More than 1,000 Occupy Wall Street protesters blocked cargo trucks at some of the West Coast’s busiest ports Monday, forcing terminals in Oakland, Calif., Portland, Ore., and Longview, Wash., to halt operations.

While the protests attracted far fewer people than the 10,000 who turned out Nov. 2 to shut down Oakland’s port, organizers declared victory and promised more demonstrations to come.

“The truckers are still here, but there’s nobody here to unload their stuff,” protest organizer Boots Riley said. “We shut down the Port of Oakland for the daytime shift and we’re coming back in the evening. Mission accomplished.”

Organizers called for the “Shutdown Wall Street on the Waterfront” protests, hoping the day of demonstrations would cut into the profits of the corporations that run the docks and send a message that their movement was not over.

A Multnomah County jury awarded a 33-year-old woman $82,000 Thursday, saying they wanted to send Portland police a message: Hand over a business card the next time a citizen asks for one.

Several jurors who spoke to The Oregonian after the verdict in Multnomah County Circuit Court said police weren’t dealing with an urgent or dangerous situation on the evening of Feb. 13, 2009 — when Shei’Meka Newmann questioned what she thought was an unnecessarily rough arrest of a fellow MAX rider. It would have taken only a few seconds for an officer to hand Newmann a card, jurors said.

“I think that police need to be reminded that it’s part of their job to de-escalate and defuse situations,” said juror Chris Bolles. Instead, jurors say police overreacted to Newmann’s queries.

After years of budget cuts, Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schrunk says he’s had no choice but to stop prosecuting dozens of illegal acts as crimes.

Among them, most addicts caught with small amounts of drugs such as heroin, cocaine or meth; first- or second-time shoplifters caught stealing anything worth less than $250; suspects who resist arrest, or who run away from police officers; drivers who hit and run, as long as they have insurance when they are caught.

Multnomah County is treating those offenses as violations — similar to being…

Clackamas County officials had an exotic — and unusual —  assignment involving a camel, a sink hole and Oregon City.

The camel went into the hole and firefighters got it out.
Oh, and the camel’s name is Moses.

It’s the pet of the family in the 15700 block of South Maplelane Road in Oregon City. They called 9-1-1 at about 9:40 Tuesday night, saying one of their camels had fallen into a sink hole about  6-feet deep and might be injured. Members of the Clackamas Fire District #1 and the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office arrived to find Moses, who weighs 1,500 pounds, stuck up to his shoulders in a muddy hole.

They had to call in more resources and spent hours digging the creature out of…