A flight from Los Angeles to Seattle was diverted to Portland late Thursday after one of the pilots lost consciousness.

Alaska Airlines said Flight 473's first officer flew the Boeing 737-700 to Portland International Airport after the captain became ill over Oregon.

The plane landed safely at 9:05 p.m. local time (12:05 a.m. ET Friday) and paramedics took the pilot to the hospital, airline spokesman Paul McElroy said.

The Seattle Times reported that a doctor on board was able to tend to the captain at the front of the plane.

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There were 116 passengers and five crew members on the flight, which had been due to arrive in Seattle at 9:30 p.m. local time (12.30 a.m. ET).

The captain has been flying with Alaska Airlines for 28 years, while the first officer has been with the airline 11 years, McElroy said.

NBC station KING5 said it was not known what caused the pilot to pass out.

About 20 passengers were re-accommodated on other flights to Seattle, while the rest took a flight scheduled to land in Seattle at 1:15 a.m. local time Friday (4:15 a.m. ET).

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An Oregon woman was freed after dangling for hours in a narrow space between two buildings, where she had just eight inches of wiggle room in the early-morning cold as rescue teams worked to cut a pathway out for her.

The incident, which occurred at a downtown Portland apartment complex, began at about 3:45 a.m. Wednesday, when the Portland Fire and Rescue Department received a call from a bystander who heard the woman yelling. The screams were coming from a tight space between the apartment building and a cinder block parking garage adjacent to the complex, said Lt. Damon Simmons, spokesman for Portland Fire and Rescue.

"Somehow, she was on top of this 20-foot-high wall and fell down between the walls," he said. "The space that was in between them, at the widest, was probably eight inches and it got narrower from there. She was wedged in. She fell down about 10 or 12 feet."

It wasn't clear why the woman was on top of the wall. Officials did not identify her; NBC affiliate KGW.com reported she was a 30-year-old who did not live in the apartment complex.

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The woman was upright and conscious, but visibly agitated when firefighters arrived, Simmons said. Simply pulling her out wasn't an option because she was so embedded into the tiny space; breaking through the wall was the only solution, he said. Urban search and rescue teams, who normally respond to earthquakes and building collapses, were called in.

"They were going to cut the wall in front of her, and just pull it away from her. [But] that was creating a major dust issue," Simmons said. Instead, they cut out two "windows" in the wall on each side of her -- smaller holes that would give rescue teams some access to her without causing her to have to breathe in as much dust.

The "windows" also enabled paramedics, who had been pumping heat from the top of the wall, to get their radiators closer to her. Meanwhile, the woman's husband had also arrived, and was talking to her to help keep her calm.

"It's 36 degrees, and she's up against these two cold concrete walls. So they're pumping heat into her, and they're talking to her, and paramedics are assessing her. At that point they elongated one of the windows and turned it into a 'door,' and then they were able to use soap and basically grease her up if you, will and slide her out of that doorway," Simmons said.

Once she was freed, the woman -- shivering, but happy -- was taken to the hospital. 

"She seemed really excited, obviously," Simmons said. "She seemed in good spirits. The hope is she'll be able to leave the hospital today."

The entire rescue took more than three hours and the coordination of more than 25 people, Simmons said.

Had the woman been stuck for longer, her situation could have been dire, Simmons said.

"In situations like that, where people are trapped and can't move around a lot, another concern is compartmentation syndrome," he said. "Your body is not able to circulate blood as well as it normally is with you moving around and walking around or lying down. And so you can almost get a blood poisoning: Your blood isn't getting cleaned like it should. And then when you're freed from that position, that blood starts circulating, and all those poisons start circulating. The rescue didn't take that long, so that didn't become an issue."

Updated at 1:30 p.m. ET -- A teenager from Oregon faces a “long road to recovery” after surviving her second brush with death in just the past few months.

Kristina Shevchenko, 15, was rushed to a hospital Tuesday in critical condition after a masked gunman sprayed bullets around a suburban Portland, Ore., mall during the height of holiday shopping season, piercing her chest. After surgery, she was in stable condition, according to a statement from her family.

Her family continued to update supporters on her condition via a Facebook page on Wednesday, with her brother, Yevgeniy, writing early in the morning, "The bullet went through bruising her lung, it missed any vital organs and it missed her ribs. She will need 2 more operations. we appreciate any and all support including your prayers! Thank you."

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In another post, Shevchenko's family revealed something else: Over the summer, Shevchenko had survived another fatal encounter.

"Many of you have noticed the earlier tragedy that happened in our family a couple months ago where 7 of my siblings and 2 friends were involved in a fatal car accident. You could read it online for yourself, but yes it did happen and yes Kristina was in that car accident," the post read, and linked to an article about a Beaverton, Ore., man who was killed after veering into a van driven by a 27-year-old member of the Shevchenko family.

Oregon mall gunman ID'd; motive unclear

The crash happened in Vancouver, Wash., in August, and alcohol was believed to have been a factor, Vancouver police told Columbian.com. Multiple teens and adults were in the van when the driver -- Alberto Perez Garcia, 25 -- veered into it, they said. The driver and at least two other adults had been hospitalized at the time.

In a statement, the family described Shevchenko as a "happy child" who is "active in church," and said "by the mercy of God she is now in stable condition, but has a long road to recovery."

Shevchenko, who had been with a friend when she was shot, regularly walked through the mall around the time of the shooting -- which happened at about 3:20 p.m. on Tuesday -- to get home from school, her family said. 

The motive for the shooting, which sent Christmas shoppers and people waiting in line to see Santa running for cover, wasn't clear.

Several witnesses reported hearing the gunman, identified as Jacob Tyler Roberts, 22, announce, "I am the shooter," before he began firing.

"All of a sudden, I just heard a series of gunshots… boom, boom, boom, boom, boom… whatever the shooter was shooting at, they continued to shoot," shopper Bill Hoff told NBC station KGW.

Macy's employee Mariah Saldana told KGW that she was sitting by the door "watching what was going on, and then some guy just ran by in a white mask and an assault rifle, and then I look out because I hear a few shots and he's … and he’s sitting there and he's pointing the gun at some people."

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PORTLAND, Ore. — Federal investigators on Thursday said the Portland Police Bureau has engaged in a “pattern or practice” of excessive force against suspects who are mentally ill.

Assistant U.S. Attorney General Thomas Perez said the Justice Department and the city reached a preliminary agreement on improvements, such as increased training, expedited investigations and increased community oversight of the reforms.

The agency launched its investigation in June 2011 to examine whether Portland police engaged in excessive force after a series of police shootings, many involving suspects with mental illness, over the previous 18 months.

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Perez said Portland's mayor and police chief cooperated with the investigation.

“While our investigation has revealed that inadequate systems of supervision and oversight and the absence of specialized training have permitted particular use of force violations to persist at the Portland Police Bureau, we are confident that the steps already taken and those contained in our tentative agreement will provide meaningful and sustainable reform.” said Perez in a statement.

Federal officials have conducted similar reviews in other states. Seattle officials recently reached a deal with the Department of Justice, agreeing to court oversight and independent monitoring of the city's police department.

The issue of how police deal with the mentally ill has been a topic for years in Portland.

U.S. Attorney for Oregon Amanda Marshall told The Oregonian the findings of the report were "grave and serious."

“We all agree with the fundamental principle that all citizens, especially our most vulnerable, must be able to trust the police to protect their civil rights,” said Marshall in a statement.

The DOJ announced its Portland investigation in the aftermath of the 2010 death of Aaron Campbell, an unarmed man who was fatally shot by officers who responded to a call that he was threatening suicide.

Another prominent case involved the death James Chasse Jr., a mentally ill man who died after he was chased and tackled by officers after he was said to have urinated in public in 2006.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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CHICAGO -- A U.S. federal judge in Oregon on Monday dismissed a clergy sexual abuse case that was the first to try to hold the Vatican responsible for moving an offending priest into unsuspecting parishes, lawyers in the case said.

U.S. District Court Judge Michael Mosman in Portland, Oregon, ruled the Holy See in Rome could not be shown to be the "employer" of the late Father Andrew Ronan, who abused children in Chicago and later in Portland.

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Church officials in Chicago knew that Ronan, who ultimately left the priesthood and died in 1992, had a history of sexual abuse, but he continued to abuse after he was transferred to Oregon, court documents showed.

Mosman had previously ordered the Vatican to provide all the relevant documents in Ronan's case but he ultimately concluded the Holy See did not belong in the case.

Roman Catholic Church official convicted of endangerment in priest-abuse trial

"There is no fact in the record on which to base an employment relationship," Jeffrey Luna, a lawyer for the Vatican in the United States, said in summarizing the judge's ruling.

The Oregonian newspaper quoted Luna as saying the ruling was "quite significant ... because the Holy See has patiently and cooperatively worked with the American judicial process to arrive at this day."

Vatican accused of negligence
When confronted about the abuse, Ronan admitted it to his superiors at Our Lady of Benburb, Ireland, according to the documents, but was transferred to a Chicago high school anyway. He abused children there, the documents show, then was transferred to St. Albert's Church in Portland.

Vatican issuing guidelines to combat sex abuse

"It's clearly a disappointment, but we're definitely not discouraged," plaintiffs' attorney Jeff Anderson said according to The Oregonian.

Anderson, who has represented scores of victims of clergy abuse, said he would appeal Mosman's dismissal of the case on behalf of the now 60-year-old victim. 

"He is eager to keep this alive, to hold the Vatican accountable for their role in this," Anderson said of the unidentified plaintiff. The Portland diocese and the Servite Order of priests are also defendants in the case.

When it was filed in Portland, the lawsuit was heralded by clergy abuse victims as the first to require the Vatican to produce documents detailing its involvement in an American priest's career path, which Rome did.

Philadelphia priest gets 3-6 years for cover-up in Catholic priest sex-abuse scandal

Numerous other lawsuits alleging clergy abuse have named the Vatican as a defendant, usually accusing the Holy See of negligence in allowing offending clergy to remain in the priesthood.

The clergy abuse crisis exploded in Boston more than a decade ago and spread around the world. The church in the United States has paid out more than $2 billion in settlements to victims.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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If you've had your bike stolen, this story about a Portland, Ore. man confronting an alleged bike thief is for you.

Here’s what happened: On Aug. 3, Jake Gillum, a scruffy, 28-year-old who describes himself as blue collar, according to Digital Trends, found that his 2009 Fuji Team road bike had been stolen.

Gillum scoured Craigslist.org, where he spotted, four days later, his $2,500 bike for sale in Seattle.

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He resolved to get his bike back, but first, he would start growing out his beard to look tougher and older, he told Digital Trends.

He would contact the thief, posing as a prospective buyer. He would use the iPhone Burner app so the alleged thief would think he was calling from Seattle and not Portland, where the bike was stolen.

The two would meet – in Seattle’s upscale University Village mall -- and as Gillum stalled the alleged thief by asking questions, his friends would call the police. He would wear running shoes, thick Carhartt pants and a sweatshirt to look bigger.

The police would arrive, the bad guy would get arrested and Gillum would get his bike back.

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That’s what happened on Saturday, pretty much, plus a very slow bike chase and a surprisingly civil confrontation between thieved and (alleged) thief that could have been inspired by Reno 911!

“I would like you to apologize,” Gillum says in the video.

“For what?” the alleged thief asks.

“For stealing my bicycle.”

The alleged thief, Craig Ackerman, 22, does not apologize. Later he claims he bought the bike from Craigslist, knowing it was stolen.

“It’s not illegal to buy stolen stuff. I looked it up, dude,” Ackerman tells Gillum.

“Well you’re in possession of stolen property and you’re going to jail,” Gillum shoots back.

“You don’t go to jail for that! You got it back, dude.”

“Dude, you go to jail.”

“For what?”

“For stealing my bike.”

“I didn’t steal it!”

“You stole it.”

“I didn’t.”

And so on, until the police arrive, the alleged thief is apprehended and the thank-you credits role.

Postscript, not available in the video: Ackerman was booked Saturday on suspicion of felony trafficking of stolen property and released Monday evening. No charges have been filed -- the case has not yet been referred to the King County Prosecutor's Office, according to spokesman Dan Donohoe.

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The father of a teenager who died after being shot in the head along with her girlfriend in a Texas park called their attacker a “monster” after seeing the most recent sketch of the suspect released over the weekend, local media reported.

Mary Kristene Chapa worked with a forensic artist from the Texas Rangers on Friday to update the drawing of the man who attacked her and Mollie Judith Olgin on June 22 in Portland, Texas. An earlier sketch she made with the artist was released July 4.

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When asked what came to his mind when he saw the sketch, Olgin’s father, Mario, told local NBC News affiliate kristv.com: "I think monster, you know. That guy took my daughter away from us."

The night they were shot, Chapa, 18, and Olgin, 19, had planned to spend some time in the park before seeing a movie, Olgin’s father, Mario, previously told local television station kiiitv.com.

They were found by a couple the next day in a grassy area of the park with gunshot wounds to the head. Olgin, a first-year university student living in Corpus Christi, died; Chapa, of Sinton, was alive and rushed to an area hospital.

NBC Latino reported Monday that Chapa had left the hospital and entered neurological rehabilitation as well as physical and mental therapy.

Her brother, Hilario Chapa, said they have now informed her of Olgin’s death.

“She didn’t know about Mollie for the longest time, but we finally decided to tell her,” he told NBC Latino, noting that the Olgin family and authorities were present to help break the news. “With that support group we passed the info to my little sister. She was brokenhearted, very upset.”

Police recovered a bullet casing from a large-caliber gun at the scene, leading investigators to believe the shootings occurred where the pair was found. Two witnesses said they heard what could have been gunshots or firecrackers just before midnight on June 22 but did not report it at the time.

Wright has previously said that there was no evidence to indicate the attacks were motivated by the couple’s relationship. On Monday, he said no motive had yet been established.

"The new sketch has generated new calls from around the country. We are continuing to interview potential witnesses and processing evidence for forensic examination," he told msnbc.com in an email, adding that he had no new developments to report.

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Friends reel from shooting of teen lesbian couple in Texas
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The FBI was also helping to investigate, and Chapa was working with authorities to reconstruct the crime scene, Wright said.

The suspect is described as a thin white man with a scruffy beard, in his 20s, weighing 140 pounds and standing 5-feet-8-inches tall.

"When I think about her last 15, 20, 30 minutes on Earth," Olgin told kristv.com, "how scared both girls had to be whenever they were approached by this monster."

He urged anyone with information to come forward.

"It's been over three weeks now and the longer it carries on, the harder it's gonna be," he said.

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Updated at 11:00 p.m ET: When Hilario Chapa went to a hospital to identify his sister, who was found shot in the head along with her girlfriend in a South Texas park, her face was unrecognizable. He and another sibling had to check her hands and feet and the rest of her body instead, in order to determine this was Mary Kristene Chapa, their sister.

But days after the brutal attack that left Kristene’s girlfriend, Mollie Olgin, dead, the 18-year-old has opened her eyes and is making inquiries about her recovery, though she has to write on a clipboard and use sign language to communicate, and she has little sensation on the left side of her body, her brother said.

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“I do believe she knows what’s happened, but she hasn’t chosen to talk (about) it on her own,” he said. “I’m under the impression that she doesn’t know” who did it.

“I think she’s pissed about what happened to her and I think she’s ready to get up and take off walking if she could,” he added.

The swelling from the gunshot has gone down, but it's unclear when she'll be able to leave the intensive care unit, said Chapa, 32, who also spoke to NBC Latino.

“All that we’ve gotten from the doctors is that she is making very … impressive progress,” he told msnbc.com, saying it had been "rough." "I can’t even imagine how the other family feels about this situation. ... It’s very tragic.”

Olgin, 19, and Chapa were found in a grassy area of the park by a couple Saturday morning with gunshot wounds to the head in Portland, Texas, Police Chief Randy Wright said. Olgin, a first-year university student living in Corpus Christi, died; Chapa, of Sinton, was alive and rushed to an area hospital.

Police have recovered a bullet casing from a large-caliber gun at the scene, leading investigators to believe the shootings occurred where the pair was found, but they haven’t found the weapon. Two witnesses said they heard what could have been gunshots or firecrackers just before midnight last Friday but did not report it at the time, he said.

Late Thursday, police said an eyewitness to the attack described the suspect as a white man with dark hair in his 20s, weighing 140 pounds and standing 5 foot 8 inches tall.

In the community of Portland, the crime rate is low, with the last homicide occurring in 2010, Wright said. The police haven’t established a motive for the attack on the girls, who were planning to spend some time in the park that fateful Friday night before seeing a movie, Olgin’s father, Mario, told local television station kiiitv.com.

"Information from family and friends indicates that Mollie and Mary were engaged in a same-sex relationship. However, there is no current evidence to indicate the attacks were motivated by that relationship," the police chief said.

Wright told msnbc.com on Monday that: “It appears as if … this was not just a random attack, but that’s something that we really have to develop over time.”

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Friends reel from shooting of teen lesbian couple in Texas
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The thought of an attack on his sister because she is gay is incomprehensible to Chapa. She is an “all-American kid,” who excels at her studies as well as at softball (she is a pitcher), and is well liked, he said.

“A lot of people want to speculate it was a hate crime. I just can’t comprehend why somebody would shoot two … 18 or 19 year old girl(s) over a hate crime,” he said. “The brutality of it, you know, it’s just unimaginable.”

“I know that Texas has a lot of stereotypes … but South Texas really is a good place,” he added. “You don’t see a lot of hate crimes going on down here. You don’t hear about gay bashing or anything like that.”

Chapa didn’t know his sister was gay before the shootings, though he had thought she might be. He said his mother and other sister already knew. Friends say the pair had been going out since mid-February.

“Our family is very supportive,” he said. “We will take Kristina … for who she is and what she wanted to be, and we will support her in that.”

Chapa said his sister has maintained a stoic face: "You just see her fighting," he said, noting she was eagerly asking questions about her condition.

“She’s moving her right side very strongly,” he said. “But her left side, they haven’t used that word (paralysis), it’s too early to tell. ... She just hasn’t moved it.

"No one is saying she’s paralyzed," he added, noting that he believed his parents had said she experienced some feeling on her left side.

Kristene has written Mollie’s name down a few times, but Chapa said he worried about telling her she was killed, fearing it could cause a medical setback.

“I'm kind of afraid," he said. "She is in such a fragile state right now.”

 The shooting has taken its toll on the family. The parents are maintaining a 24-hour vigil at the hospital and Chapa said he was initially a wreck.

Doctors have told them almost no one survives this kind of shooting, especially given the long period of time between being shot and found. It was an "amazing thing,” he said.

The shooting has also hit the family hard financially. Chapa’s father had just started a new job in West Texas and had not yet enrolled for health insurance, so Kristene is without coverage. They are seeking donations to help them pay for the medical care, which doesn’t yet have an end in sight. (Donations can be made here)

The family has yet to meet with Olgin’s family, though they hope to soon and to provide them support as well, said Chapa, who had never met Mollie.

Chapa has taken time off work from his job as an equipment cleaner at the Corpus Christi Army Depot to focus on his sister’s recovery. During these tough days, he said it is Kristene who gives him encouragement.

"I can honestly say that just watching my sister progress, watching her come back to us, and … seeing her strength, it gives me strength,” he said. “There’s nothing that anybody can tell you … all you can really do is just hang onto hope and just watching her gives me hope.”

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Updated at 6:45 p.m. ET: The father of a young woman who was shot along with her girlfriend last week in a South Texas park is mourning the loss of his “guardian angel,” telling a local television station that “justice will be served” in the case.

Mario Olgin’s daughter, Mollie, 19, and her girlfriend, Mary Kristene Chapa, were found in a grassy area of the park by a couple Saturday morning with gunshot wounds to the head, Portland, Texas, Police Chief Randy Wright has said. Olgin, originally from nearby Ingleside but recently living in Corpus Christi, died; Chapa, of Sinton, was rushed to an area hospital where she is making an “amazing” recovery in the intensive care unit, her brother told NBC Latino.

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The couple had planned to spend some time in the park before going to see a movie, Olgin told kiiitv.com on Tuesday. When his daughter, a first-year college student who wanted to become a psychologist, didn’t show up for work on Saturday, Olgin said he knew something was wrong.

“It was not like Mollie. … If she had some place to be she was going to be there,” he said. “I immediately had bad feelings (about) it.”

Wright said police had recovered a bullet casing from a large-caliber gun at the scene, leading investigators to believe the shootings occurred where the pair was found, but they haven’t found the weapon. Two witnesses said they heard what could have been gunshots or firecrackers just before midnight last Friday but did not report it at the time, he said.

A motive had not been established, he said in the statement.

"Information from family and friends indicates that Mollie and Mary were engaged in a same-sex relationship. However, there is no current evidence to indicate the attacks were motivated by that relationship," he said.

Wright told msnbc.com on Monday that: “It appears as if … this was not just a random attack but that’s something that we really have to develop over time.”

Because of her medical condition, Chapa has not been formally interviewed about what happened, he said.

Chapa’s brother, Hilario, said that his sister was making physical progress on the right side of her body but doctors were awaiting a response from the left. She was able to communicate via sign language.

“The doctors say it’s too early, no one is using the word ‘paralyzed,’” he told NBC Latino. “They say we should be so happy with her progress after three or four days. She’s very strong. She survived a very tough ordeal but her recovery is coming in strides and  impressing everybody.”

He was hesitant to share many details about the search for a suspect.

“We don’t know who did this to her, she hasn’t given us a name,” he said. “We’re under the impression she doesn’t know who did it. We don’t know if it’s a hate crime.”

Teen lesbian couple found shot in Texas park
Friends reel from shooting of teen lesbian couple in Texas

The Texas Rangers have joined the investigation, which is being led by the Portland Police.

“We offered our assistance and they accepted and we have been actively involved in the investigation since Sunday," Tom Vinger, spokesman for Texas Department of Public Safety, wrote to msnbc.com in an email.

The park, a nature area with some parts overgrown and no lights, was often frequented by visitors during the day, but not at night. It is located along a bluff overlooking a bay, Wright said, with some homes situated nearby.

“We’re not really sure how they got to the point that they were found,” he said. “It is a scenic overlook with a wooden deck and there is a place at the edge of the deck where you can actually go down a very steep incline into a grassy area that leads down to the shoreline, and that’s where they were found.”

The crime rate is low in Portland, north of Corpus Christi on the Gulf of Mexico, Wright said. The last homicide occurred two years ago.

The couple’s friends and well-wishers placed rainbow ribbons, goodbye messages, flowers and cut-out hearts on Sunday around the site where Olgin and Chapa were found. On Friday, a candlelight vigil and walk will be held for them.

Frank Reyna, a 19-year-old university student, said he grew up with Chapa and met Olgin his sophomore year of high school. He described Chapa as an athlete who played softball, and said Olgin, a student at a nearby university, was focused on academics but also was a big joker. He last saw them together at a local coffee shop in May, which was the first time he saw them out as a couple.

“It’s something that I think all of us are going to carry with us for a while,” Reyna told msnbc.com. “It’s going to take a while to get past this, the idea that there is somebody still out there that did this to these two amazing, beautiful people, and that they’re walking free right now.”

Friends said the pair had been together since mid-February.

The couple’s relationship “was a readily accepted thing,” Reyna added, and was not what their friends focused on.

“We focused on their personalities and how they got along with everybody else … their kindheartedness and their ability to just make other people smile and make each other smile,” he said. “We didn’t care … what they were, it’s who they were.”

Jillian Manuel, 20, who used to work with Olgin, said it was hard to return to the park on the weekend knowing what had happened there. She went to help create the makeshift memorial, where friends shared stories and tears, and to check the scene, where she recalled the difficulty of watching Olgin’s car get towed.

“We’re … hoping to kind of just remember Molly, remember her and just share our memories,” Manuel said of their planned vigil. “And then … send off prayers for Christine and just celebrate them.”

The family will hold a memorial on Friday before the candlelight vigil and walk. Olgin welcomed the outpouring of support in the wake of his daughter’s death.

“She was happy,” he told kiiitv.com. “She didn’t need for her life to end the way it did. Justice will be served.”

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