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Police Report in Killing of Black Security Guard Is Criticized as Rushed
Source: New York Times
Police Report in Killing of Black Security Guard Is Criticized as Rushed
By Matthew Haag
Nov. 14, 2018
The Illinois State Police took steps on Tuesday to defend the actions of a suburban Chicago police officer who killed an armed security guard on Sunday, claiming that the guard was not wearing a uniform and ignored verbal commands to drop his weapon. But witnesses have contradicted that account, and it was not clear how the State Police reached its conclusions.
The findings by the state’s Public Integrity Task Force, the lead agency in the case, were based on a preliminary investigation into the killing of the guard, Jemel Roberson, 26, who was responding to a shooting at a bar. But a lawyer for his family disputed the state’s account and criticized the agency for rushing to judgment just days after the deadly encounter.
“We are three days into this and they are saying preliminarily that it was a good shoot?” the lawyer, Greg Kulis, said in an interview on Wednesday. “They traditionally take nine months or longer.”
The killing of Mr. Roberson has ignited protests and demands for justice, just a month after a Chicago police officer was found guilty of second-degree murder in the high-profile killing of Laquan McDonald, a black teenager who was shot 16 times by an officer in 2014. Protesters have pointed out that Mr. Roberson, who was black, was killed even though he was a “good guy with a gun,” the type of person put forth by the National Rifle Association and President Trump as a solution to mass shootings.
-snip-
By Matthew Haag
Nov. 14, 2018
The Illinois State Police took steps on Tuesday to defend the actions of a suburban Chicago police officer who killed an armed security guard on Sunday, claiming that the guard was not wearing a uniform and ignored verbal commands to drop his weapon. But witnesses have contradicted that account, and it was not clear how the State Police reached its conclusions.
The findings by the state’s Public Integrity Task Force, the lead agency in the case, were based on a preliminary investigation into the killing of the guard, Jemel Roberson, 26, who was responding to a shooting at a bar. But a lawyer for his family disputed the state’s account and criticized the agency for rushing to judgment just days after the deadly encounter.
“We are three days into this and they are saying preliminarily that it was a good shoot?” the lawyer, Greg Kulis, said in an interview on Wednesday. “They traditionally take nine months or longer.”
The killing of Mr. Roberson has ignited protests and demands for justice, just a month after a Chicago police officer was found guilty of second-degree murder in the high-profile killing of Laquan McDonald, a black teenager who was shot 16 times by an officer in 2014. Protesters have pointed out that Mr. Roberson, who was black, was killed even though he was a “good guy with a gun,” the type of person put forth by the National Rifle Association and President Trump as a solution to mass shootings.
-snip-
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/14/us/security-guard-shot-by-cops-jemel-roberson.html
