It's A Thanksgiving Miracle! Chicago Cop Might Not Get Away With Murdering Black Kid

A black kid staring, you say? We're on it!

Here's a story that is no doubt familiar to you by now. Cop shoots a black kid a whole bunch of times, black kid dies, cop tells a story of why he had no choice but to shoot shoot shoot bang bang, and then:  

The video is dramatically different than the initial police account of the shooting.

On Tuesday, Chicago Police Officer Jason Van Dyke was charged with first-degree murder for the fatal shooting of 16-year-old Laquan McDonald on Oct. 20, 2014. At the time of his death, the Official Police Story was that the teenager was comin' right for 'em, with a knife and, according to Pat Camden, a spokesman for the Fraternal Order of Police, "a 100-yard stare." Clearly, this left Officer Van Dyke no choice but to shoot McDonald dead, to save himself from the life-threatening stare of a black teenager.

The dash-cam video released on Tuesday, pursuant to court order, shows a slightly different story, surprise!

If you'd rather not ruin your appetite for the rest of your life, the video shows the teenager being shot, falling to the ground, and then being shot a whole bunch more times. Sixteen bullets in all, most of which were fired after McDonald was already on the ground and no longer a knife-wielding threat to the officers. Ah, but as we learned after the fatal shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, black teenagers have super-villain strength, so best to keep shooting until they are super dead.

Chicago police had been called to the scene that October night after reports of a man stabbing car tires with a knife. However, while we are but simple caveman unlicensed lay-lawyers, as we understand it, vandalizing cars is not typically a crime punishable by immediate public execution.

The unexpected plot twist in this grossly familiar story is that the officer who killed McDonald could go to prison. After more than a year of investigations, efforts to keep the video suppressed, an allegation by the manager of a nearby Burger King that police had erased the restaurant's security footage that captured the shooting, and the city's $5 million settlement with McDonald's family, Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez charged Van Dyke with murder, saying the officer's actions were "not justified and were not a proper use of deadly force."

The police union is, of course, supporting Van Dyke and had been seeking donations on GoFundMe for the officer and his family. The page no longer exists , perhaps because of GoFundMe's unfair and Satanic policy of prohibiting fundraising for crimers. Or, it would seem, even alleged crimers. Blah blah First Amendment blah blah. We are sadly certain the police union will figure out an alternative method for the #AllLivesMatterExceptBlackOnes a-holes who know the kid deserved to be killed, was no angel, was hopped up on his blackness, and posed a legitimate threat with that stare of his. We shall now have a Serious National Conversation about whether staring at cops is a crime, or at least should be a crime.

Fox News Girl Reporter Megyn Kelly devoted a segment of her Tuesday night episode to just askin' whether it's even legal, or appropriate anyway, for black people to stare at cops, as one Black Starer dared to do Tuesday night, during protests in Chicago:

During a panel discussion on her show, Kelly interrupted when she saw an image of a man staring at a police officer in Chicago during the protests. [...]

"He gets right in his face and stares him down? This cop hasn't done anything wrong," Kelly replied.

"You think that's fine? You have no problem with this?" Kelly later asked [radio host Richard] Fowler after he maintained that the protester had a right to stare down the officer.

"This is his first amendment right. This biggest problem here is..." Fowler said in response.

"It's not a question of what his constitutional rights are. It's a question of what's appropriate," Kelly hit back.

Staring while black might not technically be a crime, but it's quite uncouth, according to Megyn Kelly. And if you're a Chicago teenager, it just might get you killed.

Even if Officer Van Dyke is ultimately convicted and sent to prison for murdering Laquan McDonald, it's too late for this story to have a happy ending. But a modicum of justice would at least give this all-too-familiar tale of a cop killing a black kid a surprise ending. Maybe that's the best we can hope for.

[ HuffPo / Gawker / Addicting Info / TPM ]