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In many recent high-profile prosecutions of police officers firing at police officers, police officers testified on their own behalf, although experts said the number of such cases was too low to draw many conclusions. The results were also mixed. Last year, police officers who testified in gun trials in Minnesota, Missouri and Oklahoma were acquitted. Another Wisconsin officer was acquitted without testifying. And this summer, a Texas officer was convicted of murder after appearing on the witness stand.
Often, police officers used language similar to the witness bar to defend their actions. In the Minnesota case, Constable Jerónimo Yanez said he "had no choice" but to fire at Philando Castile, a black motorist. In the Oklahoma case, in which an officer shot Terence Crutcher, an unarmed black, Constable Betty Jo Shelby told jurors that she was convinced she had a firearm. "I meet a gun with a gun," she said. And in Ohio, where two juries have failed to rule on the fatal murder of Samuel DuBose, the agent Ray Tensing said last year that he had opened fire after "my police instinct came into play".
In the courtroom in Chicago on Tuesday, agent Van Dyke said he heard a radio colleague look for help after learning that someone had collapsed in a vehicle and went to the scene that same evening in 2014. He was worried after learning that Laquan had ripped the tire off a police cruiser, presumably with a three-inch folding knife that had been ripped off. ;he wore. When Constable Van Dyke arrived at the scene, he stated that Laquan's behavior had exacerbated his concerns.
"His face had no expression. His eyes were just coming out of his head. He just had those huge white eyes staring at me, "said agent Van Dyke. "I shouted at him," Let go of the knife! "
The video of the shooting of the police in the dashboard camera did not capture the sound of what was going on and the angle of the camera, behind Laquan, did not show Laquan 's facial expressions nor did it. before his body. Agent Van Dyke began filming a few seconds after arriving at the scene, showed the video. About 10 other police officers on the scene, some of whom followed Laquan for several blocks, did not fire.
In cross-examination, the prosecutors questioned officer Van Dyke about why he had not waited for a colleague with a Taser, why he had headed to Laquan then that he was shooting and why he had claimed that Laquan was approaching him when the video showed the teenager running away. , to the other side of the street.
"You did not even have to get out of the car at that time, did you?" Asked Jody Gleason, a prosecutor.
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