Mental Health Association of Portland

From the Eugene Weekly, April 18, 2013

Cinema Pacific, the annual festival featuring films from Pacific-bordering countries, is in full swing, and like any good film festival there is a dizzying array of options for movie buffs and casual cinemagoers alike to choose from. This year’s focus will be on films and filmmakers from Singapore, Mexico and the U.S. West Coast.

James Chasse at his Portland group home

“It’s a yearlong process,” Cinema Pacific Director Richard Herskowitz says. “This is a very curated festival.” Herskowitz spends the year leading up to Cinema Pacific attending other film festivals, such as Sundance and Toronto, and combing through programs to find films he wants to bring to Eugene. He came home with a bounty: The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada directed by Tommy Lee Jones and written by Guillermo Arriaga (21 Grams, Babel), Singapore Dreaming by Colin Goh and Yen Yen Woo and the animations and song accompaniment of San Francisco filmmaker Jermey Rourke, to name a few.

Herskowitz didn’t have to go far to find one of this year’s most poignant films: Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse, cosponsored by the Good Works Film Festival. The film, directed by Brian Lindstrom, premiered in February at the Portland International Film Festival, and Herskowitz says there was “an incredible response from the audience.”

Alien Boy unravels the myths and misinformation that swallowed up the legacy of Portlander James Chasse, who died at the age of 42 in September 2006, while in the custody of the Portland Police Department. Three police officers (Chris Humphreys, Kyle Nice and Bret Barton) found Chasse, who had schizophrenia, urinating on the street in Portland and asked him to stop. When Chasse looked like he was going to flee, the officers tackled, beat and Tased him; Chasse was left lying in the street with 26 broken bones, drifting in and out of consciousness, his breathing stopping and starting, while the police sent the medics at the scene away, not informing them of the extent of physical trauma inflicted, and claiming that they were bringing him to jail because they had criminal charges against him. As the documentary reveals, James Chasse had a clean record. He died on the way to the hospital in the back of a police car that night.

The documentary elegantly and intimately weaves together the span of Chasse’s life — his creative childhood, the onset of mental illness in adolescence, his role in Portland’s DIY punk scene in the late ’70s, his adult struggle with and management of schizophrenia — with the details of the fatal September night and its aftermath. Through interviews with his parents and friends, a tender, imaginative and thoughtful-yet-tormented man is formed. And through countless interviews with witnesses at the crime scene, a picture is painted of a slight (he was 5 feet 9 inches tall and 145 pounds), frightened man with mental illness — a very different profile than the potentially dangerous crack addict with a criminal record that Humphreys, Nice and Barton pegged him as. At one point, the officers enter into evidence a sandwich baggie filled with breadcrumbs that they initially claimed was crack.

And while the catalyst for the film is police brutality, Alien Boy is as much about society’s misconceptions and mishandling of mental illness as it is about police corruption. One witness, playwright and director Randall Stuart, remembers thinking at the crime scene, “Are they going to throw him away?” The question not only reflects the indifference of the police officers that night, but also the indifference of a society to those who need the most help.

Alien Boy screens at 6:30 pm and 9:15 pm Saturday, April 20, at the Bijou with filmmaker Brian Lindstrom. For Cinema Pacific Film Festival’s full line up, visit cinemapacific.uoregon.edu

By Emilly Prado, Bitch Magazine, April 11, 2013

Cases of police brutality are reported time and time again across the country.  And yet, despite the passing of years and supposed reforms, we are always taken aback when new cases arise.

Seven years after one particularly awful case in Portland, Oregon, the new independent documentary Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse captures the horror once more. The film is a chilling, intimate look at one case of police brutality and the flawed justice system that allows officers to act with impunity.

In the  partially-Kickstarter-backed 90-minute film, director Brian Lindstrom offers us a small glimpse into the extraordinarily complex life and heartbreaking death of James Chasse.

Raised in Portland, as a teenager, Chasse expressed feelings of alienation and rebellion that feel familiar to many people. An active member in the local punk rock community in the late ’70s, Chasse fronted his own band and was the inspiration for the song “Alien Boy” by The Wipers.  Chasse’s determination to live an independent life on his own terms was evident as early as age 14 when he chose to move out of his parents’ house.  From the onset of his teenage years, however, his mental illness emerged.  Chasse’s psychosis eventually led to his hospitalization and diagnosis with schizophrenia, but Chasse resisted remaining institutionalized.  Medication allowed Chasse to safely integrate into society for many years.

In the weeks leading up to his altercation with the Portland police in September 2006, Chasse’s family suspected he’d gone off his medication. In the film, witnesses who’d been eating lunch at one of Portland’s fancier restaurants recall seeing Chasse possibly peeing on a tree on the sidewalk, being confronted by police, running off, then being tackled, crushed, and kicked by an officer.

In excruciating detail, the film chronicles how the police at the scene noticed that Chasse was in pain, but refused to load him into a waiting ambulance and signed a medical waiver instead. In a particularly distressing clip, we see Chasse being dragged by officers through the station, crying out in agony with a spit sock over his head.  This happened more than once. When officers finally decided to take Chasse to the hospital, he died en route in the backseat of a police car with 16 broken ribs and a punctured lung.

Through the aid of archival footage, official court and police documentations, and interviews, Alien Boy is a disturbing look at both the callous police attitudes that led to Chasse’s death and the officers’ ability to escape serious punishment. As the film continues to unearth the mystery surrounding the beating and Chasse’s subsequent death, it becomes more and more clear at how flawed our judicial system remains. While Chasse’s mother tearfully explains the process of grieving her son, the film rolls tape of the officers’ responsible for Chasse’s death giving testimony at the grand jury investigating the fatal incident. Their demeanor is steely as they absolve themselves of blame—after years of legal wrangling, the city winds up being unable to even fire the officers.

Though this particular case occurred in Portland, Alien Boy is a film that’s sadly relevant to any city in the country.

Alien Boy will be playing at the Minneapolis St. Paul International Film Festival next week and at the Cinema Pacific Film Festival in Eugene, Oregon later this month.

Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse continues at Clinton Street Theater in Southeast Portland in the first week of April.

Question and answer sessions will follow each screening. Brian Lindstrom, the film’s director will attend screenings on April 1, 2, 3, 4, and 7. Andrew Saunderson, co-producer of Alien Boy will attend April 5.

SHOWTIMES
Monday, April 1 – 7:00 PM
Tuesday, April 2 – 7:00 PM
Wednesday, April 3 – 7:00 PM
Thursday, April 4 – 7:00 PM
Friday, April 5 – 7:00 PM
No showing on April 6
Sunday, April 7 – 7:00 PM

“Alien Boy is a triumph – and an emotional bulldozer.”
~ John Chandler, Portland Monthly

“Brian Lindstrom’s Alien Boy packs a horrifying punch: intimate, terrible & true.”
~ Shawn Levy, The Oregonian

“Infuriating, tragic, heartbreaking and incendiary in equal measures… plays out like a horror film and leaves you absolutely breathless.”
~ AP Kryza, Willamette Week

“A masterful piece of work, with relevance that extends far beyond Portland.”
~ Judge Darlene Ortega, The Portland Observer

Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse is a project of the Mental Health Association of Portland and is available for licensing. Click here for a full report on the status of the film.

Have you been meaning to see Alien Boy, but haven’t gotten around to it?  There’s still time — but not much!

Cinema 21 extended the showing of the James Chasse documentary “Alien Boy: The Death and Life of James Chasse,” through March 7.

This exquisitely crafted, evocative documentary will shock you, horrify you and bring you to tears as director Brian Lindstrom shows you who Jim Chasse was, and what happened to him at the hands of Portland police.

When: Saturday and Sunday: 2:30, 4:30, 7 and 9 p.m. Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday: 4:30, 7, 9 p.m. Thursday (last day!): 3:45 and 6:05 p.m.

Tickets are $7 before 6 p.m., $9 after 6 p.m., $8 for students, $6 for seniors and children. Cinema 21, 616 N.W. 21st Ave.

WATCH – Alien Boy trailer

Listen and download @ http://kboo.fm/node/54128

Documentary film producer and Mental Health Association of Portland board member Jason Renaud speaks with KBOO radio Wednesday host Lisa Loving about the film Alien Boy: the Life and Death of James Chasse and the state of police reform in Portland, Oregon, February 27, 2013.

From KBOO: Tickets are still available for ‘Alien Boy,’ the documentary about the police killing of James Chasse now showing at Cinema 21. We are live in Studio Two with the film’s producer, Jason Renaud. Did you know James Chasse? Give us a call, 503-281-8187

By Brian Lindstrom, in the Portland Tribune, Feb. 21, 2013

Brian Lindstrom

As parents of a 7- and an 8-year-old, my wife Cheryl Strayed and I often discuss what we hope to impart to our children.

At the top of that list is resilience, which I define not only as the ability to persevere despite obstacles but also as the capacity to extend some key element of your essential being beyond the vicissitudes and surfaces of day-to-day life.

James Chasse was resilient, and the opportunity to share that and other of his defining characteristics with a large audience was one of the main reasons for making the documentary “Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse.”

Many of you know Chasse’s name through the headline “Man with schizophrenia dies in police custody.” Perhaps you followed the story through the grand jury and civil lawsuit phases, and perhaps you wondered how he received 26 fractures to 16 ribs.

The first task of the film was to delve into James’ life, adding necessary dimension, depth and nuance to a person that — through no fault of his own — was now being defined by how he died. In making “Alien Boy,” I wanted to define James by how he lived.

One of the brightest parts of James’ life was his participation in Portland’s early punk music scene. Embraced by fellow outsiders and artists, he flourished, publishing his fanzine The Oregon Organizm, writing and recording songs as lead singer of The Combos, and playing muse to Greg Sage of the Wipers and Kim Kincaid of the Neo Boys, inspiring the songs “Alien Boy” and “Nothing to Fear.”

How many of us can say one song was written about us? James had two.

A measured account

James Chasse

The onset of schizophrenia made it nearly impossible for James to maintain those relationships, though he valiantly tried, writing a heartbreakingly brave note to an old friend from his punk days, “I thought I’d try to explain who I am….”

As so often happens with people suffering from severe and persistent mental illness, his behavior put people off and his interactions became confined to family members, mental health professionals and the rare person willing to endure the discomfort of reaching across the chasm of schizophrenia. One such brave, kind soul was Russell Sacco, a retired physician who attended the same church as James.

“He’s just a person and I’m just a person, so I went up and talked to him,” Dr. Sacco explains.

After weeks of no response, one day James replied “hello” to Dr. Sacco and a dialogue began. If only the police officers had approached James in a similar spirit that fateful day — or, absent that, ignored him altogether and not have initiated a foot pursuit that the Portland Police Bureau’s Training Division would later rule should never have happened.

The other task of the film was to take a clear-eyed, calm, measured account of how and why James Chasse died. Using eyewitness accounts, audiotape of the police investigation, police evidence photos, official court documents, footage from jail surveillance cameras, interviews of Medical Examiner Dr. Karen Gunson, recent Portland Mayor Sam Adams, then-Multnomah County Chairman Ted Wheeler, journalists Matt Davis and Anna Griffin, attorney Tom Steenson and James’ mother and father, and videotaped depositions from Officer Christopher Humphreys, Sgt. Kyle Nice and Deputy Bret Burton, the film presents a relentless, enraging cascade of actions, decisions, omissions and lies on the part of police that led to James Chasse’s death.

Then-Mayor Tom Potter and then-Police Chief Rosie Sizer attempted to divert attention from the actions of Humphreys, Nice and Burton by framing what happened to James Chasse as a failure of the mental health system.

Nothing could be further from the truth. James was a success story, living independently and managing things well. He went off his meds, which is part of the disease of mental illness, but his case manager was aware of this and asked Project Respond to do a welfare visit accompanied by a police officer.

The welfare visit revealed that James was in a bad way, and Project Respond’s Ela Howard asked Officer Worthington to file a report flagging James as mentally ill so that if the police ever encountered him again, they would know to call Project Respond rather than try to deal with James by themselves.

Officer Worthington didn’t file the report. This was on Sept. 15, 2006, two days before James died. The mental health system is not to blame for James’s tragic death.

Fueling change

Last Friday evening, at the Northwest Children’s Theater on Northwest 18th and Everett, a mere 100 feet from where Officer Humphreys first encountered James, we had a party after “Alien Boy” premiered at Cinema 21 as part of the Portland International Film Festival.

I had the privilege of introducing Mayor Charlie Hales to James Chasse Sr. What followed was an open conversation between a still grieving father and a new mayor about what steps the city can take to guard against this kind of tragedy happening again.

I’m in Missoula, Mont., where the film just played in the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival. The audience was enraged — may that rage fuel positive change.

But rage will only get us so far. Let Russell Sacco’s simple, wise words guide us: “He’s just a person, and I’m just a person….”

In that vein, we have to ask about the toll all this has taken on the officers involved. Have they received the necessary mental health help such a traumatic experience requires? How has this experience changed them? What have they learned? Are they still capable of doing their jobs? Do we, the public, still have confidence in them?

Portland resident Brian Lindstrom’s third feature-length documentary, “Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse,” will play Sunday through March 7 at Cinema 21 in Portland.

By Jamie S. Rich, The Oregonian, Feb. 21, 2013

James Chasse as a boy.

Chances are most Portlanders remember hearing about the night James Chasse died, even if they don’t remember his name or the exact circumstances.

In September 2006, Chasse died in police custody after sustaining injuries during his arrest. The 42-year-old man, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia as a teenager, was chased down and tackled by officers downtown in the Pearl District. The cops defended their use of force as being in line with department standards. Bystanders, including one who snapped pictures with his phone, had a different story to tell.

“Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse” is the result of six years of work by Portland filmmaker Brian Lindstrom. The documentary sets out to separate and explore the different versions of the tragic events.

Lindstrom frames the material as a clinical procedural, sifting through testimony and looking at the evidence. Though the arresting officers declined to take part, they are represented via videotaped depositions. Much of what they have to say doesn’t add up, and a lot of what we see and hear is stomach turning. Yet “Alien Boy” attempts to be fair. The judgments come from without, rather than within.

Lindstrom lets the facts shine a light on the faults within the system that allowed these civil servants to forget they were dealing with a human being and not a stereotype or statistic. In the process, the director also restores James Chasse’s identity, reminding us that he was more than a headline, but also a son and a friend.

“Alien Boy” is enraging and heartbreaking. While it answers a lot of questions about the circumstances of that terrible night, it raises many others about how we view the mentally ill in our country and, perhaps more specifically, how even a city like Portland can turn a blind eye to so much suffering. Lindstrom’s film never preaches, but it does provoke. Don’t be surprised if you leave the theater looking at the streets outside differently than when you went in.