Chicago Shooting: 4 New Dashcam Videos Released In Laquan McDonald Killing

Chicago police officers line up outside the District 1 central headquarters at 17th and State streets, Tuesday, Nov. 24, 2015, during a protest for 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, who was fatally shot and killed in October 2014 in Chicago.

More than 100 protesters took to the streets of Chicago on Tuesday, after the release of a video that shows a white police officer shooting a black teenager 16 times, ushering in the first of many expected demonstrations across the city.

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

Though the protests across the downtown and South Side were largely peaceful, there were exceptions.

In the new video, the officer is seen kicking something out of McDonald’s hand after he was shot.

Late on Wednesday, the Chicago Tribune newspaper reported it had exclusively obtained video footage from the dashboard cameras of five police vehicles that were on the scene.

Police have said the teen had a knife.

His lawyer, Daniel Herbert, told CNN that the video was not an indicator of his client’s guilt.

“Since I got here, I’ve been talking about changing the culture of the Chicago Police Department in a positive fashion”.

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.

Alvarez said Tuesday she chose to announce the charges against Van Dyke earlier than planned because of the video’s release. Van Dyke, the first Chicago police officer to face a murder charge for an on-duty incident in decades, was charged hours before the video was released.

The New York Times reported Wednesday that freelance reporter Brandon Smith said he was barred from attending the session with Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Police Superintendent Garry F. McCarthy. Witnesses said he was handcuffed at the time.

Among the marchers was 73-year-old Frank Chapman of Chicago, who said the disturbing video confirms what activists have said for years about Chicago police brutality. Van Dyke, he said, “truly was in fear for his life as well as the lives of his fellow police officers”.

Clinton, who made the comments Wednesday in an emailed statement, added that police officers across the country are doing their duty honorably “without resorting to unnecessary force”.

The video, however, shows the officer opened fire as McDonald backed away from officers.

Van Dyke had been on site less than 30 seconds, and out of his auto for six seconds, when he started shooting, Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez said.

Demonstrators are calling for an independent investigation into the case and are questioning why it took more than a year for authorities to release the video to the public, and to bring charges against the officer.

London was among five people who were arrested on charges that included weapons possession and resisting arrest.

However, this week’s release of police dashcam video of the McDonald’s killing is becoming a political as well policing controversy.

Van Dyke and other officers were responding to a report of a teen with a knife who had been breaking into cars on the night McDonald was shot.