Two Baker City Police officers shot a Boise man who brandished a gun at them during a traffic stop early Tuesday, Jan. 2.

Neither officer was hurt, Baker County District Attorney Greg Baxter said.

The officers shot Justin Douglass Burkeen, 30, around 2 a.m. at Church and Clark streets.

Burkeen is being treated at a Boise hospital. His condition wasn’t available as of Friday morning, Jan. 5.

Both police officers are on paid leave during the investigation, per police department protocol.

Baxter declined to name the two officers as of Friday morning, Jan. 5, but he said he would release the names at some point.

Burkeen was in the front passenger seat of a car driven by a woman whose name has not been released. The woman has not been charged with any crime, Baxter said.

He declined to give any details about the incident, including the type of gun Burkeen had, how many shots the officers fired and how many hit Burkeen. Baxter said he has reviewed video from the officers’ body cameras that show the episode. He said he will release more details about the incident as the investigation continues.

Baxter said he will convene a grand jury to review charges against Burkeen.

The Baker County Major Crimes Team, consisting of Oregon State Police, Baker County Sheriff’s Office, Baker City Police Department and the Baker County District Attorney, is investigating the incident.

If you have any information about this incident, please contact Oregon State Police Sgt. Sean Belding at 541-664-4600.

Sgt. Wayne Chastain of the Baker City Police, who is the local area lodge president for the Fraternal Order of Police, the largest professional police organization in the U.S., said the group is “dedicated to supporting our officers and their families as they navigate this tragic event. We pray for the families of all involved.”

The local lodge includes Baker, Malheur, Union, Wallowa, Umatilla, Morrow and Harney counties.

Baxter said Baker City Police also had an “interaction” with Burkeen on Nov. 25. He was not arrested.

Baxter said Burkeen has arrest warrants from Idaho. Baxter said the investigation includes both the Nov. 25 and Jan. 2 incidents.

According to Idaho court records, Burkeen pleaded guilty to possession of a controlled substance on Feb. 28, 2020, in Ada County. He was charged with probation violation in February 2021 and sentenced to 60 days in jail. He was also sentenced to probation through March 25, 2026.

An arrest warrant for probation violation was issued on Aug. 17, 2023, and Burkeen failed to attend a probation review hearing on Nov. 7, 2023, according to court records.

Burkeen pleaded guilty to theft and failure to appear in Elmore County, Idaho, on April 30, 2020. He was sentenced to 197 days in the Elmore County Jail.

Burkeen pleaded guilty on Jan. 21, 2020, in Ada County to disorderly conduct/loitering on private property without lawful business.

He was sentenced to 10 days in county jail on that charge.

He pleaded guilty to theft and failure to appear in Ada County on Dec. 24, 2019, and was sentenced to 51 days in county jail.

On April 22, 2016, Burkeen pleaded guilty to disturbing the peace in Ada County. He was sentenced to 50 days in the county jail.

On April 20, 2016, Burkeen pleaded guilty to battery, a charge stemming from an incident on Dec. 14, 2014. He was sentenced to 42 days in the county jail.

Effect on police patrols

With two officers on leave during the shooting investigation, Police Chief Ty Duby said Oregon State Police will have troopers cover some 10-hour shifts temporarily.

He hopes the two officers will return to work within about three weeks.

But their return won’t end the department’s staffing challenges, Duby said.

Two other officers are slated to leave the department for other police jobs later this month, he said. The department also has one patrol officer position that’s been vacant for a few months, meaning the agency will have three openings even when the two officers on leave return.

The department is budgeted for 15 sworn officers — eight patrol officers, two patrol sergeants and one criminal sergeant, two detectives, the school resource officer and the chief.

(The code enforcement officer is not a certified police officer.)

Duby said the city is doing background checks on three applicants for those jobs. However, none of the three is a certified police officer, so all three, if hired, will need to take the 16-week training course through the Oregon Department of Public Safety Standards and Training.

Duby said he doesn’t think any of the three would be ready to start patroling until late summer 2024 at the soonest.

In the meantime, Duby said the department’s narcotics detective, Jared Wood, has been working patrol shifts, as has Sgt. Wayne Chastain, who oversees the department’s two detectives, school resource officer and code enforcement officer. Duby said he wants to avoid assigning the major crimes detective, Josh Chandler, to patrol duty because he wants Chandler to focus on investigations, including sex abuse cases. Duby said Chandler and Wood often work together on investigations.

The situation is far from ideal, Duby said. With Wood working patrol, he likely won’t be able to investigate drug cases as thoroughly. Patrol officers will try to work those cases as their calls allow, Duby said.

The pending departure of the two officers this month prompted Duby to switch from 12-hour patrol shifts, which made for 24-hour patrols, to 10-hour shifts starting Dec. 1.

The day shift is from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., and the night shift runs from 4 p.m. to 2 a.m. Although Duby said he could have made the night shift 5 p.m. to 3 a.m., which would mean there were no patrols for four hours (3 a.m. to 7 a.m.) instead of the current five hours ( 2 a.m. to 7 a.m.), he decided to have the shifts overlap by one hour — 4 p.m. to 5 p.m.

That gives officers from each shift a chance to meet before the night shift starts, so the day shift officers can let the night shift know if there are any ongoing issues that need to be addressed, Duby said.

He said he believes that benefit offsets the additional hour without patrols.

During the 2 a.m. to 7 a.m. period, dispatchers at the sheriff’s office will call the police department’s on-call supervisor if there is a call that the dispatcher believes might need an immediate police response.

Duby said there were eight such calls during December. He said the on-call supervisor dispatched officers to three of those eight incidents.

One, which happened around 5 a.m., resulted in a person being arrested for driving under the influence of intoxicants while driving an ATV in town. Duby, who was the on-call supervisor at the time, said he also responded.

In another case, an unattended death was reported about 5:40 a.m. Although the death was from natural causes, Duby said police always respond to unattended deaths. He said those are relatively common given the high proportion of elderly residents.

The third case to which officers responded was a domestic disturbance around 3:15 a.m. in which one person was arrested.

As for the five other calls from dispatch to the on-call police officer, Duby said there was a request for traffic control during a structure fire that ultimately wasn’t needed, a report of someone at a business asking about buying marijuana, a person who had been trespassed from a property but had left after dispatch called, a possible domestic disturbance, and a call from a woman around 4 a.m. who heard a thump outside her home.

In the latter two cases, Duby said he was the on-call supervisor and he was able to talk by phone to people in both the domestic disturbance and the woman worried about a possible burglar.

In both cases, he said he determined that there was no threat and that police didn’t need to respond.

In addition to the eight calls that dispatchers made to a police supervisor, dispatchers “held” 10 other calls that they concluded didn’t require immediate response. Those included dogs at large calls, Duby said.