The Chicago police officer accused of shooting and killing 17-year-old Laquan McDonald has been indicted, the Chicago Tribune says.
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Mayor Emanuel will meet federal investigators Thursday, on the second day of the Department of Justice’s probe into the Chicago Police Department. He said he “welcomed” a federal investigation of “systemic issues embedded in” the Police Department and said, “I own the confusion” about his earlier opposition to the probe.
The department has increased the number of African Americans ever since it was forced to do so by a series of federal lawsuits beginning in the 1970s.
However, according to the The Guardian US’s project The Counted, which counts the number of people killed by police, LAPD has killed 20 people this year-more than any other police department. They say perhaps news that the police reports described McDonald as far more menacing than he appeared on the video might help them convince authorities that things did not happen the way police have said.
Another department veteran, Eugene Roy, was named as the Chicago Police Department’s Chief of Detectives. The video set off protests and calls for Mayor Rahm Emanuel to step down.
While staff from the Justice Department’s civil rights division takes the lead in the investigation, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Chicago will provide support.
But he told reporters on Thursday he now welcomes the DOJ’s involvement. But he stresses that community involvement is necessary if the Chicago Police Department is truly going to change. The teen was shot over 10 times after he fell to the ground.
This week, the Chicago Urban League is sponsoring “Truth and Justice for All: Advancing Police and Community Accountability”, a community forum that will begin the conversation about strategies to heal the rift caused by decades of mistrust between the police and the city’s residents. In 2004, the Cleveland Police Department agreed to reforms after a DOJ investigation. The Cleveland Police Department agreed to another settlement with the Justice Department in May.
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The investigating detective then filed a report that maintained that the officers’ statements were consistent with the video – an apparent effort to justify Van Dyke’s actions.
