WASHINGTON — (CNN) The U.S. Justice Department is investigating whether Chicago police have made a habit of violating the law or the U.S. Constitution in their policing, Attorney General Loretta Lynch said Monday.
The “pattern-and-practice” probe, as it’s known, will focus on use of force, deadly force, accountability and how the Chicago Police Department “tracks and treats” those incidents, she said.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel said he welcomes the investigation and promised the city’s total cooperation in achieving the “mutual goal” of keeping Chicago safe while respecting citizens’ rights.
“Nothing is more important to me than the safety and well-being of our residents and ensuring that the men and women of our Police Department have the tools, resources and training they need to be effective crime fighters, stay safe, and build community trust,” Emanuel said in a statement.
Word of the federal probe comes about two weeks after police released the October 2014 video of Officer Jason Van Dyke shooting Laquan McDonald to death on a Chicago street, and it comes after reports released by the city over the weekend indicate that accounts from police on the scene appear to contradict what the footage shows.
The footage of McDonald’s fatal shooting outraged many Chicagoans, who took to the streets to protest what they felt was an excessive use of force and dishonesty by the city and Van Dyke’s fellow officers, who initially accused McDonald of threatening officers. The demonstrators also questioned why it took more than 400 days to release the video, despite the city paying McDonald’s mother $5 million in April.
The spotlight on the case shone bright enough to illuminate another case — that of Ronald Johnson, who was killed by police eight days before McDonald’s death. Video from that incident was shown to reporters Monday, as Emanuel promised last week. Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez said Monday that there will be no charges against the officer responsible for Johnson’s death.
The federal investigation — which places the Chicago Police Department in the company of forces in other cities, such as Cleveland; Ferguson, Missouri; and Albuquerque, New Mexico — is necessary, Lynch said, because failing to hold police accountable for misconduct creates “profound consequences” for communities.
“When suspicion and hostility is allowed to fester it can erupt into unrest,” she said, adding that the investigation will not home in on individuals but will aim to “improve systems.”
Leadership changes in Chicago
Calls for a federal probe intensified after Chicago police on November 24 released the video of McDonald being shot 16 times last year. Political upheaval came quickly on the heels of Chicago’s demonstrations, with Emanuel asking for (and getting) Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy’s resignation.
On Sunday, the mayor announced that Scott Ando, head of the authority that investigates police shooting incidents like the McDonald and Johnson cases, had stepped down.
Sharon Fairley will be chief administrator for the city’s Independent Police Review Authority, replacing Ando, a veteran Drug Enforcement Administration agent who joined the IPRA in 2011 and took its reins last year. Fairley was general counsel to the city’s Office of the Inspector General and previously served as an assistant U.S. attorney where she prosecuted national security, financial and government fraud cases.
“Sharon brings the experience and independence to ensure that when an officer breaks the rules, they will be held accountable,” the mayor said in a statement, adding that “new leadership is required as we rededicate ourselves to dramatically improving our system of police accountability and rebuilding trust.”
This follows a series of initiatives taken by Emanuel’s office in the last two weeks, including expanding the body camera program and establishing a task force to review police discipline procedures, according to the statement.
The City Council formed the IPRA in 2007 “in response to concerns about how allegations of police misconduct were being investigated,” according to its website. It is staffed by civilian investigators charged with independently reviewing allegations against police.
Police accounts at odds with video
Video from the McDonald shooting in October 2014 shows the 17-year-old, who was armed with a knife and allegedly had PCP in his system, approach police cars in the street before veering away from officers who have their guns trained on him. None of the eight or more officers on the scene fires a weapon, but within six seconds of exiting his vehicle, Van Dyke begins unloading the 16-round magazine in his 9mm pistol. McDonald was about 10 feet away when Van Dyke opened fire.
Only two of those shots, one to the lower back and another to the upper leg, were definitively fired while McDonald was still standing, according to a criminal complaint. And though it states that only a single shot to McDonald’s right hand was definitively fired after he hit the asphalt, the complaint also notes that McDonald was on the ground for about 13 of the 14 or 15 seconds that it took Van Dyke to empty his magazine.
In the police report released over the weekend, some officers described McDonald as aggressively coming at Van Dyke — who is now charged with first-degree murder — while waving the knife and ignoring orders to drop the weapon.
One officer said he believed McDonald was attacking the officers and “attempting to kill them” when Van Dyke opened fire.
Some officers claimed McDonald clung to the knife and continued his attempts to attack them after Van Dyke fired the shots that promptly knocked him to the ground.
Van Dyke alleged that McDonald was “swinging the knife in an aggressive, exaggerated manner” and raising the weapon above his shoulder, according to the reports.
One handwritten report — which refers to Van Dyke by his initials and to McDonald as “O,” for offender — said: “VD believed O was attacking with knife … trying to kill VD … In defense of his life VD backpedaled + fired … O fell to the ground, continued to move/grasp the knife … VD continued firing. O appeared to be attempting to get up, still holding the knife, pointing at VD.”
The IPRA is conducting the investigation into McDonald’s killing, and “if the criminal investigation concludes that any officer participated in any wrongdoing, we will take swift action,” police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said in a statement.
Video of another police shooting
With pressure building over the McDonald case both at the local and federal level, the release of another dashcam video loomed over the Windy City.
Before the video was shown to reporters on Monday, Alvarez, the county prosecutor, told reporters that the facts of the case indicate Johnson was armed, that he posed a threat to officers and that Officer George Hernandez acted reasonably in shooting Johnson five times as he fled police.
According to a preliminary police statement released the same day as the shooting, Johnson pointed a weapon at pursuing officers, after first attempting to flee on foot.
Alvarez said Johnson and three other people were shot at, damaging their vehicle, after leaving a party. None of the four called 911, she said. Rather, the four left the scene and returned, at which point police saw Johnson carrying a gun, ordered him to drop the weapon and gave chase when he fled, she said. Johnson ran around a corner, encountering more police officers who tried to take him into custody, she said.
After a physical struggle between Johnson and an officer, which was not captured on any dashcams, Johnson knocked down an officer and fled again, toward three officers including Hernandez, who was in the back seat of an unmarked car. They got out with guns drawn and ordered Johnson to stop as he fled into a park, at which point Hernandez opened fire.
The video shared by the prosecutor’s office does not show the shots hitting Johnson, who fell face-first in the grass upon being shot. Several officers later observed a 9mm semiautomatic handgun with an extended 21-round magazine still in Johnson’s right hand after he was shot, according to the prosecutor’s office.
Johnson’s family members have said they don’t believe the official account, and his mother has accused the city of a cover-up. She has repeatedly said that the video will prove her son was not posing a threat to officers when he was killed and that the officer who shot him should be charged with murder.
“Shouldn’t nobody have to go through this pain over their kids,” Dorothy Holmes told reporters earlier this month.
Attorney Michael Oppenheimer has said the dashcam video shows Johnson was not carrying a weapon, nor did he ever turn and point anything.
Latest in federal police probes
Federal police probes like the one undertaken in Chicago are nothing new to President Barack Obama’s administration. Many cities have fallen under the federal microscope during his administration. A few examples:
– In Ferguson, federal authorities determined after the fatal shooting of Michael Brown that the police department had engaged in discriminatory and unconstitutional practices.
– A federal probe that began in Cleveland in 2013 documents several instances of unnecessary force after two unarmed civilians were shot more than 20 times after a high-speed police chase.
– In East Haven, Connecticut, federal investigators determined Latinos were subjected to more traffic stops, harsher treatment and more retaliation over discrimination complaints, a 2011 Justice Department report said. The following year, four officers were arrested and charged with targeting Latinos.
– The Justice Department and Missoula, County, Montana, officials reached an agreement last year after a federal probe highlighted allegations of gender bias against victims of sexual assault. The agreement to approve policies, training, communication and data sharing, among other measures, ended a lawsuit in which the county attorney accused the feds of bullying and defaming prosecutors.
– A 2011 report on New Orleans found minorities were subjected to excessive force, illegal stops and pat-down searches. It also found that more African-American residents were arrested, compared with white residents, and that police targeted transgender people for arrest on prostitution charges.
– The Justice Department accused the Albuquerque, New Mexico, police department of engaging in “a pattern” of using excessive force after a two-year investigation. In some instances, the department alleged, officers failed to turn on their cameras and recorders before such encounters.
Following the announcement of the Ferguson probe in September 2014, CNN senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin explained — much as the attorney general did Monday — that these types of investigations focus more on reform than punishing individuals for past misconduct.
Still, Toobin said, “it’s very serious because it can lead to a virtual federal takeover of the police.”
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