Body camera footage released Monday appears to show that a Chicago police officer threatened to kill a fleeing driver just seconds before opening fire into the passenger side of his car — killing him.
“Get out of the f—ing car or I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you,” the officer screamed out shortly before firing six shots into a tinted window.
The car’s driver, Derek Jordan, was pronounced dead at a hospital shortly after the March 9 shooting in Humboldt Park. Attorneys for Jordan’s family argued the shooting was “unnecessary” and was caused by the officer’s “failure to de-escalate.”
Officers had attempted to stop Jordan’s white Mercedes, which was wanted in connection with a shooting earlier in the day on Interstate 290, according to the Civilian Officer of Police Accountability. Jordan allegedly fled and struck a pedestrian in a crosswalk.
Officers eventually caught up to Jordan in an alley in the 800 block of North Homan Avenue, where he was boxed in by a CTA bus and a parked car, according to police and video footage.
Additional cops arrived at the mouth of the alley and completely surrounded his car, the video shows.
The officers repeatedly yelled for Jordan to get out, but he kept trying to drive off and crashed into the bus and a police vehicle, video shows.
Twenty seconds after arriving on the scene, the officer fired into Jordan’s car as it appeared to drive toward the bus again, video shows. Right after, a witness standing nearby yelled out, “Don’t kill him, man.”
“He’s wanted for murder, bro. Shut up,” the officer appeared to respond.
No one was injured in the earlier shooting on I-290 that allegedly involved Jordan’s car, according to Illinois State Police. A gun was found in the car, police said.
ISP wouldn’t initially comment on any connection between the expressway shooting and Jordan’s death. On Monday, the agency said its investigation into the earlier shooting “has been administratively closed.”
Jordan suffered multiple gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at Mount Sinai Hospital, officials said.
His family is being represented by the law firm of Romanucci and Blandin. The firm, which previously represented the family of George Floyd, said it has launched its own investigation into the shooting.
“When you watch the footage of the encounter between Derek Jordan and CPD officers, it is clear that there was nowhere Derek could run or drive away to,” attorney Antonio Romanucci said in a statement.
“They had him surrounded. At that point, stepping back and de-escalating was the right thing for officers to do. They had time and space to control the situation, but instead they escalated it and used a level of force that was not needed in that situation”
The officer who shot Jordan was stripped of his police powers on March 13, although it’s unclear if that move was related to the fatal shooting, the law firm said.
Police said the officer had been moved to the department’s Alternate Response Section, which is staffed by cops facing disciplinary action and others not medically cleared for full duty.