The man shot to death late Saturday along Portland’s Northeast 82nd Avenue was the sixth person to die in the vicinity of the Madison Suites motel since August 2021.

The Oregonian/OregonLive chronicled the violence surrounding Madison Suites in July 2022 after four nearby homicides, dubbing the 8200 block of Northeast Milton just south of the motel Portland’s “deadliest.”

In the months that followed publication, city and neighborhood leaders, including Mayor Ted Wheeler, focused their attention on the block and the motel, substantially transforming it.

“Drug dealers and prostitutes are no longer easy to spot,” the news organization wrote in January 2023. “The camp of tents outside the First Orthodox Presbyterian Church is gone. The flock of broken-down cars and RVs have been towed away.”

For months, no homicides were reported around Madison Suites.

But Saturday’s killing was the second in the area in the past 14 months. On Monday, city leaders said no one was available to speak to the weekend shooting and whether it represented any sort of backsliding.

On May 19, 2023, a 19-year-old man died in a shooting a block south of the motel.

This weekend’s suspected homicide appears to have taken place behind Madison Suites, although police said it took place in the motel parking lot.

Mike Patel, the motel’s owners, said Sunday he found multiple types of bullets in the alleyway between Madison Suites and the next-door business, Integrated Health Clinics, after police left. To Patel, that suggested a back-and-forth shooting.

Hours after the shooting, a faded crimson pool of blood stained the clinic’s asphalt parking lot.

Bullet holes pierced a nearby shed, outdoor washing machine and metal trash bin.

The motel’s main parking has about five security cameras, but Patel said they no longer work because people frequently cut their wires.

A neighborhood meeting with the city is scheduled for Thursday. It had been planned since May but will now be an opportunity to discuss the latest shooting, said Allen Luebke, a nearby resident who lives on Milton Street.

— David Nuñez covers breaking news and public safety for The Oregonian/OregonLive. Reach him at 503-294-7607 or dnunez@oregonian.com.

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