A 39-year-old woman was arrested Monday after Eugene police say she sat cross-legged in the middle of West 1st Avenue near Madison Street and refused to move. Police also say she tried to roll herself into the path of an oncoming vehicle. Amber Martinez now faces a charge of disorderly conduct following the encounter, which unfolded on West First Avenue near Madison Street.
According to KVAL, officers responded at 12:40 a.m. Monday, Sept. 21, 2026, to a report of a woman sitting in the roadway near Madison Street. Police said Martinez had her legs crossed and was blocking traffic when officers arrived and ordered her to clear the street. KVAL also reported that Martinez tried to roll into the path of an oncoming vehicle and pulled away from an officer during a detention attempt. Martinez eventually got out of the roadway and was arrested.
Police say Martinez ultimately left the roadway and was lodged at the Lane County Jail on a disorderly conduct charge, according to KVAL.
The Charge and the Law Behind It
Oregon Revised Statute 166.025(1)(d) makes it a crime to obstruct vehicular or pedestrian traffic on a public way with intent to cause public inconvenience, annoyance, or alarm — or while recklessly creating that risk, according to the Oregon State Legislature. Second-degree disorderly conduct is a Class B misdemeanor in the state, according to the Gary R. Johnson Law Firm.
Martinez was arrested after reportedly pulling away from an officer and trying to roll into the path of an oncoming vehicle.
A City Already on Edge About Traffic Deaths
Eugene recorded 22 traffic deaths in 2024, the highest single-year total in the city's recorded history, with 88 percent of those fatal crashes occurring on high-speed, multi-lane arterial roads, according to KLCC.
Eugene's response to street-level disturbances has also shifted in the past year and a half. In April 2025, the city ended its contract with CAHOOTS, a mobile crisis intervention program run by White Bird Clinic, shifting acute behavioral health calls to Mobile Crisis Services of Lane County instead, according to University of Oregon research. The transition concerned acute behavioral health calls.
Jail Space and Police Workload
Once booked, Martinez was held at the Lane County Jail, a facility that operates with a funded capacity of 411 adult-in-custody beds but is capped at 382 under a federal consent decree, according to the Lane County Sheriff's Office. The consent-decree cap is lower than the facility's funded capacity.
The arrest also comes against a backdrop of heavy call volume for Eugene police, who fielded 87,839 public-initiated calls for service and logged 27,247 officer-initiated calls within city limits in 2024, per Eugene Police Department records.
