13-year-old Black boy with arms up shot, paralyzed by Chicago Police

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“He just wishes he would have stayed in the house because he might never walk again,” said Cierra Corbitt, mother of a 13-year-old Black boy.

On May 18, 2022, A.G, a young Black teenager only referred to by his initials, was unarmed when Chicago Police shot him. 

In the video footage provided by FOX 32 Chicago, A.G ran off the sidewalk and entered the gas station parking lot with his hands up. Soon after, A.G turns to his right, where he is shot by an officer and collapses on the ground. 

The bullet severely damaged the boy’s spine, and he could be paralyzed for the rest of his life. His family is still waiting for answers on whether or not A.G will be able to walk again.

Enraged with the Chicago Police Department, Corbitt is filing a federal lawsuit against the city and one against the officer who shot him. In the lawsuit, the officer’s name is not identified, as he is only referred to as John Doe Officer. In addition, she is demanding that the video of the shooting gets released to the public. 

Superintendent claims Officer “Doe” fired after teenage boy faced him.

David Brown, Chicago Police Superintendent, states that the teenage boy turned toward Doe, which resulted in him firing a shot. However, the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, the organization investigating officer shootings, stated no weapons were found at the scene. In addition, they have footage from Doe’s body-worn camera but say they can’t release it since the boy is a minor. 

After the police chased the boy, he raised his arms to surrender when the bullet struck him. According to a recent lawsuit,  the incident emphasizes the deeply distorted implementation of department policy on the pursuit of suspects. In addition, they say that the boy, a passenger, was adhering to orders from many officers instructing him to raise his hands. The excessive force lawsuit also states the boy “was unarmed and did as he was instructed. But the officer still shot him — recklessly, callously, and wantonly — right through his back.”

 “After he was shot, the new video shows, two officers carried the teen to a different location by only two legs, and a piece of clothing as his arms briefly dragged on the pavement —- something Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown had previously claimed was to avoid harm from an explosion at the gas pump following the shooting.”, said Daily Beast.

However, the sequence of events that followed contradicted Brown’s claims. Another officer responding to the incident crashed his car into the gas station, shifting the other officers’ attention towards him instead of the boy who had just been shot.

According to the lawsuit, “CPD officers did not render immediate aid to A.G, but instead callously dragged him across the pavement and then turned their attention to an uninsured officer who crashed into a sign at the gas station while arriving on the scene.”

Family seeks recovery, justice for boy shot by Chicago Police

As of now, A.G is housed at the Shirley Ryan Ability Lab, suffering severe wounds to his esophagus. He still has a piece of the bullet stuck in his back. Andrew M. Stroth, the family’s lawyer, told The Beast, “His wishes are to get healthy, his wishes are to walk, his wishes are to play basketball, his wishes are to ride his bike.”

The filing asserts that Doe knew or should have been aware of safer alternatives to the foot pursuit. There were many options that Doe could have enforced instead of shooting, such as creating a perimeter to contain the boy, then arresting him. At least one police helicopter was above, while several officers and police vehicles were watching the boy.

During the Chicago Police Department press conference, Superintendent Brown did not confirm or deny if the teenage boy had his hands up; however, an eyewitness confirmed that he did. The witness told ABC7, “They said, ‘Put your hands up, put your hands up!’ The boy’s hands were up. There’s other people out there that seen it. I got it all on my phone—his hands were up. He didn’t have a gun. They shot him for no reason.”

This latest shooting exposes the Chicago Police Department’s history of violent pursuit practices, which the city has pledged to amend.

The lawsuit declares that the department has been excruciatingly slow in advancing their pursuit policy to best-practice standards, as before June 2021, they had “no pursuit policy at all.” For many years, police officers claim to be finalizing policies for a change in regulation, yet no action has been executed.