Ex-Chicago attorney’s cases examined after judge’s ruling

The head of a city watchdog that investigates Chicago police shootings pledged greater tr…

(Brian Jackson/Chicago Sun-Times via AP).

CHICAGO (AP) – Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is on the defensive again, dealing with the fallout from a judge’s opinion accusing a top city lawyer of hiding evidence in another case involving a fatal police shooting.

When asked if the Law Department’s handling of lethal force cases should also be probed, Emanuel said said “No, I think that [federal investigators] are working where they are”. They said they shot Pinex after he refused their orders and put his auto in reverse. Released in November, the video shows white police officer Jason Van Dyke shooting the 17-year-old McDonald, who was black, 16 times as he walked away from police carrying a 3-inch knife that was later found to be folded. During a news conference, Emanuel, Chicago’s embattled mayor, called for “zero tolerance” for a city employee not upholding professional standards, “especially an individual representing the city in a courtroom”, The Associated Press reports.

Steve Greenberg, an attorney in the civil case Chang ruled on, said he would expect attorneys who sued the city in similar cases to take a close look for possible misconduct by the law department that might be grounds to have those cases reopened.

After a decades-long fight to bring to light the torture of black men by Chicago police, the city on Monday began to disburse $5.5 million in reparations. But that, the ouster of the police superintendent and Emanuel’s promises of reforms haven’t quieted his critics.

In the officers’ account of Mr. Pinex’ death, they said they stopped his auto because it matched the description of a vehicle involved in a shooting they had just heard about over their police radio. In the most recent of those rulings Monday, U.S. District Judge Edmond Chang faulted lax training and oversight at Patton’s department for hampering the production of Police Department records when officers are accused of misconduct.

“There is a culture there of, ‘We are protecting the good guys, police, against bad guys and so we should be able to bend the rules to protect them”, Ms. Hamilton said. “It does indicate that I [am] willing to be accountable and willing to be held responsible for the city and have the determination, the desire and the diligence to get it done”.

While the gesture appears to be a step in the right direction in a bid to quell further issues, the Jones family has launched a lawsuit against the city and observers state that the legal backlash will continue on in the coming months as open investigations into police brutality and use of force are ongoing.

A new bill would allow voters to recall mayors and other elected officials.

It’s one of the “steps to rebuild Chicagoans’ trust in IPRA and its findings”, she said.

The recall law would apply only to future lawmakers, not those now in office.