* Laquan McDonald was shot October 20, 2014. The video was released on November 24, 2015. From a December 8, 2015 Paris Schutz interview of Mayor Rahm Emanuel about the case…
PS: When did you first learn that there were discrepancies between the initial reports from officers on the scene that night and the video?
MRE: When we get the information, that it’s public, that’s when I learned it like everybody else.
PS: So former superintendent McCarthy didn’t tell you that there might be a problem between the official reports and what the video shows?
MRE: No. That’s not what he briefed me about.
* But that’s not what former police superintendent Garry McCarthy said this morning on WVON…
Charles Thomas: What did the mayor know and when did he know it? When did you brief him on the LaQuan McDonald shooting and what that videotape said?
Garry McCarthy: The shooting I believe happened on a Monday night, so it would’ve been at my Wednesday briefing that we did the shooting review. And after that, I spoke to the mayor and I told him all about it.
Maze Jackson: Did he know about it?
Garry McCarthy: I told him about the shooting and the video a few days afterwards.
Maze Jackson: Did he see the tape?
Garry McCarthy: Now, that, I can’t answer.
Charles Thomas: How did you tell him about the video? Did you tell him that the video did not jive with what the officers on the street said about it?
Garry McCarthy: Well, Charles, you’ve got to realize, I didn’t know that. We didn’t know that at the time because the investigation was underway. I got a high-level briefing from Dave McMartin, who’s the chief who conducted the preliminary investigation. And what I told the mayor was, the officer is going to have a problem explaining what’s going on here. And [Officer Jason Van Dyke] was stripped of his authority.
* According to the Tribune, Officer Van Dyke was stripped of his police powers nine days after the shooting…
Authorities said the city’s Independent Police Review Authority opened an investigation into the shooting within hours, and Van Dyke was stripped of his police powers nine days after the shooting.
* Now, some caveats. McCarthy is talking about running for mayor. So, the timing here could possibly be suspect. And as far as I can tell, this is the first time McCarthy has said anything like the story he told this morning. For instance, from a 2016 Tribune story…
In his first public remarks since the Laquan McDonald controversy cost him his job as Chicago police superintendent, Garry McCarthy distanced himself from any responsibility in the handling of the fatal police shooting, saying by law his only role was to strip the officer of his police powers.
During a panel discussion on policing earlier this week at Harvard University, McCarthy said he viewed the video of Officer Jason Van Dyke shooting the black teen 16 times on the day after the Oct. 20, 2014, incident.
“That was the end of my involvement until the Independent Police Review Authority recommended that I take the only disciplinary step that I could take by Illinois state law, which is to strip that officer of his police authority, which I did immediately,” he said Tuesday, according to a recording of his appearance. “After that, I was completely not involved in it.”
I’ve asked the mayor’s office for comment.
