Police officers won’t be charged with a crime in Dexter Reed shooting death
By Todd Feurer
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CHICAGO (WBBM) — Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke announced Wednesday that the Chicago police officers who killed Dexter Reed last year during shootout in Humboldt Park will not face any criminal charges.
“What happened that evening was a tragedy. A young life ended, a police officer was shot with a potentially career-ending injury, and many other lives were upended. An entire neighborhood was traumatized,” Burke said. “In this case, the evidence is clear and overwhelming that we would not be able to meet our burden and secure convictions. Therefore we will not be any of the police officers who were involved in this incident.”
Video released by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability – which investigates all police shootings – shows Reed, 26, shot an officer after failing to comply with orders to roll down his window after he was pulled over on March 21, 2024 in the 3800 block of West Ferdinand Street.
Police returned fire, with officers firing a total of 96 shots at Reed in 41 seconds, hitting him 13 times, killing him. Reed fired a total of 11 times during the shootout.
Both Reed’s family and COPA have raised questions about why a team of five plain-clothed tactical officers pulled over Reed to begin with.
In a federal lawsuit against the city and the officers, Reed’s mother claimed the traffic stop targeting her son was “unlawful and pretextual,” and was the result of traffic stop quotas CPD imposes on officers.
“Officers had no reasonable suspicion that Dexter violated any law, and they falsely stated otherwise in official CPD reports,” the lawsuit claims.
Former COPA Chief Administrator Andrea Kersten, who stepped down in February, has said the officers involved claimed they noticed Reed wasn’t wearing a seat belt, but she has questioned how they could have seen that through his vehicle’s tinted windows.
In April, the City Council Finance Committee rejected a recommendation from the city’s attorneys to settle the Reed family’s lawsuit for $1.25 million, meaning the lawsuit will now go to trial.
COPA’s investigation into the officers’ actions remains open. While they won’t face criminal charges, the officers could still face disciplinary action if COPA determines they violated any CPD policies.
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