A 25-year-old Portland man is facing felony charges after Portland police say he pulled out a slingshot and fired rocks at a couple on the platform at Gateway Transit Center, shattering glass windows at the MAX station in the process. Jonas Tarauo was arrested shortly before 2 a.m. and now faces charges of unlawful use of a weapon, harassment, and first-degree criminal mischief.
According to court documents cited by KPTV, Tarauo approached a woman and her boyfriend at the platform and recognized the boyfriend from a prior incident that had occurred a few months earlier. Tarauo told officers he asked to borrow a pipe before pulling out the slingshot and using it to confront the boyfriend. Per the affidavit, Tarauo then launched rocks at the woman and her boyfriend.
Officers who responded found a slingshot and multiple rocks on Tarauo, the outlet reports. A rock hit the woman in the chest; she had no visible marks but reported minor pain from the impact and declined medical attention. The boyfriend was hit by several rocks but reported no injuries.
Shattered Windows and a Machete Claim
Shattered glass and rocks were collected as evidence at the base of the windows, according to the same court documents. Tarauo admitted he accidentally broke the TriMet windows while aiming at the boyfriend, but told investigators he did not believe the rocks actually hit either the woman or her boyfriend. He also claimed the boyfriend had chased him with a machete during that earlier encounter — a claim noted in court documents but not independently confirmed. Tarauo remains in custody in Multnomah County.
Both charges Tarauo faces carry serious weight under Oregon law. Unlawful Use of a Weapon under ORS 166.220 is a Class C felony punishable by up to five years in prison and fines reaching $125,000, according to oregongunlaw.com. First-degree criminal mischief under ORS 164.365 is likewise a Class C felony, applying when intentional property damage exceeds $1,000 or targets public transportation infrastructure, per Trotter Law's breakdown of the statute.
A Pattern of Platform Violence at Gateway
This is not the first time a slingshot has turned into a felony weapon on TriMet's east-side MAX line. In August 2025, the Multnomah County Circuit Court sentenced a 40-year-old man to five years and 10 months in prison after he used a slingshot to fire a 6-inch metal dart into a rider's lung at an East Portland platform, a case first surfaced by The Oregonian and detailed in reporting from the Chronicle. That defendant pleaded guilty to second-degree assault and unlawful use of a weapon following what was described as a retaliatory dispute.
Gateway Transit Center itself has a troubled recent history. In December 2022, a woman pushed a 3-year-old child onto the tracks there in an unprovoked attack; a bystander pulled the toddler off the rails before a train arrived, and the attacker was later committed to a psychiatric facility for 10 years, as Hoodline reported at the time. The following month, TriMet issued a five-year transit exclusion against a MAX platform attacker, an administrative tool the agency reserves for people who assault riders or pose ongoing safety threats, according to Metro Magazine.
TriMet's Security Response and Legal Pipeline
The Multnomah County District Attorney's Office funds two dedicated deputy district attorneys, paid for directly by TriMet, whose sole job is prosecuting violent crimes against transit passengers, staff, and facilities — a setup Hoodline detailed in its coverage of a TriMet beating case. TriMet has also expanded physical infrastructure, installing more than 29 emergency blue-light security call boxes along a 15-mile stretch of the east-side MAX line, including platforms between Rose Quarter and Gresham Central, with plans to add 50 more systemwide by mid-2026.
Policing on the line falls under an intergovernmental agreement led by the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office through June 2028, which draws personnel from the Sheriff's Office along with the Port of Portland, Beaverton, and Hillsboro police departments. Gateway Transit Center has also drawn scrutiny over how security is handled onboard trains: an October 2023 chokehold incident involving two contracted security guards led to a $415,000 civil lawsuit and criminal charges filed against the guards this January, according to Hoodline's earlier reporting.
Separately, a state law that took effect January 1, 2025, made illicit drug use on public transit vehicles a Class A misdemeanor punishable by up to 364 days in jail, part of a broader legislative push to bolster safety across Oregon's transit systems, Mass Transit reported. Despite the added security staffing, call boxes, and dedicated prosecutors, high-profile violent incidents on the MAX platform continue to test rider confidence in the system's safety.
