On Dec. 26, Chicago Police Officer Robert Rialmo responded to a series of 911 calls placed by a mentally ill teenager having a dispute with his father. Upon arrival, Rialmo said Quintonio LeGrier, 19, swung a bat at his head twice, barely missing. When the teen raised the bat a third time, Rialmo said that’s when he decided to act, shooting LeGrier six times and killing him.

Bettie Jones, 55, an innocent bystander who lived downstairs, was accidentally killed during the altercation, after at least one bullet passed through the teen and into her chest.

LeGrier’s father, Antonio LeGrier, filed a wrongful death lawsuit alleging his son was not a threat. Rialmo responded by filing a countersuit, requesting $10 million in damages from LeGrier’s family, citing the “extreme emotional trauma” he suffered as a result of the killings, according to the Chicago Tribune.

A new low for the Chicago PD

“Antonio LeGrier’s attorney, Basileios Foutris, was incredulous at what he called the officer’s ‘temerity’ in suing the college student’s grieving family. Foutris said the lawsuit was ‘outlandish.’”

“After this coward shot a teenager in the back … he has the temerity to sue him? That’s a new low for the Chicago Police Department,” said Foutris.

Rialmo’s lawyer, Joel Brodsky, says his client is suffering too. “He’s got this extra added burden (with) the death of Jones,” said Brodsky. “He’s going through what I would call the normal grieving process for someone who is forced to take a human life.”

“The fact that LeGrier’s actions … forced Officer Rialmo to end LeGrier’s life, and to accidentally take the innocent life of Bettie Jones, has caused, and will continue to cause, Officer Rialmo to suffer extreme emotional trauma,” states the lawsuit.

But a closer look at the suit indicates that one of the primary motivations for filing it is to protect the police officer’s reputation.

“Brodsky said there’s been a presumption that his client did something wrong when he opened fire on LeGrier and the lawsuit was an opportunity to get Rialmo’s side of the story out there, because it hasn’t been disclosed officially,” reports the Tribune.

Police killings and lottery tickets

Trust in police is at an all-time low, particularly in Chicago, which has a strong history of white police officers killing black citizens. The shooting death of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald by police in Oct. 2014, was a turning point for the city, after it was ordered to pay the teen’s family $5 million. McDonald was shot 16 times by a white officer.

Rialmo’s attorney accused the LeGrier family of taking advantage of Chicago’s recent payout to the McDonalds. “Ever since the McDonald payoff, people are treating officer-involved confrontations like a lottery ticket and they’re waiting to cash it in,” said Brodsky.

“Rialmo reasonably believed that if he did not use deadly force against LeGrier, that LeGrier would kill him. Officer Rialmo drew his handgun from its holster, and starting to fire from holster level, fired eight rounds at LeGrier from his 9 mm Smith & Wesson handgun, which holds 18 rounds, in approximately two and a half seconds,” the lawsuit states.

“LeGrier was shot on the left side of his chest, the lower left side of his back, the right buttock, the left arm and suffered graze wounds to his chest and right shoulder, according to LeGrier’s autopsy report. Jones died of a single gunshot wound to the chest, Cook County medical examiner records show,” reports the Tribune.

Sources:

ChicagoTribune.com

NYDailyNews.com