Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by on Monday January 23 2017, @08:59AM   Printer-friendly

The World Socialist Web Site reports:

On [January 18], a Chicago police officer was arrested and charged with first degree murder for the fatal shooting of an unarmed man at the beginning of the year.

The officer, Lowell Houser, 57, shot Jose Nieves, 38, following an argument on the morning of January 2 in Hermosa, a working class neighborhood on the city's Northwest Side.

The charges against Houser come just days after the release of a damning report on Chicago police conduct by the US Department of Justice, which carried out a 13-month investigation of the Chicago Police Department (CPD). The report catalogued systematic violence and lawlessness on the part of the CPD, and concluded, in its restrained language, that the department engaged in "a pattern or practice of force in violation of the Constitution."

[...] Houser is the second Chicago cop to be charged with murder in little over a year. The previous, Jason Van Dyke, was charged with first-degree murder on November 24, 2015, for the killing of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald over a year earlier, in October 2014.

[Continues...]

More from the Chicago Tribune:

Prosecutors had sought to keep Officer Lowell Houser in custody, citing a state statute that calls for mandatory no-bail for a defendant who personally fires a gun in a fatal shooting and faces a possible life sentence.

But Judge Donald Panarese Jr., without giving any explanation for his reasoning, released Houser on electronic monitors and without having to post any cash bail. The judge also gave him the option to be rid of the electronic monitoring if he posted $15,000 cash.

Lawyers with years of experience at the Leighton Criminal Court Building who have no connection to the case could not recall a similar bail being set in the many hundreds of murder cases handled in bond court in recent years.

The DOJ report mentioned above can be found here.


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Phoenix666 on Monday January 23 2017, @04:40PM

    by Phoenix666 (552) on Monday January 23 2017, @04:40PM (#457678) Journal

    Since nuking it from orbit isn't a real option, might I suggest a different process? Something along these lines:
    1. An agency from outside Chicago forces the corrupt elements of the judicial system to reform themselves.
    2. The newly reformed judicial system ruthlessly goes after other corrupted elements of the system. Politicians, corrupt businessmen, etc.

    It's a fine idea, except that nothing like that has happened since the Civil Rights days. Detroit has had, what, two mayors in a row go to prison for corruption and the city is a basket case but no outside force has done what you recommend. Their being an even more egregious example they would be a stronger candidate for an outside intervention that has not come.

    There's also St. Louis County in Missouri where the entire justice system amounts to nothing more than an extortion racket. The judges and their henchmen, the cops, murder and oppress the citizens with impunity. The State of Missouri, Congress, and the Whitehouse did nothing about it except have the Justice Department release a report saying mean (but true) things about them. The FBI didn't take them down under RICO, as they should have. Federal troops were not sent in to arrest the cops and judges and cart them off to jail.

    So, yes, actually nuking Chicago is wildly more improbable than the highly improbable outside intervention you're talking about, but wish fulfillment is not about odds.

    --
    Washington DC delenda est.
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +1  
       Informative=1, Total=1
    Extra 'Informative' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   3