Chicago police recommend 7 officers fired in McDonald case

As NPR’s Cheryl Corley reports for our Newscast unit, the footage seemed to contradict police statements indicating “that MacDonald had lunged at officers”.

All eight have been accused of violating the Chicago Police Department’s Rule 14, which prohibits police officers from giving false information.

A Minnesota police chief is defending his officer who shot and killed a black man during a July traffic stop. “Each officer will have their right to due process”, Johnson wrote in an email to officers, according to the Tribune.

The dashboard camera video of the shooting death sparked widespread protests and revealed an entrenched “code of silence” among officers who had lied about the incident in an effort to cover it up. He said their interpretation of what unfolded may have been accurate from their perspective, noting that perceptions can be affected in high-stress situations, like shootings.

“That’s what humans go through”, he said. Superintendent Johnson’s action today moves us one critical step in that direction.

Johnson’s call to fire the officers broadens the political and departmental fallout, which includes pressure on Mayor Rahm Emanuel to provide more transparency and overhaul the police disciplinary system to break down an entrenched “code of silence” among officers and build public trust. Jason Van Dyke, the officer who shot McDonald 16 times, has been since charged with murder.

Several protests occurred in Chicago after the video was released. The next year, when a judge forced the city to release the explosive police video that documented the shooting, Van Dyke was charged with first-degree murder.

Separately, a special prosecutor is investigating whether the officers lied to justify the shooting death of McDonald and will decide whether to bring criminal charges.

For the third time this week, Emanuel was asked why he isn’t taking the lead in the code of silence investigation by himself calling for the firing and or discipline of officers connected to the Laquan McDonald cover-up. McDonald swung the knife at the officers in an “aggressive manner” when he was 12 to 15 feet away, Walsh told investigators. Mr Van Dyke’s claims were backed up by colleagues at the scene.

But the video belies those accounts.

In it, Van Dyke is seen stepping from a squad auto and shooting nearly immediately.

The video appears to show McDonald’s body getting hit by bullets even after he was on the ground.

The head of Chicago’s police union questions whether seven officers recommended for dismissal for allegedly filing false reports in the fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald can get a fair hearing.

The department disagreed that a 10th officer should be fired and “feels that there is insufficient evidence to prove those respective allegations”, Guglielmi said.