The white police officer caught on video shooting Laquan McDonald, a black teenager, 16 times is set to go on trial for murder as Chicago is braced for heightened tension over the case which rocked the city.
The process of selecting a jury is due to begin Wednesday in the case of the former Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke, who faces six counts of first-degree murder, one charge of official misconduct and 16 separate counts of aggravated battery, one for each shot fired.
Build-up to the trial has been marked by Van Dyke taking the extraordinary step of doing two media interviews - with the Chicago Tribune and a local Fox TV affiliate – in which he talked of his fear of being jailed and insisted: “I’m not a racist.”
The drama surrounding the case escalated further on Monday when Chicago’s mayor, Rahm Emanuel, made the surprise announcement that he would be stepping down and not fighting for re-election next year. “This has been the job of a lifetime, but it is not a job for a lifetime,” Emanuel said.
The trial is expected to bring fresh scrutiny of the way the city, and Emanuel, dealt with the case, paying out $5m in compensation to Laquan McDonald’s mother but withholding for more than a year the video which revealed how he died.
Emanuel, former White House chief of staff for Barack Obama, was accused of a cover-up over the October 2014 shooting because the police dashcam video was only released in November 2015 after a legal battle and on the orders of a judge.
Emanuel, who had been re-elected for a second term months earlier, faced calls for his resignation when the video was made public and continues to be unpopular among African American residents of Chicago.
The video showed Van Dyke’s car pull up as McDonald, 17, was striding down the middle of a two-way street, carrying a knife. Van Dyke opened fire within seconds of emerging from his patrol car and most of the shots were fired after Laquan fell to the ground.
The release of the video led to weeks of protests and a breakdown in trust between black neighbourhoods in Chicago and the city’s predominantly white police force. As shootings have escalated in the predominantly black neighbourhoods on Chicago’s west side and south side, the lack of trust has been seen as a factor in police failures to mount successful prosecutions in many gun violence cases.
The case has also had repercussions for the Chicago police department – the force’s top officer, Superintendent Garry F McCarthy, was fired. A taskforce was created to look at accountability, oversight and training and a US justice department review found police regularly used excessive force.
The Rev Gregory Livingston, who had been leading a campaign for the mayor to resign, welcomed the news of his departure, saying: “He was always more of a decent power broker than someone who could govern people.”
He added: “This trial is coming up and that’s a very messy piece for him. That is the case that basically has altered the trajectory of his entire career. What comes out in that case could be very harmful for him.”
Asked what was at stake in the trial over the death of Laquan McDonald, Livingston said: “Justice. The emotional condition of the south and west side: can we have justice when it seems there is something so blatant on videotape? If he still walks, what happens then? There is a fear factor too for the whole city.
“It’s unpredictable. I pray that nothing happens but we have to be prepared for the worst.”
Van Dyke is the first on-duty officer to be charged with murder in Chicago since the 1970s. It is not in doubt that he fired the shots, but to gain a murder conviction prosecutors will have to demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that Van Dyke shot with no legal justification, and with the intent to kill.
Criminal justice activists are expected to gather on Wednesday and barriers have already been put in place around the Cook county courthouse, where the trial is expected to take place. Potential jurors will be given a questionnaire on Wednesday and are due to be selected next Monday.
The defence has asked for the case to be moved because they claim Van Dyke cannot get a fair trial in Chicago, but the Cook county circuit judge Vincent Gaughan said he will wait until jury selection to determine if a fair jury can be chosen.
On Monday, McDonald’s family appealed for calm. The teenager’s great uncle Pastor Marvin Hunter said: “On behalf of the Laquan McDonald family, I am asking that peace prevail no matter what the outcome of the verdict will be.”
He said the family was not looking for revenge and warned “outside agitators” against a repeat of rioting in the aftermath of the assassination of Martin Luther King 50 years ago, which caused destruction that still blights the poorest neighbourhoods.
“Our community cannot handle that kind of action. We are trying to economically rebuild our community. We need to be at a table and protesting in a way that will bring the resources back to our communities,” Hunter said.
