# Jury awards $0 to homeless burglar after owner throws cup of urine at his face, shoots him 3 times

**By:** agreen  
**Published:** 2026-08-19T15:31:31.863Z  
**Source:** [oregonlive, Advance Local](https://www.oregonlive.com/crime/2026/08/jury-awards-0-to-homeless-burglar-after-owner-throws-cup-of-urine-at-his-face-shoots-him-3-times.html)

---

During testimony on Wednesday, Aug. 12, 2026, Kenneth Voyles reenacted the positioning of his body when he was shot by business owner James Grant. (Photo by Aimee Green, The Oregonian/OregonLive)

A Portland jury took only a few hours Tuesday to reject a man’s $10 million ask after he burglarized a stone countertop business while homeless and nearly lost his life when the owner shot him three times.
The jury sided 10-2 with business owner James Grant, refusing to rule that Grant opening fire on burglar Kenneth Voyles was unjustified. The jury also found that Voyles’ decision to pry a board off the building, cut metal bars and wiggle through an old doggie door to get inside was a “substantial factor” that contributed to his wounds.
Walking out of the Multnomah County Courthouse Tuesday evening, Grant said he was relieved that his legal ordeal was over.
“Everybody I know, and I’m not just talking about 10 or 20 people, nobody could believe we even got this far. The laws are bad,” Grant said. “It’s just not fair.”
During the seven-day trial, Voyles testified he was in search of food and warmth as temperatures dipped into the 30s overnight on March 6, 2023, when he broke into Touchstone Granite & Marble on Northeast Columbia Boulevard. It was about 5:30 a.m., Voyles said, when he picked up a Dewalt bag with a drill inside with the intention of taking it with him and then encountered Grant walking naked through the closed showroom floor. 
James Grant, owner of Touchstone Granite & Marble, said he shot an intruder in self-defense.(Photo by Aimee Green, The Oregonian/OregonLive)

A shocking encounter
Grant — who’d just woken up from a backroom, where he’d been living to save money — had a towel strapped over his shoulder as well as a cup of urine in one hand. In a confrontation caught on surveillance video, Grant immediately threw the urine, splashing Voyles in the face. He then threw heavy tiles at Voyles, who ran toward the doggie door and shouted, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”
Voyles said he selected Touchstone Granite & Marble to break into because he thought it was unoccupied. He said it was a shock to find someone inside so early in the morning. Grant, the business’ owner, testified he had homes in Nevada and overseas but that he lived at the countertop business while in Portland, even though the city had previously found him in violation of the industrial district’s zoning rules and told him not to reside there.
Voyles’ attorney, David Wallace, told jurors in closing arguments Tuesday that his client meant no harm and was only trying to meet his basic needs while homeless.
“We won’t deny that Mr. Voyles did something wrong that night,” Wallace said. “But that choice did not make his life worthless and it certainly did not make those three bullets necessary.”
After initially chasing Voyles with the tiles, Grant retreated to the backroom to get his gun. Voyles, meanwhile, tried to use a large pair of bolt cutters to cut a lock on a door and get out, Voyles testified. Voyles said he didn’t initially try to leave through the old doggie door because he was worried that Grant would grab hold of his legs as he was trying to wiggle through. 
Pictured here is the old doggie door that Kenneth Voyles broke through by prying off a board and cutting through metal bars.(Photo of court exhibit)

Grant then returned and shot Voyles twice in the arm and once in the torso because, he said, Voyles raised the bolt cutters over his head and started to move toward him.
James Grant reenacted how he said Kenneth Voyles held up a pair of bolt cutters over Voyles' head, in a threatening manner.(Photo by Aimee Green, The Oregonian/OregonLive)

Grant said he never heard Voyles’ apologies for breaking into the business because Grant wasn’t wearing his hearing aids.
Voyles, however, contended that Grant was on a mission to kill him, that he wasn’t threatening Grant with the bolt cutters and that Grant shot him as he was down near the ground. Voyles said Grant then informed him, “You’re going to die.”
Grant insisted he said no such thing, though he did fear for his life, noting that he was 70 at the time and Voyles a much-younger 43.
Defense picks apart plaintiff’s case
The Multnomah County District Attorney’s Office didn’t charge Grant with any wrongdoing. Oregon’s so-called “castle doctrine” allows people to defend their homes — but not their businesses — with lethal force from intruders. It appears prosecutors, in making their decision not to pursue charges against Grant, believed at the time that the business met the legal definition of a home.
The shooting was not recorded on video or was lost somehow as Portland police tried to retrieve it, said attorney Stephanie Schilling. Schilling was hired by Grant’s insurance company, Liberty Mutual, to defend him.
Schilling called upon an expert who said Voyles had methamphetamine in his system and that that could affect his ability to remember the details of the clash accurately.
Kenneth Voyles cried as he described the shooting that shattered a bone in one of his arms and collapsed one of his lungs.(Photo by Aimee Green, The Oregonian/OregonLive)

The lawyer told jurors that Voyles — “a criminal” — shouldn’t be rewarded.
“And James Grant does not deserve to be punished,” Schilling added, describing him as “a victim” of crime.
Voyles pleaded no contest in 2023 to first-degree burglary and menacing, the latter for threatening harm to Grant. He was sentenced to five years of probation and participation in a drug-treatment program, though he also ended up serving more than a year in prison for an unrelated string of car thefts.