Lawyer: Police shooting of black teen deserves second look

City attorneys on Thursday, Jan. 14, 2016, released grainy 2013 surveillance video showing the fatal shooting of the 17-year-old black carjacking suspect by a white police officer. The public release of the footage followed a reversal by Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration. Gettlement said that in the video, it is hard to distinguish “exactly what Mr. Chatman’s position was or what he had in his hand” in the moments before the shooting, The New York Times reported. The city settled with McDonald’s family last spring.

Immediately after Thursday’s hearing, Chatman family attorney Brain Coffman was asked if a criminal case should be reopened based on the video and other evidence. They say the city’s sudden decision to release the tape is for purely political reasons, not legal ones.

The video’s release comes at a time when Chicago city officials are facing increased public pressure and questions for how they handle police shootings. Officer Jason Van Dyke, who is white, was indicted with six counts of first-degree murder in the death of the 17-year-old McDonald, who is black, but pleaded not guilty.

U.S. district judge Robert Gettleman lifted a protective order that barred the release after the city dropped its objections.

“We talk about media trials where it goes beyond just a police case, and I can see that’s a valid concern for the police union and police officers involved, and everyone who has to be involved in selecting a jury”, says Frankie Bailey, a criminologist at the University at Albany in NY.

The mayor, Calloway said, is “not really into practicing transparency”.

The videos are expected to be released on Thursday.

On Thursday, lawyers for the city said they would not oppose the release of the footage for the sake of transparency.

According to the lawsuit filed by Chatman’s family, a maximum of seven seconds passed between Chatman jumping out of his vehicle and the police opening fire. Hernandez was not charged. “Office Fry, it appeared, did not exhaust any method of capturing Chatman other than shooting him and killing him”, says Lorenzo Davis, a former IPRA investigator.

One of those was the Chatman case.

Davis, who was sacked IPRA, told CNN, the video “shows a shooting that should not have occurred”. Toth’s partner, Officer Kevin Fry, opens fire.

Emanuel has faced calls for his own resignation amid the continuing police scandal.

Initially, the city stuck to its longstanding policy of keeping police videos private. The task force is scheduled to present recommendations for any changes by the end of March. This time, Cedrick Chatman, 17. He remains on active duty in the department. There is no accountability anymore from any level for these types of matters. Fry ran diagonally to try to cut off Chatman’s path, and says at some point Chatman “pointed a dark object back toward the officers as he continued to run”, according to the Independent Police Review Authority records seen by the Chicago Tribune.

Lawyers for the family of Chatman were suspicious over the timing of the video’s release. Fearing for his life, one of the officers fired his weapon and shot Chatman.

Investigators said later the object was an iPhone box.

A federal judge has sharply criticized the city of Chicago for fighting the release of a police shooting video for weeks only to suddenly reverse course and call for its release.

In an agency where cops are rarely punished, Davis was accused of having an anti-police bias and was sacked in July.