Video showing a Chicago police officer fatally shooting a teenager on March 29 was released as scheduled by the city’s Civilian Office of Police Accountability.
Among various pieces of video released on Thursday was body camera footage, posted to the office’s website, showing an officer identified by case report documents as officer Eric Stillman chasing 13-year-old Adam Toledo down an alley, whom he began pursuing on foot after responding to calls of shots being fired in the area.
During the pursuit, Stillman can be heard yelling, “Stop” as the two stop running, pausing near the opening in a fence. “Stop right f—ing now! Hands! Show me your f—ing hands,” Stillman says, and then, “Drop it,” before firing a single shot, striking Toledo.
Police said they recovered a gun from the scene, and 21-year-old Ruben Roman has been charged with carrying and firing the gun that apparently brought police to the area originally. Authorities said investigators matched the gun with cartridge casings found at the scene where Roman had been firing, according to the Chicago Tribune.
In an email to the Associated Press, Stillman’s attorney, Tim Grace, said Toledo had a gun, leaving Stillman with no option but to fire his weapon.
“The juvenile offender had the gun in his right hand … looked at the officer which could be interpreted as attempting to acquire a target and began to turn to face the officer attempting to swing the gun in his direction,” Grace wrote. “At this point the officer was faced with a life threatening and deadly force situation. All prior attempts to deescalate and gain compliance with all of the officer’s lawful orders had failed.”
Adeena Weiss-Ortiz, an attorney for Toledo’s family, disputed that he held a gun in his hand when he was shot, pointing to the video footage.
“If he had a gun, he tossed it. … The officer said, ‘Show me your hands,’ [Toledo] complied,” she said, adding that the officer “is trained to look, he is trained not to panic.”
The office of Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot released a joint statement with counsel for Toledo’s family on Thursday saying that “both parties agree that all material should be released, including a slowed-down compilation of the events of March 29 that resulted in the tragic death of 13-year-old Adam Toledo.”
“We acknowledge that the release of this video is the first step in the process toward the healing of the family, the community and our city,” the statement said. “We understand that the release of this video will be incredibly painful and elicit an emotional response to all who view it, and we ask that people express themselves peacefully.”
In a press conference on Thursday, Lightfoot responded to the shooting, saying, “We live in a city that is traumatized by a long history of police violence and misconduct.”
She continued, “So while we don’t have enough information to be the judge and jury of this particular situation, it is certainly understandable why so many of our residents are feeling that all too familiar surge of outrage and pain. It is even clearer that trust between our community and law enforcement is far from healed and remains badly broken.”
Other materials posted by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability include footage from other officers who responded to the scene, footage from third parties, including home security camera footage, and sound recordings of shots recorded by ShotSpotter technology, a gunshot detection system.
During her Thursday press conference, Lightfoot called for peace in the wake of Toledo’s death. “Even as our understanding of this incident continues to evolve, this remains a complicated and nuanced story,” she said. “We all must proceed with deep empathy and calm and, importantly, peace.”
The new video of Toledo’s fatal shooting comes days after national attention was directed to suburban Minneapolis, where Brooklyn Center police officer Kim Potter killed 20-year-old Daunte Wright in a shooting that the former Brooklyn Center police chief called “accidental” before he resigned.
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Potter has been charged with manslaughter and was released on bond on Wednesday.
