Video shows Chicago officer shooting subway rider in back

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press


Michael Tarm, Ap Legal Affairs Writer
Updated 1:08 am CDT, Wednesday, April 29, 2020

CHICAGO (AP) — Extended security and body-cam video released Tuesday shows Chicago police shooting an unarmed short-order cook at the foot of a subway escalator and then again with his back turned to officers after they tried to stop him for violating a city ordinance by walking from one train car to another.

The Chicago Transit Authority and police body-cam videos for the first time provide a detailed look at how the incident unfolded from the time Ariel Roman used a subway’s gangway doors to when he was shot for the second time after scrambling away from officers up the escalator. Roman, 33, survived but was severely injured.

In the most striking video segment from a CTA camera, Roman is seen running up to the top of the escalator in the busy red line station holding a coat in his right hand. With the pursuing officers about 10 feet behind him, and with his back still turned to them, a female officer shoots him and he immediately slams face first onto the floor. The officer reholsters her gun and appears to handcuff him.

The Feb. 28 shooting raised questions about whether the Chicago Police Department is complying with a court-monitored reform plan that, among other things, seeks to remedy decades of excessive force by the 13,000-officer force through training that stresses conflict de-escalation.

Read more: https://www.chron.com/news/article/Video-shows-Chicago-officer-shooting-subway-rider-15232578.php

[Bernardo de La Paz]

1. Attempted murder. Throw the book at that Authoritarian thug. . . . nt

[dalton99a]

2. Clearly unarmed

Lawyers for Roman say he clearly wasn’t armed when the female officer shot him the first time, nor when the injured Roman scrambled up the escalator with his back turned. The first bullet damaged his small intestine and bladder, and the second one entered his buttocks and lodged near a sciatic nerve, his lawyers say.

Two days after Roman was shot, Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx’s office dropped resisting arrest and criminal narcotics charges against Roman at the request of then-interim Police Superintendent Charlie Beck. Roman in March sued the city and the two officers for unspecified damages.

[The Wizard]

3. Expect the standard defenses:

His hand was by his waistband, he had a shiny object, the shooter feared for his / her life, fit the description of a suspected violent fugitive.

[PatSeg]

4. For walking from one car to another?

Seriously?

[lagomorph777]

5. ...and cop fired in a crowded subway station? How many innocent bystanders could have been killed?

That cop needs to be put away forever.

[PatSeg]

9. Yes

That dawned on me as well. That is insane.

[Progressive Jones]

6. It's an ordinance akin to jay walking. nt

[greenjar_01]

8. Effectively, it's an anti-pan-handling ordinance

Since the majority of people walking in-between cars are panhandling (which is itself prohibited, so it's just another way to gaffle them folks up).

[PatSeg]

10. Apparently

possible panhandling comes with a death sentence. Thank goodness the man didn't die. I can imagine there will be a successful lawsuit in his future, though I'm sure he'll never be the same.

[greenjar_01]

7. Conservative Lawyers Group arriving imminently

They'll tell you all about how this is justified.

Brace for impact.

[Sapient Donkey]

11. Oh no, those conservative lawyers are too busy defending some mothers who were arrested

while performing a protest with their children at a park closed due to covid-19... They are clearly defending our civil rights from the police in ways that truly matter. They'll defend these cops once they can do it without the glaring hypocrisy being as obvious.