A Southeast Portland man was charged with a hate crime Tuesday and is accused of wielding a machete, using homophobic slurs against a store employee, and punching that employee in the face earlier this month.

Multnomah County District Attorney Rod Underhill charged Camar Livingstone, 19, with one count of unlawful use of a weapon, one count of menacing, one count of harassment and two counts of second-degree intimidation. Livingstone pleaded not guilty on all charges.

Court documents say Livingstone was in Macy’s department store at Lloyd Center mall on May 6 when a man who worked at the store as a loss prevention officer saw Livingstone put clothes into his backpack. When the officer tried to talk to Livingstone, the documents say, he took the clothes out of his backpack and put them down, but came toward the officer, started using homophobic slurs, and made threats. According to court documents, Livingstone then took the merchandise and moved around the store, and when the officer followed him, he continued to make homophobic slurs. Court documents say he threw the clothes at the officer’s head and hit him.

Other loss prevention officers came to help, and Livingstone reportedly punched the victim in the face. When the other officers arrived and tried to get Livingstone away from him, Livingstone is reported to have grabbed a machete from his pants and waved it around.

Court documents say Livingstone then fled the store and was soon arrested by the Portland Police Bureau, but that police did not recover the machete. Livingstone was lodged in the Multnomah County Detention Center and released to Multnomah County Pretrial Release Service the next day.

—Jayati Ramakrishnan; 503-221-4320; jramakrishnan@oregonian.com; @JRamakrishnanOR

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