Chicago releases documents related to shooting

On Thursday, a Chicago judge released video of the deadly 2013 shooting of 17-year-old Cedrick Chatman by Chicago police.

The footage captured two years ago by surveillance cameras shows 17-year-old Cedrick Chatman fleeing after he stole a auto.

It turned out the object was a black iPhone box.

City attorneys said in a Wednesday filing that the city was dropping its opposition in an effort to be more transparent while it waits for a recently created special task force to review policies regarding the release of videos showing disputed police shootings.

The Chatman video comes two weeks after Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced a major overhaul of the city’s police force in the wake of a series of fatal shootings which sparked mass protests.

Laquan McDonald was shot 16 times by officer Jason Van Dyke, who is white, in October 2014. The officers remain on their beats.

The delay in the video’s release had to do with prosecutors trying to determine whether fellow officers had made false corroborating statements.

Chicago city officials had originally filed a protective order to keep the video out of the public eye, saying that its release would sway a potential juror pool.

U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman told city lawyers during a Thursday hearing he was “very disturbed” by how they dealt with video showing a white police officer fatally shooting a black teenager, Cedrick Chatman, in 2013.

“I think it says that there is a culture of coverup, that there is a culture of protecting wrongdoers within the police department”, says Richard Boykin, Cook County Commissioner in Chicago. “And until that changes, we’re calling on a boycott”.

Although activists say they are pleased with the release of the video, they are still leery about the city’s shift in philosophy as it relates to the fatal shootings of unarmed citizens.

The surveillance videos show Chatman bailing out of the auto nearly as soon as Toth and Fry get out of their unmarked Ford Crown Victoria.

The city’s Independent Police Review Authority (IPRA), which investigates police shootings, found the killing to be justified. He said that he did not see Chatman turn or aim at the officers.

Commenting on the video of the shooting of Chatman, he said, “I pay most attention to Officer Fry”.

Linda Chatman, 40, talks about her son Cedrick at her apartment on Thursday, Aug. 28, 2014 in Chicago. Davis was the “only supervisor at IPRA who resist[ed] making requested changes as directed by management in order to reflect the correct finding with respect to [officer-involved shootings]”, according to performance records obtained by WBEZ. “We’re still hoping it’s a systemic change in the way police misconduct is treated in the city of Chicago, and that’s what this fight is about”, said Smolens.

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.

“You have everything going on in Chicago right now rolled into one case”, Brian Coffman, a Chatman family attorney, told CNN.

An officer killed Chatman on January 7, 2013, during a foot chase.

Attorneys for Chatman’s family believe that the newly released video refutes Fry’s account that he “feared for his life”, reports ABC News.

Although the CCTV footage wasn’t high quality, his family maintain that it is clear enough to show he didn’t turn to the policeman – as he suggested.

Also per the Times, a final report concluded that claims of the officers using unnecessary force were unfounded.