The "Justice" Dept. report on the Chicago police tells black folks what they likely already knew…

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Chicago’s police superintendent, Eddie Johnson, said that some of the findings were “difficult to read,” and that he wanted to expand training and mentoring for officers. “While I’m optimistic and hopeful about the direction that we’re heading in,” Mr. Johnson said, “I’m realistic about the fact that there is much, much, much more work that needs to be done.”

Chicago’s announcement came only a day after the Justice Department and city leaders in Baltimore announced an agreement that called for greater oversight of the police department there, as well as improved training and safety technology. The consent decree came in the wake of the death of Freddie Gray, 25, who died of a spinal cord injury in 2015 while in the custody of the Baltimore police.

Chicago officials have been bracing for the findings after more than a year of tense public debate about the police and its long, troubled history of community relations, particularly with African-American and Latino residents. Announced in December 2015, the investigation came in a year of cascading violence for the city. Shootings and murders rose significantly. In 2016, there were 762 homicides in Chicago, more than New York City and Los Angeles combined and more than this city has experienced in 20 years.

The inquiry was spurred by the city’s reluctant release of a chilling video that showed a white police officer shooting a young black man, Laquan McDonald, 16 times. For months, the city had fought to keep the dashboard camera footage from being made public, but a judge ultimately ordered its released. Residents were outraged by the images, some marching in protest and demanding that Mr. Emanuel resign.

Long before the Justice Department’s findings, the critiques of the Chicago police were stark. Two years ago, the city announced reparations and an apology to black men who had for years said they were tortured and abused at the hands of a “Midnight Crew” of officers overseen by a notorious police commander in the 1970s and 1980s. Last year, a task force appointed by Mr. Emanuel issued a blistering report that concluded that racism had contributed to a long pattern of institutional failures by the police.

“C.P.D.’s own data gives validity to the widely held belief the police have no regard for the sanctity of life when it comes to people of color,” the task force wrote. “Stopped without justification, verbally and physically abused, and in some instances arrested, and then detained without counsel — that is what we heard about over and over again.”

As Chicago awaited the Justice Department’s announcement, city officials said that they were already making substantive changes at the department — separate from whatever the Justice Department would announce. Mr. Emanuel’s aides pointed to changes the mayor has called for in improved training and equipment. All Chicago patrol officers are to have body cameras by the end of 2017.

“As you can see from our actions over the past year, we are committed to continuing to make significant and much-needed reforms, providing officers with the tools and certainty they need to do their tough jobs well,” said Adam Collins, a spokesman for Mr. Emanuel.

But controversial police shootings have persisted, and some say the mayor’s changes have not come fast enough. Just weeks after the Justice Department began its investigation, an officer shot and killed two people: a teenager said to be wielding a bat, and an elderly neighbor hit by a stray bullet. That officer later sued the estate of the teenager he killed, claiming emotional trauma.

Last summer, another officer fatally shot an unarmed teenager in the back as he was running away.

 

[1CK1S]

Black folks been saying this for decades, ol late to the party a$$ n-gga's

 

[Copper]

....And nothing will be done about it

 

[Already Home_17]

a nigga is flabbergasted

 

[KingFreeman]

 

[ThaNubianGod]

Nothing but a rehab gesture for Rahm in Chitown. How the fuck is this guy not being called out. When we had those LAPD scandals out here in the 90's, heads were rolling.

 

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http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...unconstitutional-policing-doj-finds/96533530/

After reviewing police data, the Justice Department found Chicago officers used force nearly 10 times more in incidents involving black suspects than against white suspects. African-Americans were the subject of 80% of all police firearm uses and 81% of all Taser contact-stun uses between January 2011 and April 2016. Of incidents where use of force was used against a minor, 83% involved black children and 14% involved Latino children during the same time period, the report notes.

 

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http://abcnews.go.com/US/takeaways-...ice-report-chicago-policing/story?id=44757551

Takeaways From Scathing Department of Justice Report on Chicago Policing

Federal investigators have determined that the Chicago Police Department has routinely violated the constitutional rights of citizens for years in numerous ways, such as using excessive force, permitting racially discriminatory conduct and shooting individuals who posed no immediate threats, the U.S. Department of Justice announced today.

“One of my highest priorities as attorney general has been to ensure that every American enjoys police protection that is lawful, responsive and transparent,” Attorney General Loretta Lynch said in a statement today in announcing the findings. “Sadly, our thorough investigation into the Chicago Police Department found that far too many residents of this proud city have not received that kind of policing.”

After a year-long probe into the city’s 12,000-officer police force, which began in December 2015 after the release of a dashcam video of a white officer’s shooting a black teen, the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the North District of Illinois today released a scathing 161-page report that details their findings of “systemic deficiencies” in training and accountability that investigators say have led to a pattern or practice of using force in violation of the Constitution.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois said “these findings are not new” and should come as no surprise to Chicago residents.

After the report’s release, officials from the Justice Department and the city of Chicago said today they have signed an agreement in principle to work together, with community input, to create a federal court-enforceable consent decree addressing the deficiencies uncovered during the investigation. An independent monitor, who has yet to be chosen, will oversee compliance with the consent decree, according to the Justice Department.

“While the Chicago Police Department has made real progress and achieved meaningful reforms, the incidents described in this report are sobering to all of us,” Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel told reporters today. “Police misconduct will not be tolerated anywhere in this city and those who break the rules will be held accountable for their actions.”

Here are some highlights from the report:

CPD Uses Deadly Force in Violation of Constitution

According to the report, federal investigators found that the Chicago Police Department engaged in a pattern or practice of using force that is unreasonable and unconstitutional, including the following: shooting at fleeing suspects who presented no immediate threat; shooting at vehicles without justification; using less-lethal force, including Tasers, against people who pose no threat; using force to retaliate against and punish individuals; and using excessive force against juveniles.

“This pattern is largely attributable to systemic deficiencies within CPD and the City,” the report stated, citing, among other shortcomings, the department’s historical failure to train its officers in de-escalation and failure to conduct meaningful investigations of uses of force.

For instance, federal investigators observed police academy training on deadly force that consisted of a video made decades ago, which the report said was inconsistent with both current law and the Chicago Police Department’s own policies.

“The impact of this poor training was apparent when we interviewed recruits who recently graduated from the Academy: only one in six recruits we spoke with came close to properly articulating the legal standard for use of force,” the report stated. “Post-Academy field training is equally flawed.”

The deficiencies in officer training are exacerbated by the lack of adequate supervision provided to officers in the field, the report said.

The Majority of Cases Are Not Investigated

The report found the city of Chicago fails to investigate the majority of cases it is required to by law, including misconduct allegations filed against police officers. The ones that are investigated, “with rare exception, suffer from entrenched investigative deficiencies and biased techniques,” and discipline taken against the accused officers is “haphazard,” “unpredictable” and “does little to deter misconduct,” according to the report.

Federal investigators, who reviewed hundreds of investigative files, found that civilian and officer witnesses – and even the accused officers – are frequently not interviewed during an investigation. The city investigators also frequently failed to collect basic evidence and have allowed union representatives and attorneys to “coach officers in the middle of recorded interviews -- with official protocols actually prohibiting investigators from preventing this, or even referring to it on tape,” the report stated.

The report also detailed a lack of transparency regarding officer misconduct complaints, saying the “complainants themselves are often kept in the dark about the status of their cases” and the city investigators do not provide periodic updates to individuals complaining of officer misconduct.

“Several complainants told us that they were left unaware of what was happening with their complaint for months, or even years – and some never heard back at all,” the report stated.

CPD ‘Tolerated Racially Discriminatory Conduct’

The report called on the city of Chicago to address “serious concerns” about systemic deficiencies within the police department that disproportionately affect black and Latino communities. According to the report, statistics show the Chicago Police Department uses force almost 10 times more often against blacks than against whites.

“CPD’s pattern or practice of unreasonable force and systemic deficiencies fall heaviest on the predominantly black and Latino neighborhoods on the South and West Sides of Chicago, which are also experiencing higher crime,” the report stated. “As a result, residents in black neighborhoods suffer more of the harms caused by breakdowns in uses of force, training, supervision, accountability and community policing.”

According to the report, the Chicago Police Department “tolerated racially discriminatory conduct” that federal investigators say contributes to its pattern of unreasonable force. Federal investigators reviewed the police department’s complaint database, which showed 980 police misconduct complaints coded as discriminatory verbal abuse on the basis of race or ethnicity from 2011 to March 2016. Just 13 of those complaints, or 1.3 percent, were sustained, generally when there was audio, video or other irrefutable evidence, the report said.

Federal investigators found 354 complaints for the use of the word “n--“ or one of its variations. Only four, or 1.1 percent, of these complaints were sustained, according to the report.

Federal investigators also found that some officers expressed discriminatory views and intolerance with regard to race, religion, gender and national origin in public social media forums. Meanwhile, the police department failed to take sufficient steps to prevent or appropriately respond to this issue, the report said.

The report urged the city to restore its police-community trust by addressing both discriminatory conduct and the disproportionality of illegal and unconstitutional patterns of force on minority communities.

“We have serious concerns about the prevalence of racially discriminatory conduct by some CPD officers and the degree to which that conduct is tolerated and in some respects caused by deficiencies in CPD's systems of training, supervision and accountability,” the report stated.

 

[janklow]

Nothing but a rehab gesture for Rahm in Chitown. How the fuck is this guy not being called out.

political elites protect their own.