Bend police release security photos, description of gunman who fired several shots in air early Saturday

(Update: Adding video, comments from another area resident, surveillance photos, description)

Residents within a mile were alerted to stay inside, lock doors

BEND, Ore. (KTVZ) – Police released a description and two security images Monday of a gunman who walked through a southeast Bend neighborhood firing numerous shots into the air early Saturday morning, prompting a major police call-out and an alert warning area residents to stay inside and lock their doors.

Police said the man ran from officers and was not found in a search of the area, but a gun was located.

The suspect was described as wearing a blue jacket, blue jeans and a gray backpack. Anyone with information about the incident was asked to contact Corporal Scott Salvage at 541-640-6319.

Officers responded around 2:40 a.m. to several calls of a man firing a gun in the area of Parrell and Badger roads in southeast Bend, Communications Manager Sheila Miller said.

Witnesses said the man was walking in the area and firing rounds into the air.

Miller said police located the suspect, who ran from officers.

Officers used a drone to track the suspect’s movement to Silver Sage Street, between Parrell and Benham roads, then set up a perimeter and sent out an emergency notification to neighbors within a one-mile radius, calling on them to shelter in place and call 911 if they see the suspect, Miller said.

Area resident Tim Ritter said he was tending to his 2-week-child, who woke up in the middle of the night. He recalled getting a phone alert, then a message to let him know about the suspect in his neighborhood.

"It was kind of just a confusing, weird, different sort of night," Ritter said.

"I didn't know if that alert came to us or everybody in Bend -- the first thing that flashed into my head was the mass shooting at Safeway," he said.

"I was wondering if it was another one of those. I think it was about six minutes later where I got a second alert that said it was a local issue -- it was a shooting, and a suspect at large in our neighborhood. That's when I went down to lock the doors, lock the car doors -- that sort of thing," he added.

Another area resident, Rose Speck, said Monday, "I've been asking to have a little something or camera installed around my house now, it's really important that I do. I have a front of my house and a back of my house that are exposed to streets. It was very scary to think that somebody was that close to my home."

"It's not the same little town my children grew up in, and now my grandchildren are growing up in," she added.

The Central Oregon Emergency Response Team was called in to search the area. CERT departed by around 8 a.m. after conducting a thorough search and locating a firearm, but not the suspect. The shelter-in-place order for Silver Sage Street residents was lifted.

Scott Vause, whose mobile home sits just off Parrell Road, said he was up late, waxing his snowboard when he first heard the “pop pop from inside my house.”

“At first, I thought it was leftover fireworks from the first of the year,” Vause said Sunday, but when he went outside, he heard more shots down the street – and on the third, saw a muzzle flash.

Vause called 911 dispatch and was on the phone for nearly 15 minutes, figuring he heard 20 shots in total. “The last three shots, I could smell the gunpowder,” he said, adding that he saw officers picking up brass shell casings behind a fabric store at the outlet mall.

Miller said police were continuing to investigate the incident and “ask that residents in the area look around their property for any shell casings, gunshot damage or other evidence. If you find any evidence, please leave it in place and contact non-emergency dispatch at 541-693-6911."

Residents with surveillance cameras also are asked to check footage from between the hours of 2:30 and 4 a.m. Saturday “for any footage showing a person with a gun moving through the area.”

A resident on Rae Road said in a Nextdoor post that they "heard 4 gun shots at 3:10 a.m. stay inside!!"