A security guard monitoring a longshore picket line outside

June 30 spotted a man in a black cape, hood and grim-reaper mask carrying a raccoon.

Joseph Andrade, who works for the strike-breaking company J.R. Gettier & Associates, reported watching as the picketer tried to throw the animal over a chain-link fence at 2:45 a.m. The masked man said something, but Andrade couldn't hear it over recordings of pig squeals or other animals in distress that picketers played on speakers aimed at Andrade and a few other guards, all men of color.

"He again attempted to throw the raccoon over the fence," Andrade said in an incident report, "but the animal seemed to move, which made it awkward for him to grasp it, to throw it. The animal briefly looked as if it blinked."

The guard videotaped the man shoving the raccoon's snout into the chain-link fence so the limp animal remained upright. Longshore Local 8 member Joshua Slighter, who was arrested on accusations of animal neglect and disorderly conduct, told police the raccoon was roadkill, dead before he brought it to the picket line.

On the waterfront, racism infects the longshore standoff as dockworkers spew invective at replacement workers and the guards hired to protect them. "You're a slave, a sucking slave," yelled a picketer at a crew of guards Monday outside Columbia Grain. "You're always going to be a slave. You're a pig, a slave pig."

Welcome to the front lines of the months-long lockout at grain export terminals in Portland and Vancouver. The metro area remains a hotbed of labor turmoil, as dockworkers picket the terminals and engage in continuing strife at the Port of Portland's container yard -- and as Daimler Trucks North America workers strike for higher pay.

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Grain terminal managers and union members remain at a stalemate after failing to renew a contract last year. Bosses want an agreement with labor savings equivalent to those at competing terminals in Kalama and Longview, Wash. Longshore leaders seek a contract similar to that signed in February with Temco, a Cargill Inc. and CHS Inc. joint venture.

Portland police officers responded to the raccoon incident at Columbia Grain, a division of Japan's Marubeni Corp. An officer reported the incident as a potential bias crime, citing statements by picketers who taunted the guards, asking whether they'd eat the raccoon for lunch and speculating whether they liked possum.

Longshore union leaders disown the racist actions. Jennifer Sargent, a spokeswoman for the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, released a statement calling the incident involving the raccoon upsetting.

"The individual's actions in the video that Marubeni-Columbia Grain provided to the media are inappropriate on many levels," the statement said, "and far out of line with the values of the hardworking men and women who are fighting to maintain good working standards in our union's 80-year collective bargaining agreement with the employer."

Local 8 leaders also are investigating the raccoon incident, the statement said.

The criminal accusations against Slighter were dismissed, according to court records. But a spokesman for the Multnomah County district attorney's office said the case remains open as the Portland Police Bureau gathers more information.

Tension on picket lines

Longshore workers have set up camp outside Columbia Grain, which locked them out May 4, and United Grain Corp., where they were shut out Feb. 27. Union tents staffed around the clock at terminal access gates display American flags and contain bottled water, barbecue grills, snacks, sunscreen and other supplies.

Protesters delay delivery-truck drivers and non-union workers crossing the picket lines. Picketers surround each vehicle for up to 5 minutes, peering through tinted glass and shouting insults at impassive drivers and passengers. Occasionally picketers stand close to advancing vehicles, toppling over and claiming to have been hit.

Pat McCormick, a spokesman for the grain handlers, collects video clips of confrontations taped by security guards. In the recordings, picketers point strobe lights at drivers' eyes and use the terms "'jigaboos' and 'gooks.'"

Guards video tape picketers. Protesters video tape guards.

Inside the terminals, work goes on, using non-union employees, managers and replacement workers. Managers say the current work force unloads grain trains and loads ships faster than longshoreman did.

Unorthodox actions by longshoremen aren't new, judging by a U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals opinion issued July 5 that described tactics during protests in 2011 at the Export Grain Terminal in Longview. There, protestors tore down gates, assaulted employees, keyed vehicles, placed bags of feces outside buildings and used an airplane to drop a bag of manure on company property.

In April and May, United Grain filed unfair-labor practice charges against ILWU Local 4, saying longshore union members visited company employees' homes and threatened and intimidated them. On the picket line, the charges said, protesters make statements such as, "We know where you live," and "We are going to kill you."

The union has also filed unfair-labor practice charges against United Grain, describing the lockout as an extreme measure based on anti-union animus. No talks have been held since March, but pressure could mount as the grain harvest boosts shipments.

Monopoly accusations

Fresh charges filed June 28 by Seattle lawyers for the National Labor Relations Board separately accuse the longshore union and its local 8 and 40 of continuing to stage slowdowns at the Port of Portland's container terminal. The union is barred from slowdowns at Terminal 6 under an injunction issued last year by U.S. District Judge Michael Simon.

Simon held a hearing Wednesday on litigation involving the union and the Port's terminal operator, ICTSI Oregon Inc. They continue tangling over jobs held by International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers members who plug, unplug and monitor refrigerated containers, or reefers. The controversy snarled freight last summer as international cargo vessels bypassed Portland.

In an antitrust claim, ICTSI argues that the ILWU and the Pacific Maritime Association, which represents companies that employ longshore workers, are conspiring to restrain trade and monopolize the labor market for handling West Coast marine cargo. The union and the association oppose the claim and continue to maintain the reefer jobs belong to them. An administrative law judge is expected to rule on the reefer jobs later this year.

Container vessels continue calling on Portland, but they do so without a contract. ICTSI has yet to reach agreement with Hanjin Shipping and Hapag-Lloyd to renew contracts that expired Dec. 31.