‘Could Hear Ringing In His Ears’: Chicago Cop Stripped of Full Policing Power After Bodycam Footage Caught Him Choking Handcuffed Boy Until He ‘Almost Passed Out’

The Chicago Police Department reassigned an officer caught on bodycam footage choking a handcuffed boy who was suffering a mental health crisis. The cop’s reassignment came after the city’s administrator for Civilian Office Police Accountability called for his superiors to strip him of his official police duties, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. The oversight agency’s administrator, Andrea Kersten, stated in a July 15 letter to the police superintendent that the cop used “deadly force” on a boy after he was dispatched to an incident on June 27 in the 4700 block of South Cottage Grove. Google Maps shows the image of 4700 S Cottage Grove Ave in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo: Google Maps) According to Kersten’s letter obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times, the officer went to the scene with a new officer he was training. The details of the police call weren’t released to the Sun-Times, but when the officers arrived, they encountered the boy and two other individuals. At some point, the cop in charge pulled out his gun and pressed it to the boy’s back. He backed off after the boy told him, “Blow my brains out,” Kersten’s letter states. The officer then pinned the boy to the ground and...