Portland Police Chief Larry O'Dea is under state investigation for accidentally shooting a friend in the back during an eastern Oregon hunting trip last month.

O'Dea was on vacation April 21 in Harney County when he fired his .22-caliber rifle, striking a friend once in the lower left side of his back, according to police and Harney County dispatch records.

O'Dea on Friday called it a "negligent discharge.'' He was off-duty at the time.

Retired Portland police Sgt. Steve Buchtel, a former head of firearms training at the Police Bureau, was with O'Dea and called 911 at 4:37 p.m. that day.

The wounded 54-year-old man was described as "alert and breathing," according to dispatch records. He was driven to the Fields Station restaurant in Fields, where he was airlifted by LifeFlight helicopter to the closest trauma hospital, St. Alphonsus in Boise.

"I'm very thankful that my friend is OK, and I'm tremendously upset this happened,'' O'Dea said in a prepared statement.

He didn't comment further. Police didn't explain why O'Dea was only now publicly acknowledging the shooting. Portland police and the Harney County Sheriff's Office didn't identify the friend who was shot.

Oregon State Police and the Oregon Department of Justice are now investigating O'Dea, state police Capt. Bill Fugate confirmed.

Because the shooting occurred during an off-duty trip and not during a law enforcement action, the state police certification agency likely won't get involved in the case, said Eriks Gabliks, director of the Oregon Department of Public Safety Standards & Training.

"He was there as a hunter,'' Gabliks said. "It's a sad, tragic hunting accident.''

The shooting happened in the Catlow Valley area of Harney County, about 80 miles south of Burns.

It's unclear if Harney County sheriff's deputies knew then that the shooter was Portland's police chief.

Harney County Sheriff's Lt. Brian Needham said he couldn't make a police report available because it hasn't been finalized. He didn't release further details about what occurred. The investigation is ongoing, he said.

Portland police spokesman Sgt. Pete Simpson said he couldn't answer whether O'Dea identified himself as chief. "I don't have any other information to offer you on this right now,'' he said.

O'Dea reported the shooting to Mayor Charlie Hales and to the Police Bureau's Professional Standards Division Capt. Derek Rodriguez, Simpson said. He didn't indicate when that happened.

"Larry O'Dea is a great chief, who is heartsick over hurting a friend,'' Hales said in a statement. Hales appointed O'Dea in 2014 to replace retiring Chief Mike Reese and O'Dea was sworn in on Jan. 2, 2015.

O'Dea served as a reserve officer in Fairfax County, Va., and a reserve deputy sheriff in Clackamas County before joining Portland police in 1986. He was appointed as an assistant chief in November 2008.

Kristina Edmunson, spokeswoman for the state Justice Department, said the agency couldn't comment on the investigation.

It's unlikely the shooting would result in a criminal prosecution, considering the victim is a friend of O'Dea's, according to legal experts. The rarely used negligent wounding statute, though, might apply in the case -- a Multnomah County judge ruled in 2011 that the state law was drafted to apply to hunting cases.

Under the statute, "any person who, as a result of failure to use ordinary care under the circumstances, wounds any other person with a bullet or shot from any firearm, or with an arrow from any bow, shall be punished by imprisonment in the county jail for a period not to exceed six months, or by a fine not to exceed $500, or both."

The shooting appears to have some similarities to Vice President Dick Cheney's notorious hunting accident in 2006 in Texas. Cheney shot 78-year-old lawyer Harry Whittington while aiming for a quail on a private ranch.

Cheney didn't publicly disclose the accident until the next day. He struck Whittington, an acquaintance, in the face, neck and chest with shotgun pellets. Whittington suffered a mild heart attack caused by a pellet that traveled to his heart, but he recovered.

Texas authorities closed the investigation without bringing any charges. President George W. Bush said Cheney handled the situation "just fine."

-- Maxine Bernstein

mbernstein@oregonian.com

503-221-8212

@maxoregonian