Protesters disrupted holiday gift shopping in downtown Chicago on Friday, marching up and down the city’s “Magnificent Mile” retail district, in the largest and most concentrated demonstration since the release of a video late Tuesday showing the shooting death of a black teenager by a white city police officer.
The video showing the October 2014 slaying of Laquan McDonald, 17, by officer Jason Van Dyke, who was charged with first-degree murder this week, has stirred the protests. In the video, taken from a police cruiser, Van Dyke is seen shooting McDonald 16 times.
As they have all week, protesters — frustrated by the fact that it has taken more than a year for Van Dyke to be charged — on Friday demanded the resignation of Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy and the assignment of a special prosecutor to take over the case from Cook County officials. Protesters also accuse Mayor Rahm Emanuel of being tone deaf to what they allege is a systematic trend of police misconduct against African Americans in the city’s most impoverished areas.
