Chicago officer charged with murder in teen’s shooting

On the first day of the protests people in hundreds blocked the intersection of Roosevelt and Michigan Avenue.

Angry demonstrators took to the streets Tuesday night in Chicago after dash-cam video of white Chicago police officer, Jason Van Dyke, was released showing him shooting a black teenager 16 times.

On Tuesday, prosecutors charged Van Dyke, 37, with first-degree murder in the death of the black teenager.

Skirmishes broke out between protesters and police, who surrounded officers after they apparently made arrests.

“You can not kill our children and expect us to be quiet any longer”, protester Quovadis Green said.

Jessie Davis, of the group Stop Mass Incarceration Network, said there have been calls on social media for people to engage in civil disobedience, and Charlene Carruthers, national director of the activist group Black Youth Project 100, would not rule out acts such actions. He said protesters also planned to target the Board of Trade and other landmarks in the coming days.

McCarthy noted that there would be no audio in the video his department was set to release.

The calls from civic, political and religious leaders came from, among others, the Chicago Urban League, members of the black caucus of the Chicago City Council and two members of Congress.

A woman at the protest leads the group and calls for reforms in the city’s lack of spending for education, employment opportunities and healthcare. A line of officers walked beside them to ensure they remained on the sidewalk. The offer to be held in isolation is made to all inmates, and most frequently taken by members with gang ties, said Benjamin Breit, a sheriff’s department spokesman.

“This Thanksgiving, I ask everybody to keep those who’ve suffered tragic loss in our thoughts and prayers”, wrote the president. “And I’m personally grateful to the people of my hometown for keeping protests peaceful”.

“Like many Americans, I was deeply disturbed by the footage of the fatal shooting of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald”, Obama said.

Clinton added that officers across the country are doing their duty honorably “without resorting to unnecessary force”.

The new dashboard camera videos include one from the auto Jason Van Dyke was in, the Chicago Tribune reported. None of the other five cops, including Van Dyke’s partner, discharged their weapon. McDonald spins around and crumples to the pavement. McDonald lifts his head, moves an arm and then a cloud from another gunshot rises up from his chest as he lays in a fetal position. Another officer was seen kicking the knife away from where the suspect lay unmoving in the street.

City officials, who had tried to block the video from going public, were ordered by a judge to release it no later than Wednesday.

“Honestly it’s the cold that’s likely to scare us away first”, said Christopher Smithe, who was visiting from London with his girlfriend.

The absence of any recorded discussions from officers in any of the five vehicles for which videos were released makes it impossible to discern what the officers might have discussed in their cars on the runup to the shooting of McDonald. After a judge’s order, the investigations were quickly wrapped up and a charge announced.

Some community leaders questioned that assertion.

The Chicago Tribune newspaper quotes police as saying McDonald was behaving erratically, had drugs in his system, and refused police commands to drop a knife he was holding. Footage of the incident contradicts Van Dyke’s account that McDonald was moving toward officers when he was shot.

Johnae Strong, 25, May Page, 26, and Troy Alim, 24, were all charged with misdemeanors for resisting a police officer and were released on recognizance bonds.

The Chicago shooting is another in a series of highly publicized police shootings and deadly assaults of young black men by officers – mostly white, some black. However, Bush said, “When they do what appears to have happened here they should be charged as was the case in this case”.