Chicago’s independent police review authority (IPRA) has publishedan online database that makes public more than 100 incidents of alleged police misconduct, that the agency is currently investigating.
The trove of evidence – which includes graphic videos depicting fatal shootings, police incident reports and audio recordings – was published on Friday, and comes in the wake of recommendations made by a police accountability task force last April.
The task force recommended a complete overhaul of many aspects of the Chicago police department’s operations, including that all videos relating to police shootings be released within 60-90 days after the incident. The task force was launched by Mayor Rahm Emanuel after video footage of the 2014 fatal police shooting of Laquan McDonald was released in November. The footage was ordered released by a judge as a result of a freedom of information lawsuit.
In a statement published minutes after the database was published online, Emanuel said his administration was “acting boldly and thoughtfully” in implementing the task force’s call for transparency, “to change the decades-old city practice of waiting to release videos and other evidence from police-involved incidents until the associated investigations concluded”.
This new database allows anyone to search through current open incidents of alleged police misconduct. IPRA is not required to list every case currently under investigation.
Rather, the agency must publish those that show officer-involved shootings, the deployment of a Taser, or any evidence linked to a report that a person was harmed while in police custody.
“It’s really important for you to keep in mind that these materials may not convey all of the facts and considerations that are relevant [for each case],” Sharon Fairley, the recently appointed head of IPRA, said at a press conference announcing the launch.
One incident IPRA published ample material for public viewing is of a 60-year-old Canadian tourist, Terrence Clarke, visiting Chicago in 2015 after attending a Chicago Black Hawks hockey game.
According to cellphone footage, an off-duty police officer can be seen punching Clarke in the face with handcuffs in his hand as Clarke resists arrest in a local restaurant.
Some of the city’s leading activists responded optimistically to IPRA’s transparency efforts.
“I feel confident that now hopefully they are going to do the right thing and hold officers accountable when they are in the wrong,” said William Calloway, the activist who helped secure the release of the video of Laquan McDonald.
But Calloway said there is still more to be done.
“The videos I want to see are of closed investigations,” Calloway said. “Those are the ones that will really be something to see.”
The release of the database comes as the overall shooting rates in Chicago continue to mount, with at least 60 people shot, six fatally, over the Memorial Day weekend.
IPRA sees the database is a necessary step for Chicago to become more accountable to its citizens.
“These past few months as the city has struggled with so many questions about policing and police accountability it has been clear that we all agree that there’s a lack of trust and that increased transparency is essential to rebuilding that trust,” Fairley said.
“Today represents an important first step toward that end,” she continued.
