A 58-year-old man arrested over the weekend is the first person in Oregon to be accused of a bias crime, a new state law that went into effect last month, according to the Multnomah County District Attorney Rod Underhill.

Robert Oden has been charged with one count of bias crime in the first degree, felony assault in the fourth degree, two counts of harassment and two counts of bias crime in the second degree.

Under Oregon’s new law, it is now a felony to commit a bias crime when a person intentionally, knowingly or recklessly causes physical injury to another person because of the actor’s perception of the victim’s race, color, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or national origin. Previously, to be charged as a felony, two or more people would need to commit the offense.

Oden has been accused of assaulting a group of people leaving CC Slaughters, a gay nightclub, in Old Town over the weekend, Underhill said.

At about 2 a.m. Saturday, three men and a witness, all of whom Underhill said were Latino, were walking away from CC Slaughters. As the group walked along the sidewalk talking, Oden was sitting in an alcove of a nearby building. None of the men spoke with Oden.

Oden is accused to yelling at them, using homophobic language toward the group and attacking them, hitting three in the face. The group escaped, but Oden is accused of yelling “go back to your country.”

Employees from CC Slaughters called police. When Oden was taken into custody, court documents said, he continued to use racial and homophobic language and threatened continued assaults.

One of the men had a swollen and bloodied lip and said that he felt substantial pain.

The Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office was an active participant of the Oregon Attorney General’s Hate Crimes Task Force and helped draft the language that was in Senate Bill 577. The new law, which went into effect on July 15, 2019, renamed the crime of “intimidation” to “bias crime,” added gender identity to the list of protected categories and removed the requirement that two or more people commit the crime in order to make it a felony.

--Tom Hallman Jr.

thallman@oregonian.com; 503 221-8224

@thallmanjr