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Rekia Boyd On March 21, 2012, near a park where people were socializing, Detective Dante Servin, purposely approached 4 individuals walking to the store and got into a verbal altercation with persons standing near Rekia Boyd, a 22year-old young woman. From his personal vehicle, and with a Glock 9mm semi-automatic gun, Servin turned the wrong way on a one-way street & fired five rounds at the group of friends. One of the rounds hit Rekia in the back of the head. She died less than 24 hours later. Police claimed a man in the group approached Servin with a weapon, prompting him to fire, out of “fear for his life”. The Independent Police Review Authority stated they found no weapon and that the man was holding a cell phone. Rekia died on March 22, 2012. Servin was charged November 28, 2013 with involuntary manslaughter, reckless discharge of a firearm and reckless conduct. On April 9th, 2015 Servin went to trial. On April 20, 2015 Judge Porter granted the defense a controversial directed verdict acquitting Servin of involuntary manslaughter. Judge Porter stated that Servin did not act involuntarily. He wrote, “Firing a gun at some person or persons on the street is an act that is so dangerous it is beyond reckless; it is intentional. It is intentional and the crime, if any there be, is first-degree murder.” Because of double jeopardy, Servin cannot be tried again for murdering Rekia Boyd and instead walks free. After four months of protests at the Chicago Police Board hearing by Rekia’s family, friends and supporters, on September 16, 2015, the Independent Police Review Authority recommended that Dante Servin should be fired, thus marking the first time in 15 years that a Chicago Police officer was recommended to be fired for murdering someone. On November 23, 2015, the now fired, Superintendent Gary McCarthy agreed with IPRA’s recommendation to fire Servin. The Chicago Police Board has scheduled Servin’s evidentiary termination hearing to occur May 19, 20, 23, 24 and 26th. Rekia’s family and supporters are demanding that at the absolute minimum, Servin will be fired by the Chicago Police Board for the murder he committed. On May 17th, two days before the hearing was to begin, Dante Servin resigned. For information about the #RememberRekia campaign, visit: RememberRekia.Wordpress.com
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Ronald “RonnieMan” Johnson On October 12th, 2014 Ronald "RonnieMan" Johnson was shot and killed by CPD Officer, George Hernandez, on the city's South Side. He was 25 years old and a father of five. This murder by the hands of the state was captured on police dashcam video which a judge denied the release of after petition by the City’s attorneys. The lawyer representing RonnieMan’s mother, Dorothy Holmes, filed a Freedom of Information Act request with CPD for the dash-cam video that captured the shooting. On December 7, 2015, one week after a judge ruled that the City had to release the dashcam video of Laquan McDonald, the soon to be former Cook County State’s Attorney, Anita Alvarez, announced that charges would not be filed against CPD officer George Hernandez. Alvarez began the press conference by stating that Johnson “fit the description” of a suspect because he was wearing a dark hoody. She proceeded to state that Hernandez’s “frame of mind” was important in considering accountability. She then showed a highly pixelated version of the dashcam video, showing that Johnson was running away from Hernandez. When asked by a reporter whether the dashcam video definitively showed Johnson holding a gun, Alvarez refused to answer. She then showed a video of a police shooting that had nothing to do with Ronald Johnson, in effort to explain the possible “frame of mind” of George Hernandez in order to absolve of responsibility. Instead of impartial, principled representation dedicated to serving the people of Chicago as Chief Prosecutor, Alvarez again operated instead, as chief defense attorney for the Chicago Police. In a sworn deposition, Witness A reported that the “idea of a gun” came from detectives. Witness A stated in the deposition, "I had no thought, or the idea of a gun- wasn't a thing until they presented the idea to me." In the sworn deposition, Witness A was asked "Did the idea of a gun come from the detectives, not you?" Witness A replied, "That is correct". Witness A was asked, “Was it a lie that you thought it was a gun?” Witness A responded, “Yes, it was a lie that I thought it was a gun.” Ronald Johnson’s family attorney, reported that Alvarez refused to interview the officers involved in the shooting, including George Hernandez. The inept and corrupt handling of both Ronald Johnson’s cases reveal complicity in cover ups that go all the way to the Mayor’s and State’s Attorney’s offices. It is not enough to force the resignation of police superintendent Gary McCarthy, the resignation of the head of IPRA, Scott Ando, and the resignation of CPD’s Chief of Detectives, Constantine Andrews. We call for the immediate resignation and criminal investigations of Anita Alvarez and Rahm Emanuel for the cover up of the murders of both Laquan McDonald and Ronald Johnson, both killed within 8 days of each other. We demand Hernandez be prosecuted for murder.
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Dominique “Damo” Franklin Jr. Dominique “Damo” Franklin Jr., 23, was killed as a result of being tased by a police officer who was responding to a report of the stealing of a bottle of Vodka on May 7, 2014. Witnesses reportedly shot video of the aftermath where Franklin is seen lying in the street as police officers stand around him. Some witnesses interviewed on the evening of the incident claimed no one appeared to offer to help. Damo was taken to Northwestern Hospital in critical condition and after two weeks fighting for his life, he was pronounced dead on May 20, 2014. The killing of Dominique "Damo" Franklin, Jr. by CPD through the use of tasers, spawned the creation of one of Chicago's most impactful groups, We Charge Genocide (WCG). Called to action, WCG sent 8 young people of color, including one of Damo’s close friends Ethos Viets-Van Lear, to testify before the United Nations Committee Against Torture charging the Chicago Police Department with genocide and violating specifically, Articles 2, 10, 11, 12, 13 & 14 of the Convention of Torture, through the cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment of youth of color in Chicago. One of the leading founding members of We Charge Genocide, and founder of Project Nia and many other projects and organizations dedicated to ending mass incarceration and fostering liberation, Mariame Kaba, described the reason people were called to organize: “Yet because young people like Damo are deemed disposable, they aren’t seen as deserving of love, care, and support. Damo was in fact loved and cherished by his chosen family but he was marked as a threat by society at large. He was managed throughout his life through the lens of repression, crime, and punishment. And now he’s dead and those of us left behind must find a way to heal while building more justice. We’ll continue to fight in Damo’s memory because we won’t allow his death to have been in vain…”
Damo’s close friends and family have organized an annual event called “Damo Day” to occur on the anniversary of his death in order to honor his life and protest state violence. The organizers described this event by saying, “Dominique was a brother, a son, a friend, and family of many people in the city of Chicago. We created this event not only to protest the perpetual Racist brutality carried out by the State and all its affiliates, but also to Celebrate the Life of someone filled with so much light. We gather May 20th to greet death with Life. We gather to show the system they cannot take us away without hearing from us. We gather for Damo.”
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Pierre Loury: Another Life Extinguished by the Chicago Police Department By Kaleb Autumn, 14-year-old organizer with the Let Us Breathe Collective Another Black Life was taken by the hands of the state. Another Black Person turned into a hashtag. Another Black Mother is grieving. On April 11, 2016, Pierre Loury was murdered by the Chicago Police Department. This is not the first time and will not be the last time a Black person will be turned into a hashtag. This city and nation is problematic. The Chicago Police Department and all police departments are highly problematic. If you think it is okay to kill and incarcerate Black people then you too are a part of the problem. The CPD is the same police department that kills 100,00 more people than any other police department in the nation. This is a police department that supports and defends police officers that murder and show misconduct to the people of this city. This is same police department that has no accountability. We, the people of this country are tired. We are tired of the mass lynching of Black People. We are tired of the mass incarceration of our people. We are tired of having to fight alongside grieving families that have lost loved ones to the state and state sanctioned violence. We are tired, but make no mistake we will do anything and everything to make sure that Black Lives Matter. We will stand arrest. We will disobey. We will shut this city down. We will win. We will win. We will win. We know in this world there is a force of anti-Blackness. We know that in this country and this world Black people are targeted daily. We know that white supremacy is alive and well. We know this, and this is why we are fighting. We must fight for not only for Pierre Loury but all people that have been harmed by the state. We must fight against all systems of oppression. We must fight and make it be known that BLACK LIVES MATTER. BLACK LIVES MATTER WHEN WE SAY THEY MATTER. In order for this to be known we must fight, abolish and transform. This world needs a REVOLUTION. It is coming, it must come. In the words of Veronica Morris Moore, “When We fight We Win.�
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Dakota Bright By Tess Raser Dakota Bright, was murdered on Nov. 8, 2012, by an unidentified Chicago Police officer. He was 15 years old. To this day, his mother, Panzy Edwards, has not received the police report, autopsy report or name of the officers who killed her son. He was left in the street for 5 hours. On Nov. 8, 2012, Dakota had gone to his grandmother’s after spending time at a girlfriend’s home, where he was playing video games. When he was done, he left to head home. Moments later, the girl called Edwards to alert her to the fact that she had heard gunshots in the direction that Dakota had walked. The girl asked, “Did Dakota come home?” Edwards tried to call Dakota. “I got up and went over there. [The police] wouldn’t tell me nothing. Someone went over [to the scene] and said it was Dakota. I lost it,” Edwards says. Dakota had a tattoo of his mother’s name and was immediately identified by a neighbor. There was a Ceasefire officer, Cure Violence gang mediator, out at the time of Dakota’s death, who saw a plainclothes officer bring a gun to the scene while Dakota lay handcuffed and dead. “They left him out for five hours. They flagged the ambulance away. They put down that he was put down at the hospital. No, he was taken straight to the morgue,” Edwards cries. At the time, Edwards could not bring herself to go identify the body herself. She was heartbroken. The CPD will not name the police officer who killed Dakota, and no actions have been taken against him.
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“I can’t get anything. When they put it on the news they said Dakota was a 20-year-old, known gang member,” Edwards says on the negligence of the media. The media portrayed Dakota as just another “gang banger.” They portrayed him as a monster, which he just wasn’t. “He had teachers and his principal leave school, leave their work, to go to his funeral. No one would do that for a monster,” Edwards says. “I don’t feel like my son should’ve run from the police, but he had just had his teeth kicked down his throat by the police,” Edwards says, referring to a prior attack by the police which occurred at his school. “Listen, I’ve seen the police pull over a boy because he had his hat on backwards. … They do so much to them. They slammed his head on the car,” she explains. Edwards cannot go down the street without seeing the police. “I seen them slam a 10-year-old on the gate for cursing!” Edwards says with frustration. When Edwards’ eldest son was released from prison, after Dakota’s death, he was arrested 30 times in his first two months out for such acts as riding his bike on the sidewalk. Edwards herself is harassed when she protests for justice for Dakota, wears shirts with his name on them and is in her car, which displays a bumper sticker in his honor. “When they see people with the shirts, they ask, ‘Who are you to Dakota?’” Edwards explains. Someone had set fire to Edwards’ car when I first spoke to her, and she refused to call the police, as she doubted whether they would do anything but cause more trouble for her. “The other day, I’m sitting outside my house. [The police] gave me a drinking ticket for sitting outside my house, not drinking, because I had a hoodie on with Dakota’s picture,” Edwards says. The armed police even lined up at Dakota’s funeral and followed the family to the burial. Edwards has been out protesting for justice for Dakota since his murder. Yet, she feels hopeless that there will be any justice in Chicago — that her son’s life will matter to the CPD, that Black life will matter in Chicago. “Nobody knows about my child. People don’t know about my child. … It is sad, and I see these pictures up and none of the people they flash up are my child. It’s sad for the boys in Chicago. [The police] gonna keep doing it and get away with it,” Edwards says. She sighs, “He ain’t getting the justice his life deserves.” We demand the immediate release of the police report, the autopsy report and the names of the officers who killed Dakota. We demand the immediate prosecution of the officers involved in his murder.
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Flint Farmer Around 2 a.m. on June 7, 2011 Gildardo Sierra who had been drinking that night, responded to a disturbance call at Flint Farmer’s house. Flint fled through an empty and got as far as the parkway when the kop yelled at him. "Don't do it,” per reports Flint was pulling up his pants, as he darted towards the parkway. Sierra, who was standing in the street, fired 16 shots hitting Flint a total of 7 times; two of which pierced Flint’s abdomen and thigh as he fell to the ground in a fetal position. A squad car responding to the scene and captured video of Sierra as he stepped onto the parkway, walked about the unarmed Farmer in a semicircle and fired three more shots into his back as he was laying on the ground writhing in pain. Within the 4.2 seconds it took for Sierra to empty his Sig Sauer semiautomatic Flint was pronounced dead at the scene. He had no weapon just a burgundy cellphone. The medical examiner said Flint could have survived the shots in the abdomen and thigh, but the shots in the back killed him. Those shots, which coursed downward, hit Flint's heart and lung, according to the autopsy report, and all three were definitely fatal wounds. The Police Department waited more than five hours after the shooting to test Sierra for alcohol. Sierra had already killed Darius Pinex, shot Dion Richards, and a dog in the same year. The Superintendent of Chicago Police questioned why Sierra was on the street and is quoted as saying, “I'm not going to defend indefensible behavior and don't expect me to.” In November 2013 Anita Alvarez, did not bring criminal charges against a Sierra saying after an exhaustive review the kop could have reasonably mistook a burgundy cellphone for a gun. City Council approved a civil settlement of $4.1 million dollars for civil rights violations and the FBI/ DOJ is allegedly investigating Flint’s murder.
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Bettie Jones Bettie was 55, a mother of five, grandmother of 9, and a workers' rights activist with Action Now. She and Quintonio Legrier, Q, a 19-year-old engineering student, were shot the day after Christmas when kops responded to a “domestic disturbance” call at their home around 4:30 a.m. Bettie opened the door when kops knocked since Antonio, Q’s father, asked her to assist. Bettie, the devoted loving mother and grandmother, responded kindly. Earlier that morning, Q had placed three emergency calls to 911. Emergency personnel did not respond to his pleas for assistance instead responded to his father Antonio’s call. Antonio said he just wanted the kops to transport Q to the hospital because he was banging on his door with a bat. Suddenly, Q became the target instead of the victim, and Bettie became “collateral damage,” per the Popo. Kops said they, "were confronted by a combative subject," and that resulted "in the discharging of the officer's weapon." Witnesses said the kop, Rialmo, was standing on the sidewalk when he began shooting. He knocked on the door, didn't say anything, ran back to the sidewalk and drew his gun in a position to shoot," and when Bettie opened the door a few minutes later, she screamed 'Whoa, whoa, whoa!'" and Rialmo began shooting "right away,” within 15 or 20 seconds, in rapid succession piercing the door with bullet holes. Witness’ say Rialmo should have been able to see Bettie in the doorway because the porch was brightly lit. "There's nothing dark about it. You can see clearly." When neighbors looked into the house, they saw Q laying on top of Bettie’s body in the hallway. Two ambulances arrived approximately six minutes later and took Q to Cook County and Bettie to Loretto hospital where both were pronounced dead. Bettie was shot once and the bullet sliced through different organs in her body, Q was shot 6 times. Rialmo, one kop killed two people in a single shooting incident and they failed to tell the coroner it was a kop involved shooting. The Popo announced that Bettie was shot "accidentally," and issued its "deepest condolences" to Bettie's family but not only has no settlement been reached, its been stalled, and Rialmo who failed to follow his training on situational awareness, is still employed by the CPD. Q and Bettie’s family had to file lawsuits against the City of Chicago for wrongful death. And in a juke move, Rialmo, the kop, has filed a lawsuit against Q’s family for emotional distress because he murdered Bettie Jones.
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Quintonio LeGrier April 29,1996 – December 26, 2015 Quintonio LeGrier was a young man who strived to improve his life and encourage those around him to do the same. He endured trauma at an early age, after being taken by child-protection and put into foster care at only 5 years old. Thankfully Quintonio flourished after being placed with his foster mom, Mary Strenger aka Grandma. He later became an honor student at Gwendolyn Brooks College Preparatory Academy and after graduating enrolled at Northern Illinois University with plans to study electrical engineering in fall 2014. Quintonio was in Chicago during the winter break of 2015 after having a difficult semster at NIU. Early in the morning of December 26th , a distressed Quintonio called 911 three times due to a conflict that occurred while staying at his father's house. He was dismissed, and hung up on by 911 dispatchers, who never discerned why Quintonio was calling. A police unit was only sent out after the third call, as his father Antonio contacted the police while en route, claiming he was being threatened by his son. Close to 3 minutes after police officers arrived on the scene, Officer Robert Rialmo shot and killed LeGrier as he came down the stairs from the second floor of the two flat building. Bettie Jones, a mother of five and downstairs neighbor was shot and killed as well. According to records, Quintonio suffered six gunshot wounds, including two graze wounds. In the days after the shooting, several press conferences and vigils were held for Quintonio, including one by students and organizers at his former high school Gwendolyn Brooks. His shooting lead to further protesting and added calls for Mayor Rahm Emanuel's resignation. At his funeral, the principal of Brooks announced that a scholarship will be offered in Quintonio's name at his former high school. To date, a lawsuit was filed on behalf of LeGrier's estate against Rialmo and the city, Rialmo has filed a counter suit against the estate. The most recent controversy surrounds Rialmo giving conflicting accounts of what happened the night of the murder.
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Laquan McDonald On November 24, 2015, Chicago officials finally released a disturbing video of police officer Jason Van Dyke fatally shooting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald—an incident that took place back in October 2014. The day before it was released, Van Dyke was charged with first-degree murder, but many Chicagoans are far from appeased. Residents and city council members are calling for the resignation of Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez and Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy. (Update: On Tuesday morning, Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced that McCarthy would indeed resign. "This is not the end of the problem," he said. "But it is the beginning to the solution of the problem.") Among other things, the mayor's critics have been asking why officials tried so hard to keep the footage under wraps, and why it took
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prosecutors nearly 13 months to file charges against the officer, given what it shows. Here are 10 other things you should know about the case. 1. The police dash-cam footage starkly contradicts the initial police narrative of what happened. A spokesman for Chicago's police union said at the time of the shooting that Van Dyke had fired his gun after McDonald lunged at him with a knife, defying an order to drop his weapon. But the video shows that McDonald was first shot while facing away from the officers, and apparently many more times after falling wounded to the ground. An autopsy report showed that Van Dyke shot McDonald a total of 16 times—in the chest, back, neck, scalp, arms, and right hand and leg. 2. Officer Van Dyke had at least 20 previous complaints and two lawsuits filed against him. Since joining the Chicago Police Department in 2001, 37-year-old Van Dyke has been accused of using racial slurs, manhandling suspects, and unjustifiably pointing his gun at arrestees. None of the complaints resulted in disciplinary action, but a jury awarded a Chicago man $350,000 after finding that Van Dyke had used excessive force during a traffic stop. 3. Chicago authorities really didn't want people to see this footage. The police department denied more than a dozen Freedom of Information Act requests seeking release of this footage, which came from a police car's dashboard camera, and five other videos of the incident. The footage was made public only after a freelance reporter, Brandon Smith, sued the department and a state judge ordered its release. It gets worse, though. Earlier this year, a district manager for the Burger King chain told a federal grand jury that several police officers had entered a Burger King near the scene of the shooting shortly after the incident and deleted 86 minutes of footage from the restaurant's security cameras. 4. The city settled with McDonald's family—shortly after the mayor's reelection. In a highly unusual move this past April, the Chicago City Council approved a preemptive $5 million settlement with the family, which had not yet filed a lawsuit in the case. It might have settled earlier, according to a critical op-ed in the New York Times, except there were electoral considerations at play—namely, Mayor Rahm Emanuel was engaged in a tight race to keep his place at the helm. Members of the 50-member council's black and Latino caucuses have since accused State's Attorney Alvarez and Police Superintendent McCarthy of trying to hide the shooting from the public, and have called for their removal. They've promised to hold a public hearing on city officials' handling of the case. 5. The McDonald family didn't want the video released, either. The boy's mother "did not want to see and has not seen the video of her son's execution—and what mother would want to see that replayed?" a family lawyer told MSNBC. But he added that the mother has had a "mixed reaction" to the release and is "relieved" that Van Dyke is facing criminal charges. The family has called on demonstrators to keep it peaceful.
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6. The way the city actually released the video was kind of sketchy. Journalists were given a one-hour window to download the video from a password-protected website. It included no audio, though audio exists. And Smith, the freelancer who successfully sued to make the video public, was barred from the press conference where city officials announced they would be releasing the video. 7. Van Dyke is the first Chicago cop in nearly 35 years to be charged with murder for an on-duty shooting. The Chicago Sun Times reports that Chicago's Independent Police Review Authority has investigated nearly 400 police shootings since its creation in 2007, and only one of those shootings has been deemed unjustified. This is consistent with national figures: The Washington Post found in April that only 54 officers had been charged, out of thousands of police shootings that had taken place since 2005. 8. Black Lives Matter protesters blocked traffic and store entrances along the Magnificent Mile on Black Friday. Hundreds of protesters, among them the Rev. Jesse Jackson, demonstrated on Saturday as well, chanting "No justice, no profit." The Chicago chapter of the NAACP held a protest outside City Hall on Monday, calling for Alvarez and McCarthy's resignations. (Update: McCarthy resigned on Tuesday.) 9. The University of Chicago was on lockdown Monday after the FBI alerted campus police to a threat related to the McDonald shooting. A user posted on an online forum that he intended to shoot 16 white students—ostensibly because that's how many times McDonald was shot. A 21-year-old Chicago man was arrested and charged in federal court for allegedly making the threat. As for Van Dyke, he faces a minimum of 20 years in prison if convicted of first-degree murder. On Monday, a judge set bail at $1.5 million; Van Dyke was released hours later, after posting a $150,000 cashier's check. 10. Mayor Emanuel is feeling the heat. Facing mounting pressure to fire his top cop, Emanuel announced on Monday that he would appoint a police accountability task force to assess the department's policies. The task force, whose six members were named on Tuesday, will be advised by former Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick. It will have four months to recommend changes for improving the department's accountability, oversight, and training. The move marks a reversal in Emanuel's stance on police oversight. In an interview with CNN in October, he said that increased public scrutiny on police had made Chicago police "fetal" and caused them to hesitate when making decisions on the job.
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