The head of the Independent Police Review Authority, the body charged with probing Chicago police misconduct, called the footage of the O’Neal shooting “shocking and disturbing”.
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Some protesters said they were discouraged by the size of the crowd compared to the crowds that marched in November following the release of a video showing Laquan McDonald being shot 16 times by a Chicago officer.
Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said he was “concerned by some of the things that I saw” on body cam videos that show a confrontation between auto theft suspect Paul O’Neal, 18, and police on July 28, although the shots that killed O’Neal were not captured by video.
They show two officers firing at least 10 rounds in the span of three or four seconds at a stolen Jaguar after it narrowly missed hitting one of the officers.
“They had had those cameras maybe about a week”.
Fairley said the Review Authority is “conducting a full and thorough investigation of the entire incident including the use of force, the pursuit, body camera usage and all other possible policy and procedural violations that occurred during the incident”.
Johnson has said the officers, who he noted Saturday received the same training as the rest of the department, violated a department policy. He said that he also was “concerned” by some of the things he saw in the videos-which show police officers shooting Paul O’Neal, .
Johnson said it’s against departmental policy to fire at or into a moving vehicle if the auto is the only potential use of force by a suspect, which prompted him to relieve the officers of their duties. It was the city’s first release of video of a fatal police shooting under a new policy that calls for such material to be made public within 60 days. That and other policy changes represent an effort to restore public confidence in the department after video released a year ago showed a black teenager named Laquan McDonald getting shot 16 times by a white officer.
Ja’Mal Green, a spokesman for O’Neal’s family said, “I want to commend Superintendent Johnson for trying to be accountable and transparent, but how can we hold these officers accountable when these body cameras we use aren’t even working?” They and the attorney representing the O’Neal family scoffed when a department spokesman said Friday that the officer’s camera may have been deactivated by the force of the air bag when the stolen vehicle crashed into a police cruiser.
Oppenheimer alleged the non-operating body camera was part of a police effort to cover up what he called a “cold-blooded murder”.
Kirkpatrick said the department would not wait for the completion of an investigation by the Independent Police Review Authority to implement new tactics and policies and that her bureau would be looking at best practices from around the country.
O’Neal’s family on Monday filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the officers.
The man killed in the 28 July incident has been identified as 18-year-old Paul O’Neal. Some protesters said they were discouraged by the size of the crowd compared to the crowds that marched in November following the McDonald video’s release.
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A memorial of the 1966 march was unveiled Friday at Marquette Park.
