Since this is Beverly – Morgan Park week at YoChicago, we read this week’s Chicago Reader article by John Conroy about a police shooting that occurred at the 95th Street el station on the CTA’s Red Line with great interest. The el stop is pretty far from Beverly, a couple of miles east, but as the last station on the Red Line, it’s one many Beverly residents use.
Conroy, a meticulous reporter who practically has carved a beat out of police torture and misconduct in Chicago, makes a compelling case that the biggest problem in the station on March 8, 2003 was not a group of young men fighting, but a police officer’s poor preparedness and improper actions, which resulted in his shooting Michael Pleasance.
Coming on the heels of well-publicized stories of police officers beating people up in a Northwest Side tavern (also caught on video) and in a West Loop bar, this is one more unfortunate incident that gives the impression Chicago police are too often causing safety problems rather than solving them, when the vast majority of officers are working hard and risking their lives to protect our neighborhoods every day.
Warning – the YouTube video above, in which Conroy narrates the CTA security camera footage from that day, is not particularly graphic, but it is pretty disturbing.