A Chicago police officer was in a “reckless and uncontrolled state of mind” when he fatally shot Derek Jordan earlier this year in Humboldt Park, his family alleges in a lawsuit.
According to police, Jordan, 42, was fleeing officers around 5:30 p.m. on March 9 when they caught up to him in an alley in the 800 block of North Homan Avenue. Jordan was boxed in by CPD squad cars, a CTA bus and a parked car.
Officers repeatedly yelled for Jordan to get out of his car, but he kept trying to drive off and crashed into the bus and a police vehicle, video footage from the scene showed.
Within seconds of arriving on scene, one officer pulled out his gun and screamed at Jordan: “Get out of the f – – – ing car or I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you.”
About 20 seconds later, he fired six shots into Jordan’s car.
The Romanucci and Blandin law firm is representing Jordan’s family, and filed the lawsuit Friday. They held a news conference Monday afternoon laying out the allegations in their lawsuit, which names the city of Chicago and the police officer who shot Jordan as defendants.
The officer “came in unjustifiably hot to a scene in which Derek was inside a car that was blocked by several police officers,” said Antonio Romanucci, one of the lawyers representing Jordan’s family.
Those officers already on the scene were “working to de-escalate the situation,” Romanucci added. But the officer who shot Jordan “ignored any opportunity to calm the scene, to de-escalate and do what police officers are supposed to do.”
Representatives from the city’s Law Department and CPD declined Monday to comment on the lawsuit.
The officer who killed Jordan was stripped of his policing powers shortly after the incident, but he has not been criminally charged. The Civilian Office of Police Accountability is investigating the incident. A spokesperson said Monday that investigation remains ongoing.
Romanucci also called on Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke to investigate the incident and consider murder charges against the officer. A spokesperson for Burke said the state’s attorney’s office will review the incident after CPD and COPA have completed their own investigations.
Christine and Derek Thompkins, Jordan’s parents, attended Monday’s news conference. They said Jordan’s death has left them devastated.
“I have a hole in my heart,” Derek Thompkins said. “I miss my son and his dying this way has ruined every day for me. The person who shot and killed my son, shot and killed me also.”
“I can promise you, I am not going to back down,” said Christine Thompkins. “I will get justice for Derek. I just want justice to be done.”
The day he was killed, officers had attempted to stop Jordan’s white Mercedes, which was wanted in connection with a shooting earlier in the day on Interstate 290.
A gun was found in Jordan’s car, but he never brandished the weapon before his death, said Maura White, another attorney representing the family, during Monday’s news conference.
Read the full complaint here: