Stefan Strek shares his story about our local police

Presenter Bodycam video of former Eugene Police Officer Martin Siller denigrating local residents drew many public comments May 11. One comment described a midnight raid by EPD to seize his cat. Stefan Strek:

Stefan Strek Now, so far as police brutality, I am not unfamiliar with the lack of responsibility and accountability that’s being proposed and acted upon in Eugene.

Now everyone knows about Little Flubbers, who I adopted, but he had a brother and his name was Caesar. And I loved this cat. Back in 2022, he’d been waiting outside my house for four years while he was neglected. And neglect is abuse. This was an abused animal.

Now, during the wildfires, there was so much smoke in this valley, in this city, that this poor little cat was developing asthma because he was living outside my house 24 hours a day, huddling in the bushes, coughing. 

So after four years of waiting, I finally let him inside. And this cat followed me everywhere. Every morning we’d go on a walk around the neighborhood. We’d go just to the cemetery. I got great pictures of this little guy. 

And then after six years of taking care of this cat, my neighbors who abandoned them were moving and decided they wanted one back and not the other. They wanted to separate two 18-year-old cats who they’d neglected and abandoned for six years. This was my family. I cared about these animals.

And so the cops, Eugene Police came banging on my door at midnight the same night that Donald Trump was being raided by the FBI to take my cat at gunpoint. I am disgusted by how this has happened. Eugene deserves better. Now rest in peace, little Caesar, and rest in peace, Little Flubbers. They are together again. Those cats deserve better. And so do the people of Eugene. Thank you.

Presenter Speaking earlier this year during his candidate interview, Stefan Strek:

Stefan Strek When I first moved into this house, like ten years ago, there were two cats on the front porch. And like, I told my roommate—she was super excited, she’s like, ‘Oh, hey, I found these two super nice cats on the front porch’—and I was like, ‘Don’t pet them.’ You know, just like ‘It’s a trap.’ You know, I’ve already got a cat. 

But I spent, like, years just trying to resist acknowledging that these were my cats, you know. There’s a lot of people, they’ve got like a cat that lives in their backyard or something that they feed and they’re like, ‘Yeah, I feed that cat, but it’s not really mine.’

I was at that stage of denial, you know. These cats literally, I just started feeding them because they wouldn’t go away. It wasn’t obvious that they had another home to live at. Like literally, they were on my porch looking around. 

They’d go across the street to the intersection and just look around like the intro to a Disney movie where they’re starting an adventure. You know, you could tell they were like they’d gone through something, you know? 

So my logic, what I presumed is that the college kids just moved out and just left the cats behind because that just happens. It’s a common issue. So over time, the cats slowly crept their way inside the house. I was feeding them on the porch, and then all of a sudden I was feeding them in the living room. And, you know, that was the limit. 

I tried to—I was like, you know, the cats, those other cats are not allowed in my room. That’s my cat’s room. They all eventually started getting along. And, you know, the cats lived here like 24/7/365 for years. They were here for Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving, New Year’s, all that.

And then literally like two and a half years into living here, this woman walks by and she’s got her like two little kids with her. She lives across the street and she just points at the cats on the porch. And she’s like, ‘Oh, those are our cats. We were wondering where they were going.’

And I look at this woman and I look at the cats and the cats look at me and look back at her. And then she just literally, she doesn’t say anything else. She just walks off.

Like, a normal person whose cat was missing for a couple years would be like, you know, you’d pick them up, you’d say, ‘Oh, thank you for watching them,’ yada, yada. It’s not like, you know, it’s not like a freaking missing sock. These are living creatures, you know. It’s like—so anyways, it wasn’t an issue.

Literally, they stopped by one other time, like a year later and they’re like, ‘Oh, are they bothering you? Because, you know, just if the cats are bothering you, we can take them and lock them in the basement of our house.’

I had tried returning the cats to them, like after this woman originally was like, ‘Those are our cats,’ I was like, ‘Okay, well, I’m not being scammed by these little four-legged furry rascals anymore on the free food,’ because like, you know, this is when I was still working for U of O. I was working minimum wage, I wasn’t even breaking even because I was having to take out loans, you know, but for me, it was worth it because the cats were awesome. 

But anyways, I had tried walking across the street holding the cats because they just wouldn’t go home. I didn’t know at the time that they’d been kicked outside permanently. For me, I would never have guessed in 1,000 years that someone could believe they own such nice cats and not, like, bring them inside. 

These were very, very housebroken kitties. They were very, very posh; chill, like super chill. So I walked them over at least a dozen times, each cat.  I carried them over to these people’s front door, put the cat down, knocked on the door, like, dozens of times. 

They never once answered the door, like, just completely negligent or just avoidant, you know, who knows? What I found out later is they’d kicked the cats outside permanently because they’d had them locked in the basement. So the cats peed on some camping gear because they were sick. One of them had like a UTI infection and like a really bad flea allergy. 

So the first couple months in, originally we thought that this one cat was like a girl cat because he was like eating a lot of food and gaining weight really fast, you know? So I took him into the vet, got the UTI treated, got the fleas taken care of, some medication for that. And the vet’s like, ‘Yeah, this cat’s not going to have kittens because she’s a he.’ And I was like, oh, that’s, 

So, you know, it gets on to be 2022. You know, these cats have been here for like six years. And this woman comes up to me when I’m out with my girlfriend in the driveway. And she’s like, ‘Oh, we bought a new house. So we’re moving. And you’re keeping that one cat, right? But we want the other one back.’

Yeah. Literally like after six years. And these were brothers. These cats (I learned at that time) were like 18 years old. So they saw no issue with separating these cats after like basically abandoning them for six years and then just wanting to rip them apart, you know, like it was some kind of decoration to take up to their new spot and put out there. 

I pretty much just thought that they’d not be serious about it because, you know, literally just our conversation now is significantly more than I ever spoke with these people, living across the street from them for like six years. Like, there was zero conversation about like, ‘Hey, like the cat’s been at your house just too often.’ And these people did nothing to care for these cats, like straight up. 

So anyways, all of a sudden, all of a sudden, just literally like it becomes a huge issue that they need the cat back. And they put up flyers on every block for like a 20-block-square radius, literally every single telephone pole on every intersection.

And mind you, they were only looking for one cat out of the two. They did not mention the other cat, ever. Like they didn’t want him back, literally, because he was like a very needy cat. He’d always wake me up early in the morning, meowing for breakfast. So I’d, like, toss a pillow in his direction because he’d meow really hard really early in the morning. And like, so he knew to expect the pillow. So what he did was he’d chill standing on the other side of the doorway and he’d claw the siding of the door panel, basically, and that clawing would wake me up, you know.

But anyways, I get this text message after letting the cat out from the yard to chill for the day. And these people were gone at this point. I figured that would be the end of it. And I get this text message, ‘Hey, we found the cat. One of the neighbors said they saw him and they grabbed him and brought him back and our housesitters have him.’ 

So I went over there and I was just very matter of fact. I told these people, like, ’Hey, I don’t know what’s up with these people that are like telling you to do this, but that’s my cat. I’ve taken care of this cat for six years.’ Like, ‘Give him back to me,’ basically. 

And this cat would follow me on walks around the neighborhood in a way that is very rare. You’ll see cats like this on TikTok and stuff that like, chill, in a car ride, like, literally, this cat walked off-leash with me for like multiple hour-long walks through the neighborhood in the evenings, nighttime. We’d just go off and just like, he was just along for the ride. It was super cool. 

I’ve got so many pictures of this cat in the Masonic Cemetery next to all the monuments and stuff. I got like pictures of him just chilling right next to the obelisks and stuff, looking very Egyptian and like, you know, tuned in. 

So anyways, this lady, she opens the door and tries to tell me that the cat’s downstairs. She’s like, ‘Oh, he’s hiding.’  And he was like right there. So the cat literally just runs out when she opens the door and follows me home. So I figured that was going to be the end of it. 

All of a sudden, my phone starts getting blown up and they made up a completely false, you know, just completely bogus story. They tried to claim that, they accused me of breaking into the house and stealing the cat. 

I didn’t even raise my voice. I was just like, this is factually speaking, my cat. This is, you know, this is not acceptable. I just, I just need him back. Like, this ruse has gone on for long enough, basically. I just chose to ignore these people because I figured, you know, what are they going to do? Possession is nine-tenths of the law. This is Eugene. The police have better things to deal with, you know, like, really? 

And it turns out I was wrong, dude. 

Like literally midnight of that day, I start getting my door— the cops showed up and they started like beating on the door, like they were trying to break it down. Can you believe that? They were after the cat. Yeah. Pound on my door like lunatics yelling, ‘Eugene Police, Stefan Strek, Open up! Da da da, we’re here.’ 

And I was like, this is absolutely wild, because this was on Aug. 8. Coincidentally, this is the exact same night that the FBI was at Donald Trump’s place in Mar-a-Lago. So like just a weird cosmic coincidence there. 

I didn’t have much of an option because when the cops show up to your house and they’re banging on the door and demanding stuff, they’ve already made a decision. Like, you know, that’s basically what they told me is, ‘We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way.’

And the hard way basically involves calling for backup, and, another like , high tension situation where they’re like, you know, ‘We’ve got a suspect who’s barricaded in their home.’ But my options were either comply or become that person. 

When you’re outnumbered by people who have guns in your front yard, you don’t really have much of an option. I mean, you can fight, but it very rarely goes— You know, if you try and just assert your rights, I mean, the police just do what they want and then you get to sort it out in court later. 

The police state doesn’t have a dedicated political ideology. It’s just, you know, a might makes right situation. 

The tabby, he was so chill. He went to the front door like a dog that was ready to fight off intruders. It was so cool, man. He showed no fear. Like this cat was like, ‘Hey, I got your back,’ you know, ‘If we’ve got an issue, we’ll settle it on the front lawn.’

I was like, this cat is so cool, and I just opened the door and, you know, he went outside just to do his cat business, like he would. And my other cat, Mr. Fluffykins, he ran out too, just to like, you know. I let my cats outside when they want to chill. It’s whatever. 

So then I get a call from the cops and they’re saying, ‘Hey, you know, thanks for letting the cat out, but we can’t catch him.’ And this lady was out there too, saying it’s her cat, but not able to get him to come to her.

So we’re going from a stupid situation to a stupider situation. And still they’re just like, ‘We need your help to get the cat,’ basically, you know.

I got a copy of the police report later. So I’ve got that to at least like, you know, just substantiate the documentation. Like, this happened, you know, this happened. It sucked. You know, it was a very real situation. And, you know, just if I can, you know, work to put some better legislation in place that prevents government overreach, you know, that’s also an agenda down the road too. 

But like, man, that broke my heart just losing that cat and just, you know, this woman who just had to be like, ‘Give him to me.’ You know, that was brutal. Like, that was super brutal. 

And,you know, watching them carry that cat away at like one o’clock in the morning, you know, it wasn’t just hard on me. It was hard for the brother cats that they left behind. I mean, being separated at 18 years old for cats, that’s like separating a couple of like, that’s like separating two family members that are in their 90s. 

It’s like, you know, why would you do that? Just like, basically it’s so it’s inhumane on so many levels. I don’t think this would have passed the sniff test for like the vast majority of police officers, you know, because you’ve got to tell them what happened, they’ve got to write it down and they use a certain level of discretion to be like, ‘Really? Is that really what happened?’ 

You know, this is a broken system that is kind of designed in a way for it to be, you know, maliciously abused by people who are trying to just treat the police like some sort of personal service. It was my word as a single guy in his early 30s, living alone in a house that’s a bit behind on maintenance versus like what looks like a stereotypical very red, white and blue all-American family. 

Like, mom, dad both making six-figure incomes and, you know, a couple young children that they have in this nice freshly painted house with, you know, pretty fence and stuff. Like, who are the police going to choose to prioritize? 

It’s just an example of how the classism impacts the legal system and just how people get, you know, real service from the government and law enforcement that way. They’re just the concept of treating the police as if it’s like DoorDash or something, like, ‘Hey, just go, go talk to my neighbor and grab something for me.’ It shouldn’t be the way that things work in America.

Presenter That is Stefan Strek sharing his story about the time EPD officers banged on his door at midnight. 

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