15
1
The Chicago Police Department released the video of an officer shooting Anthony Alvarez last month. It showed the officers involved in a tense, drawn-out confrontation with Mr. Alvarez before he was killed by one of the officers.
As soon as it was uploaded to YouTube, people rushed to see if this would be another high-profile case like that of Laquan McDonald and Michael Brown Jr., which led to protests throughout the nation and sparked Black Lives Matter movements across America.
On March 31, in the very early morning hours, a shootout happened at a gas station. It was between Alvarez and three officers from Chicago Police Department at the Portage Park gas station where the whole thing began a little after 1 a.m. on March 31..
The police shooting video release includes nearly three dozen recordings of the early morning encounter with Alvarez, from cameras worn by CPD officers to security cameras.
Alvarez can be heard asking police why they shot him. He later died at Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center.
A version of the video that had been slowed down and zoomed in on shows what appears to be a pistol in Alvarez's right hand and a glowing phone in his left hand.
"The video certainly suggests enough for the police to make a claim that it was reasonable. It was a split-second decision and that it was reasonable for us," ABC7 Legal Analyst Gil Soffer said. "But we also have someone who recorded the video was shot in the back while he was fleeing, and wasn't aiming the weapon at the police officers."