President’s comments chime with Hillary Clinton’s lament for ‘loss of so many young African Americans’ as Chicago braces for more demonstrations

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old



President Obama has said he was “deeply disturbed by the footage of the fatal shooting of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald” in a Facebook message in which he also thanked the people of Chicago for their peaceful protests.

Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has also plunged into the heated debate following the release of a video showing the black teenager being shot multiple times by a Chicago police officer, saying: “We cannot go on like this.”



She also put the death in a national context, lamenting “the loss of so many young African Americans taken too soon” in a statement released on Twitter as Chicago continued to simmer in the wake of protests on the night the video was made public.

The city is braced for further demonstrations over the footage of 17-year-old Laquan being gunned down as he jaywalked near law enforcement, and a white Chicago officer was charged with murder in connection with the death.

“The family of Laquan McDonald and the people of Chicago deserve justice and accountability,” Clinton said.

She added that the country needed to grapple with broader questions.

“The mothers I met recently in Chicago are right: we cannot go on like this. All over America, there are police officers honorably doing their duty, demonstrating how to protect the public without resorting to unnecessary force. We need to learn from and build on those examples,” she said.

Obama reiterated this, asking Americans to “be thankful for the overwhelming majority of men and women in uniform who protect our communities with honor”.

He added: “I’m personally grateful to the people of my hometown for keeping protests peaceful.”

In Chicago, prosecutors dropped aggravated battery charges against activist and poet Malcolm London, who was arrested during demonstrations overnight on Tuesday.

“You are free to go,” judge Peggy Chiampas told London on Wednesday afternoon after he appeared in a packed courthouse.

London was arrested after police said he punched an officer in the face. Protests at his arrest were voiced by activists, city aldermen and thousands on social media.

Demonstrations were expected outside city hall on Wednesday, and others were being planned to block the city’s main shopping thoroughfare, Michigan Avenue, during the traditional post-Thanksgiving spending bonanza on Friday.

Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson said he hoped to see “massive” but peaceful protests.

Chicago’s mayor, Rahm Emanuel, warned that the city’s residents “will have to make important judgments about our city and ourselves – and go forward”.

The shocking video showing 17-year-old Laquan McDonald being gunned down by police was made public on Tuesday on the same day a white Chicago officer was charged with murder in the case.

The rare decision to bring a murder charge against a member of Chicago law enforcement perhaps contributed to the peaceful and relatively small nature of the demonstration that stretched into the early hours of Wednesday, as agitated crowds gathered in streets, stopped traffic in downtown Chicago and chanted.

The video made public on judge’s orders on Tuesday, which lasts six minutes and 54 seconds, shows the confrontation on 20 October 2014 between the teenager and two armed police officers. Laquan is seen striding down the middle of a two-way street and appears to be carrying a knife when the dashboard camera of a police patrol vehicle records the moment that two officers point handguns at him.

Laquan turns briefly toward one of the officers and is then shot, the impact of the first bullet apparently spinning him around before he collapses on the street. A puff of smoke or dust can be seen rising near his body as a bullet hits the ground. The camera continues to focus on his prone body as the officers, now out of frame, shoot him multiple times. An autopsy report from the Cook County medical examiner’s office showed Laquan was shot 16 times.

Documents filed in court describing the video’s contents said that for 14 to 15 seconds the officer, Jason Van Dyke, unloaded his entire gun into the teenager, who is seen lying facedown on the ground, his arms and legs jerking from the impact of the shots.

Of the eight or more officers on the scene, Van Dyke is the only one to have discharged his weapon, although a colleague can be seen with his gun drawn and pointed at Laquan.

The video ends shortly after a final puff of smoke rises from the ground and one of the officers moves forward and appears to kick an object from Laquan’s right hand.

On Tuesday, Van Dyke was indicted on a first-degree murder charge and denied bail at a hearing in the city’s main criminal courthouse hours after the state’s attorney, Anita Alvarez, announced the charges against him.

City officials and community leaders had been bracing for the release of the video, fearing an outbreak of unrest and demonstrations similar to those in Ferguson, Baltimore and other cities after black men were killed by police. A judge had ordered last week that the footage must be released by 25 November.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Chicago police officers line up outside the District 1 central headquarters Tuesday in Chicago, during a protest for 17-year-old Laquan McDonald. Photograph: Paul Beaty/AP

“Anyone who is there to uphold the law cannot act like they’re above the law,” said Emanuel at a press conference ahead of the video’s release. “I want to say one thing: there are men and women both in leadership positions and in rank and file who follow and live by that principle every day. Jason Van Dyke does not represent the police department.”

Van Dyke is the first on-duty officer to be charged with murder while working for the Chicago police department in nearly 35 years.

Since the incident he has been on paid desk leave while both federal and state investigations into the incident took place.

The Associated Press contributed to this report