'How am I going to trust a guy with a gun not kill me after I'm biting his ear?'
PORTLAND, Ore. – The three men caught up in this week's standoff in Southeast Portland at a house near Powell Butte say a man barged into their house and put a gun to their heads.
The men said that on Monday afternoon a man came up to the door and asked to use the phone, saying he'd been "jumped" out on the Springwater Corridor Trail. The men had no idea the man reportedly crashed a stolen car and was on the run.
Jonathan Mooney said the man forced his way in the house, held him down and shoved a gun to his head.
At least two shots were fired downstairs during a struggle, one of which whizzed past police who were setting up outside.
For the next hour Mooney, and his two roommates, Robert Steinfeld and Danny Rafatpanah, were paraded around the house at gunpoint.
"He wanted to make it a "hang outable" situation where he thought he could just drink until the cops went away or something," said Rafatpanah. "He finally figured out the entire place was surrounded by the police and there was no getting out of here."
When the suspect, Darwin Stauffer, reportedly bent down to change his clothes, the men pounced.
Mooney bearhugged him, Steinfeld crashed a wine bottle on his head and Rafatpanah struggled for the gun, which went off four times.
"Jonathan's like, 'Give him a sleeper hold,'" said Rafatpanah. "And I'm like, 'I don't think I can.' So I crunch into his ear, and I was like, 'Let go of the gun.' And he's like, 'Let go of my ear.' (I said) 'No, it doesn't work like that.' ... I'm like, how am I going to trust a guy with a gun not kill me after I'm biting his ear?"
"I saw that he was off-balance, and I think the fear got a hold of him and I could see something change in his mind, and I was worried for my life the entire time," said Mooney. "But I could tell right then that if I didn't do something then things were going to get really serious."
The guys got out of the house. And after negotiations went nowhere, police fired tear gas into the windows and said Stauffer came crawling out.
There's a lot of damage to that house – not just the broken windows but all the tear gas inside has to be cleaned up.
