Officers said at the time that the 17-year-old lunged at them with a knife, but the video released last week shows that McDonald was walking away at the time he was shot.
Advertisement
One handwritten report, referring to Van Dyke by his initials and McDonald as the offender, said: “VD believed O [offender] was attacking with knife … trying to kill VD …” Officers claimed, too, that even after McDonald had been shot by Van Dyke, McDonald tried to lift himself off the ground with the knife pointed toward the officers, and though he had been mortally wounded, still presented a threat.
While the highly controversial tape shows an unarmed McDonald stumbling away from police officers, the report published Friday reportedly suggests he was moving toward the officers while wielding a knife.
But the description of events doesn’t appear to match the dashcam video of the incident that was released by the city on November 24. He said the Department of Justice’s investigation was also ongoing.
“Based on information available at the time of this report it is the preliminary determination of the undersigned officer that Officer Van Dyke fired his weapon in compliance with Department policy”, states a “Tactical Response Report” filed the day after the shooting. The authority has not released its report on the McDonald shooting.
All of the officers involved in the shooting were officially cleared, despite an admission by Pedro Solis’, the officer who shot Mr. Lopez 11 of 16 times, that he had been drinking prior to pursuing Lopez, a detail that was left out of official reports. Emanuel and others used that argument in the McDonald case before a judge ordered the video’s release; Van Dyke was charged with first-degree murder the day the video was made public.
A video that caused racial riots and created high-tension against police nationwide is now being reported as ‘doctored’.
Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez’s office will investigate the possibility of criminal charges against the officer, her office said Wednesday.
The debate over the release of videos typically lines up around the U.S.as such: Police and prosecutors argue they should be withheld until the conclusion of investigations into whether the shootings were justified, while transparency advocates, journalists and activists say the public has a right to see the footage immediately. In 2012, a federal jury awarded bartender Karolina Obrycka $850,000 in a civil lawsuit that alleged Chicago Police officers conspired to cover up her beating at the hands of off-duty police officer Anthony Abbate. “VD continued firing. O appeared to be attempting to get up, still holding the knife, pointing at VD”.
McDonald, was shot and killed by a Chicago officer in October a year ago, eight days after Johnson. He described how he eventually kicked the knife away from McDonald and then told the dying teenager “Hang in there” as an ambulance was called.
In the video, Van Dyke begins firing at McDonald within about 30 seconds of arriving on the scene, near Pulaski Road and 41st Street – though the other officers already on the scene did not fire. One reason, said former IPRA investigator Lorenzo Davis, is because the agency relies heavily on reports from CPD detectives.
One of the reports noted what it called McDonald’s “irrational behaviour”, such as ignoring verbal directions and “growling” and making noises. PCP, a hallucinogenic drug, was found in McDonald’s system, according to a medical examiner’s report among the documents.
Advertisement
The police reports are blacked out in places, with those redactions covering signatures, a reporter’s cell phone number, the serial number of the officer’s gun and McDonald’s address.
