Special Prosecutor To Investigate Cops Who Saw Laquan McDonald's Shooting

By Stephen Gossett in News on Jul 1, 2016 8:28PM

A still from the Laquan McDonald dashcam video.

A Cook County judge on Friday ruled that a separate special prosecutor will be appointed to investigate whether Chicago police officers who were present at the fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald engaged in a cover up.

The ruling was issued by Judge Vincent Gaughan, who previously approved a request that a special prosecutor oversee the case against Jason Van Dyke, the officer charged with McDonald's murder. Outgoing Cook County State Attorney Anita Alvarez recused herself from the murder case amid strong criticism of the department's failure to charge Van Dyke earlier this year.

McDonald was shot 16 times on October, 20 2014, but video was not released until November 2015, just hours before Van Dyke was charged. The release of the video prompted massive public protest, calls for reform and an ongoing investigation by the Department of Justice. The footage, taken from police dashcam, appears to contradict some officer accounts.

A coalition of attorneys and community activists filed a petition in February requesting a special prosecutor for the Van Dyke case and also for the additional officers who were present at the crime scene.

"This could not be more important," Locke Bowman, attorney for the coalition, said in a statement to the Tribune following the ruling. "If the Chicago Police Department had had its way, if no videotape had surfaced of how that shooting had happened, the false account in the Police Department's official records would have become the quote — truth — unquote about how Laquan McDonald met his death."