An employee at a cannabis dispensary in North Portland is accused of fatally shooting two people who attempted to rob the business last week.
Jason Steiner, 34, turned himself in to Portland police Wednesday and was booked into Multnomah County’s downtown jail on allegations of two counts of second-degree murder and two counts of unlawful use of a weapon. Steiner worked at the St. Johns branch of the La Mota dispensary, police said.
Officials identified the people who died as 18-year-old King Lawrence and 20-year-old Tahir Burley. Both are from Milwaukie, police said.
Police are seeking a third person in connection with the robbery, but they did not give a name or a description.
Last week’s shooting happened just after 9:30 p.m. on Thursday,
The North Portland store had been targeted by at least four previous armed robberies since 2022, state records show. Two took place close to 10 p.m. A sign outside the business last week said it stopped letting customers in after 9 p.m. as a result. Instead they directed customers to a drive-through window until closing time at 10 p.m., unless they could provide an ID.
In June of this year, one employee was working when five people allegedly entered the store with guns and stole about $11,000 worth of marijuana products and cash, according to the reports. All of the individuals wore masks and filled up trash bags of money and products in the store before taking off, according to records from the Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission.
Marijuana dispensaries have been frequent robbery targets in Portland, which industry individuals attribute to the fact they primarily conduct business with cash. In 2020, an employee at Cured Green, 44-year-old Michael Arthur, was shot and killed during a robbery.
Data from the Police Bureau showed 33 robberies were reported at cannabis businesses in the first half of 2023, a number higher than annual totals each year from 2016 to 2022.
At a Wednesday meeting of the Portland City Council, employees with the city of Portland’s cannabis program recommended instituting proactive video monitoring security systems at cannabis businesses, so police may be able to respond while crimes are unfolding.
Lawrence and Burley are the city’s 57th and 58th homicide victims this year.
Burley graduated from Reynolds Learning Academy in 2022. An obituary said his first name, Tahir, means pure in Arabic. He played football and basketball growing up and enjoyed playing video games and making music, his family wrote.
In 2022, KATU-TV posted a video of Burley sharing encouraging words to graduating seniors. “We are all a flower just waiting to be watered and blossom into the sunlight to be something amazing,” Burley said in the video.
Police are asking anyone with information to contact Detective Brent Christensen at brent.christensen@police.portlandoregon.gov or Detective J.D. McGuire at jeff.mcguire@police.portlandoregon.gov and reference case No. 24-253852.
— Zaeem Shaikh covers the Portland Police Bureau and criminal justice issues for The Oregonian/OregonLive. Reach him at 503-221-4323, zshaikh@oregonian.com or on X @zaeemshake.
Portland police said Jason Steiner, 34, was arrested on allegations of two counts of second-degree murder and two counts of unlawful use of a weapon. Read More