Chicago Protests on Black Friday

Demonstrators shrugged off a cold drizzling rain to turn the traditional start of the holiday shopping season on Michigan Avenue’s Magnificent Mile into a high-profile platform from which to deliver their message: The killing of Laquan McDonald was another example of what they say is the systemic disregard police show for the lives and rights of black people.

The video released Tuesday shows McDonald jogging down a street and then veering away from Van Dyke and another officer who emerge from a police SUV drawing their guns. In 2014 there were 411; Laquan McDonald was one of them. “What I will tell you is that the mayor has made it very clear that he has my back”.

The Urban League of Chicago joined in the call for a federal investigation, alleging a pattern of “discriminatory harassment” against black people.

Some local residents spoke passionately against police brutality: “There’s a proverb about good men and women remaining quiet in the face of evil”, said Loren Taylor, 53, of Chicago.

The protesters were questioning why there was no audio on the police dash cam video that captured the shooting and also raised concerns that Chicago Police deleted relevant security camera footage from a nearby restaurant. The shooting of the black teen by a white officer has fanned the flames of racial tension which were already present in the Windy City.

In defense, Van Dyke explained that he shot McDonald because he feared for his life.

Reverend Jackson’s robo-calls and interruptions of the shopping day caused some alienation and annoyance. The first officers at the scene reported that the teenager was armed with a knife and walking away from the area.

The man, who was trying to get into a Crate and Barrel store, said that protesters should be protesting in front of police stations or city hall.

Religious, youth and union leaders are expected to be part of the event. “Let them just feel the empty cash registers”, the speaker shouted.

In the seven years between 2008 and 2014, seventy-four percent of people shot by police in Chicago were black.

A smaller group, One Chicago, is calling on demonstrators to shut down businesses to protest the city’s handling of the investigation. The video plays like the intro to the 1950s and ’60s American police procedural “Dragnet”.

As of now, Van Dyke is in jail and is being held with no bond for the Chicago teen shooting. The rest of the video is a matter of seconds, barely 30 of them, and shots: 16 of those. Not long after the shooting, Chicago cops flooded Pulaski Road where the initial description of what took place was offered by the spokesman for the Fraternal Order of Police officers. Over the course of the year, not one of them was charged.

Darshane told the Tribune he testified about the missing video before a grand jury earlier this year.

“The experience of impunity gives rise to the expectation of impunity”, said Markus Dubber, a professor of law at the University of Toronto and the author and editor of several analyses of policing in North America.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez weren’t immediately available for comment Friday.

Claims of foot-dragging and stonewalling in the case that took the prosecutor 13 months to announce charges in the case on Tuesday and hours later, a graphic video.

Some 20 million people visit each year.

“We believe injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”, said J.D. Anderson, the pastor at Centennial Missionary Baptist Church on the city’s south side.