The Rev. Jesse Jackson says he will lead a march through downtown Chicago on Sunday in response to newly released police reports about the shooting of Laquan McDonald and the city’s handling of it and other shootings involving officers.
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The reports by various police officers who were at the scene of the shooting in the third-largest city in the US are compelling because their descriptions of what happened do not match police vehicle video footage.
According to the full police report released Friday, Chicago officer Jason Van Dyke said the teen was armed with a knife and believed McDonald was trying to kill him. 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.
Dashcam video released last month shows McDonald moving away from the officers when he was shot. He was hit with several bullets when he was on the ground. Van Dyke’s partner, identified as Joseph Walsh, told an investigator that he repeatedly yelled “Drop the knife!” at McDonald and backed up as the teenager “continued to advance toward the officers”. The officer was arrested, but he is now out on bail.
The embattled mayor has called for an independent review of the police department to determine whether there was any deliberate attempt to cover up the nature of the shooting.
Chicago officials fought against the release of the dashboard-camera video for months before a judge forced the city to make the footage public.
The shooting of McDonald is the latest in a wave of high-profile police-involved killings that have raised allegations of abuses against minorities around the country. It was only after the video’s release, in fact, that Emanuel fired police Superintendent Garry McCarthy, saying McCarthy had lost the public trust.
Bringing charges against the officers for their statements could be hard, however. 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. But, in another contradiction, one of the police reports said the recovered knife’s “blade was in the open position”. One report said McDonald showed “irrational behavior”, such as ignoring verbal directions, “growling” and making noises. The autopsy on McDonald found that he had the drug PCP in his system.
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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.
