John Dempsey, for WLS-AM
Chicago police Officer Jason Van Dyke is ending his media silence, as his trial is set to get underway for killing black teenager Laquan McDonald in October of 2014.
Van Dyke spoke with the Chicago Tribune for 40 minutes in the law office of his attorney, who advised his client not to answer any questions about the shooting of McDonald, which was captured on police dash cam video. The officer is seen firing 16 shots into the body of the teen, who was wielding a knife and was high on drugs.
Van Dyke did tell the newspaper he prays every day for McDonald’s family and suggested he has been made a political scapegoat. Jury selection is set to start next week at the Leighton Criminal Courts building in Chicago.
Also Wednesday morning, Chicago Fraternal Order of Police President Kevin Graham told “The Big John and Ramblin’ Ray Show” on WLS, that Van Dyke does not deserve the scorn he has received.
“Being a police officer is an extremely difficult job, particularly at this time in our history, and we have to make decisions in the blink of an eye” said Graham. “Jason’s being made the problem of this, and it didn’t start with Jason. First of all it started with an offender and a knife. But long before that occurred, we didn’t have enough manpower on the street, we didn’t have enough equipment, we didn’t have enough supervisors, and so when they called for a taser, there wasn’t one available, when they called for a supervisor, there wasn’t one available, so you know the city is going to have to accept a larger responsibility in this entire situation than Jason.”
Graham also said that if Van Dyke requests a jury trial rather than a bench trial, the case should be moved out of Cook County because so many local residents have already made up their minds. He referred to a poll commissioned by Van Dyke’s attorneys which claims that 85 percent of prospective jurors have already made up their minds on the case.
“I think it would be very difficult. I’m not going to condemn all the people of Cook County, I think there’s lots of people who will keep an open mind, but certainly when you have 85 percent of the jury pool that has already made up their mind, that’s a tough number to overcome.”
Van Dyke has still not decided whether he wants his fate decided by a jury, or by Cook County Judge Vincent Gaughan.
