security gang asking for help in identifying Haner’s assailants. There again was that sullen visage, throughout the lead-up to Haner’s beating.
Here in a still from the Drew Hernandez video he threatens a good samaritan with a gun he claims to have concealed in his backpack; the samaritan is defending a man who identifies as a woman the group had been beating up (and who Dakota threatened with a gun in the same fashion, making for four such threats in our brief glance over his week of August 17 through August 22).
The video documents the sequence of events leading up to the attack on Adam Haner (in a blue t-shirt in the background above), beginning with the antifa security gang escorting a man they found suspicious out of the protest area. As they’re beating him in the intersection of Fourth and Taylor the trans woman draws their attention. Eventually they rob him and, after he’s been beaten up by the girls in the group, they turn on Haner, who had been hanging about and repeatedly, foolishly, trying to peacefully intervene.
Hernandez’ video is age restricted so the timestamps below aren’t hyperlinks.
At 8:52 Dakota enters the scene and briefly threatens the trans woman, who’s been robbed and roughed up, claiming to be holding a gun in his backpack.
9:43: A police paddy wagon cruises past the chaotic scene slowly with its code lights on but doesn’t stop; some of the gang follow behind, taunting.
11:17: After the girls in the group have beaten up the trans woman who’s now defenseless on the ground, a passerby intervenes. A black man in a plain white dress shirt, cradling a knife discretely in one hand, stands between the men and the downed trans woman. He’s set upon by the gang, shouting various iterations of “fuck these white people”, but they don’t attack.
11:27: Dakota enters the scene again, and eventually threatens the hero in the same fashion he threatened the trans woman, making a show of taking off his backpack and suggesting he had a gun in his hand hidden there. The hero looks terrified but bravely stands his ground, asking what’s in the backpack. You’ll find out Dakota threatens.
17:23: Marquise Love,in a fit of rage, is restrained by his fellows; one of them is a masked bald white man. Masked white antifa hang about on the fringes of the scene discretely; it seems they only intervene if they think the gang is going to go too far and bring trouble on themselves. One of them may have been Michael Reinoehl, another member of the antifa security gang, who would go on to murder Proud Boy Aaron Danielson, a little over a week later on September 1. Previously he was cited (but not apparently arrested) for possessing a loaded gun at a protest on July 5. The district attorney declined to prosecute.
Police had seized a gun from Reinoehl during an early morning protest downtown on July 5, but it was of a different caliber than the one used to shoot Danielson, according to the affidavit. Reinoehl was given a citation then, accused of possessing a loaded gun in a public place, resisting arrest and interfering with police on Southwest Main Street. Police took a Walther 9mm semi-automatic handgun from Reinoehl. The citation was dropped by the Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office on July 30, and Reinoehl spent no time behind bars. The office earlier this week said it was still reviewing the case.
20:15 Adam Haner, who can be seen throughout the video in a blue t-shirt trying to talk down the gang as they harassed the trans woman, has come under attack and is locked in his truck. The girls in the gang are trying to stop him.
20:21 The men of the gang surround the truck, trying to open door. The girls start beating Haner’s girlfriend, who has been abandoned outside the truck. Some are already shouting about the “racist”; others plea on his behalf; “he didn’t do nothing” someone yells.
21:19 Haner is trapped on the curb in his truck, he can’t pull away without hitting someone, his girlfriend has taken a pretty good beating in the middle of the street at the hands of the girls; a big man is at the driver’s side window banging on it.
21:33 Haner inches away from the curb and accelerates down Taylor. Two of the girls inexplicably pushing on the side of the truck bed fall away from the truck. Now the crowd is screaming, outraged.
23:20 Haner crashes a couple of blocks away near a high-end hotel; the gang jeers in celebration as they close in on him.
24:41 Haner is out of the truck pleading with a masked white antifa who is carrying a club and has Haner cornered, holding him for the gang; he threatens him with the club in one hand, filming him with the other: “don’t come near me bro I’ll fuck you up”.
25:03 The masked white antifa, holding Haner hostage, waiting for the gang, tries to clear the area of witnesses: “hey, there are too many people around here”. Soon Haner is pleading his case before a line of protesters blocking his escape. The gang arrives finally; “bro you’re not leaving bro”.
26:30 Haner’s beating starts as he’s pushed to the ground
26:49 Haner tries to get up, is forced back down by the white antifa.
27:05 Haner is on the ground, where’s he’s surrounded, holding his phone; an older white man appears and tries to extricate him; he’s shouted down; someone says they’re holding him “til the cops come nigga”. At some point Haner is allowed to take a call from his worried girlfriend.
28:58 Love, who’s been leading the beating and flies into a blind rage at Haner’s whimpering pleas, gets a running start from the other side of the street and blindsides Haner, knocking him unconscious with a kick; somewhere a white anifa exults, “drop that fuckin’ racist bro! You fuckin’ loser!”
29:27 Haner’s girlfriend is on the scene and in a panic after seeing his condition. The white antifa who held Haner for the gang pulls her aside trying to calm her: “he wrecked his car…was trying to run people over…”; he abandons her to stop the gang from looting the truck. They are waiting for the police they say. A few people are attending to Haner on the ground, no one knows what to do; a woman shouts “call 911”. Haner is bleeding from the back of his head; someone pours water on his face. As the scene ends expression of concern are shouted down; he’s a racist they say; “black lives matter” “I’m black motherfucker and I”m in this”; a black man in an undershirt is challenging anyone who disagrees to fight him.
Sometime after seeing his picture in the paper I saw Dakota one day, looking stoned stumbling down Harrison Street toward the waterfront.
For threatening the federal employee August 24 Dakota was released and scheduled for trial in October.
Means made his initial appearance in federal court on August 24, 2020 before a U.S. Magistrate Judge. He pleaded not guilty and was ordered released to a residential re-entry center pending a one-day jury trial scheduled to begin on October 27, 2020.
In January he was released on probation after 60 days time served.
Means told U.S. District Judge Michael W. Mosman that what he did was a “stupid mistake.”
“I regret my decision that day,” Means said. “I take full responsibility for what I have done. … I know it’s not going to happen again.”
(…)
Means appeared via video for the sentencing hearing, hours after completing an overnight shift at a 7-Eleven, where he now works full time, his lawyer said…
He lives with his wife and has a second child expected in March. He’s also getting a mental health assessment and treatment “he should have had a while ago,” Ahlemeyer said.
Intimidation of a federal employee carries a maximum sentence of one year. Dakota Means was one of many “protesting police violence” to receive light sentences for assaulting feds. So he was at home on probation in April of 2021 when he would beat his infant son Hunter for the last time.
PORTLAND, Ore. — A Portland man convicted of assaulting a federal officer is now facing charges in connection with his infant child’s death.
Court documents say 22-year-old Dakota Means is charged with two counts of second-degree murder.
According to a memorandum opposing bail filed by prosecutors, the child was admitted to Randall Children’s Hospital with a serious brain injury in April of 2021.
The child later died from his injuries in June, and the medical examiner found the cause of death was blunt force trauma.
Hunter was six weeks old when admitted to the hospital; it appears Dakota had already been beating him regularly.
Court documents say a doctor also found the child had been previously abused with evidence of rib fractures.
Prosecutors allege Dakota was the only one in the room with his child when the injuries occurred. They say the child’s mother had also told him he needed to be more gentle with the children.
Means was originally charged with assault and child mistreatment before being charged with second-degree murder. He pled not guilty to the charges in 2021.
Prosecutors say he is also on probation for a 2021 federal conviction for assaulting an officer.
The boy suffered brain bleeds, a fractured skull and broken ribs. His father was home with him at the time the injuries occurred, according to investigators.
He died in the hospital June 23, a little over a month after he was removed from life support. Hunter was three months old when he died, his mother Gabriella Means said.
(…)
His lawyer said that Means early this year was living with his wife and was expecting a second child in March. Means also was set to get a mental health assessment and treatment, the lawyer said then.
Means wasn’t the only one threatening people with a gun at the August 22 fight between antifa and Proud Boys. Antifa-friendly journalist Sergio Olmos of Oregon Public Broadcasting stalked Proud Boy associate Alan Swinney throughout the day and eventually nabbed his money shot, a photograph of Swinney, covered in paint, pointing a revolver at aggressive antifa. The tall, scary-looking Texan was a regular, prominent presence in the series of occasionally violent antifa-patriot standoffs that began with the Trump era. Antifa despised him of course and had been out to get him for years.
For this and and for paint-balling and bear-macing two counter-demonstrators at a previous confrontation on August 15 when his small group of demonstrators was trying to escape downtown, Swinney was arrested in September of 2020, for 12 charges: unlawful use of a weapon, pointing a firearm at another person and unlawful use of mace. Swinney turned himself in thinking it was a minor matter and found himself held on 534,000 dollars bond. A Multnomah County judge refused his lawye’rs motion to reduce it and he hasn’t seen the light of day since. He was eventually sentenced to ten years in prison.
DA Mike Schmidt’s prosecutors took advantage of Oregon’s mandatory minimum law, which the district attorney had lobbied against in the name of racial justice the previous March, combining charges from two separate days (both involving antifa chasing Proud Boy demonstrators out of town), each carrying mandatory five-year sentences, to be served consecutively. Antifa got over their putative hatred of law enforcement and the District Attorney got over his principled opposition to excessive sentences as the two worked together, hand in glove.
Schmidt charged Dakota Means with one count of manslaughter in the first degree and one count of criminal mistreatment in the first degree (apparently ignoring physical and witness evidence of previous beatings) for killing Hunter. He was sentenced to just over twelve years on April 7. Schmidt could have charged him with murder in the second degree, yielding a minimum sentence of 300 months, or 25 years, but it seems his opposition to long sentences is only suspended in the case of political opposition, not infanticide. The 22 year-old father of one surviving child will not yet be thirty five years old if he serves and survives his full sentence.
untethered 