Police drew their guns and arrested a University student who handled a handgun after angrily confronting them over a parking
ticket Thursday morning, police said.
But the student said he is a law-abiding gun owner with a concealed handgun permit, and the police misunderstood his actions.
Justin Taylor Grosso, 28, was charged with disorderly conduct and lodged at Lane County Adult Corrections for four hours after police arrested him near the Knight Library.
Grosso was in the West University Public Safety Station disputing the traffic ticket he received for parking in a commercial zone with a noncommercial vehicle, Eugene Police Department Lt. Jennifer Bills said.
Grosso said he went to the station to show officers the commercial logo he had displayed while parked.
The officers, who didn’t know Grosso has the commercial permit, advised him that he could dispute the ticket by either filling out a contestment form or finding a parking officer with whom to discuss the ticket, he said.
Grosso said he wasn’t excessively irate.
“I went in there hoping an officer could look at my logo so that when I contest my ticket, I could say ‘officer such and such viewed my sticker while I was parked there,’” Grosso said.
Before entering the police station, Grosso had removed his handgun and placed it in the trunk of his car in a safe, he said. State law forbids carrying guns into a police station. When he left the station, he pulled the gun out of the trunk and drove away, Grosso said.
Police saw Grosso remove the handgun from his trunk and,
concerned for the public’s safety, followed him as he pulled away from the station, Bills said.
Officers saw Grosso stop on Kincaid Street in between East 14th and East 15th avenues and exit his car, Bills said. They began a “high-risk traffic stop,” believing Grosso was armed, Bills said.
Grosso said he pulled over to talk to a parking officer about the ticket and had left his gun on the console of his car. Police drew their guns on Grosso and yelled at him to stop, he said.
Officers quickly arrested Grosso and confiscated his weapon, he said. “I fully understand why they followed me if they saw me arm
myself,” Grosso said. “I have no gripes with police for doing so … But once they found out I had a permit, I was legal in every sense of the manner.”
“There’s absolutely nothing against the law that I did,” Grosso said.
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