Portland woman’s SE home broken into 3 times since last year, she says

PORTLAND Ore. (KPTV) - Nancy Utterson has lived on the same southeast Portland street for more than 20 years, but since the end of 2022, her home has been broken into three times.

She says she’s changed the locks on her Southeast Cora Street home four times after coming home to damaged garage doors and her front door left wide open.

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“This last time when I went in my house, they’ve been in there they’ve been staying in there and everything has been unpacked,” says Utterson.

Utterson says there’s been a major camping problem on her street and believes that may be part of the problem. She says it’s gotten so bad that she hasn’t slept in her home since September. She says a trailer was parked just a few feet away for two and a half years. And after many, many phone calls, the trailer was finally towed.

“You couldn’t see from right at that tree all the way down to the road and all the way back on the side,” says Utterson. “They had their canopies open it was crazy - you couldn’t walk on the sidewalk.”

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She’s made the decision to move and just wants her family to feel safe.

“You want to feel proud of where you live and you want to feel comfortable in your own home,” says Utterson. “If we got my grandson, we would go stay at a hotel somewhere, that’s how bad. He’s 6.”

Utterson says she plans on getting the home cleaned, fixed up and put on the market before it happens again.

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