Bodycam Shows Chicago Man, 26, ‘Open Fire on Cops’

Heart stopping footage shows the moment a Chicago man ‘opens fire on police’ before cops shoot more than 90 times to kill him.

Dexter Reed, 26, was killed following a traffic stop in Humboldt Park after police pulled him over for allegedly failing to wear a seatbelt.

The shooting on March 21 came just days after he appeared in court in connection with firearms charges, NBC reports.

Bodycam footage shows plain clothes officers approaching Reed’s SUV and ordering him to roll down his window with their weapons drawn.

Reed refuses at first, before several gun shots can be heard. The Civilian Office of Police Accountability said preliminary evidence showed Reed fired first, injuring one officer. However, this is not clear from the footage.

A gun was later recovered from the passenger side of the vehicle and an investigation is now underway.

NEW: Mother of Dexter Reed who was shot and killed by Chicago police during a traffic stop, falls over during a press conference.

New video footage shows police officers firing 96 shots at Reed in less than a minute.

Reed was pulled over during a traffic stop and refused to… pic.twitter.com/30OvL7lWUc

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) April 10, 2024

However, activists are already planning to demonstrate outside CPD’s 11th district at 6 pm on Tuesday.

‘I really can’t explain the pain that me and my family is going through, but I just hope there are people out there who understand he was a son, he was a brother, he was an uncle, he had loved ones,’ Reed´s sister, Porscha Banks, told reporters. ‘He was somebody very important.’

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson told a press conference that he was ‘devastated’ to be learning of another young, black man killed by police, but stressed that he could have been grieving the loss of another black life if the officer hit had been killed.

He spoke following the release of several bodycam clips, including from the officer who was shot.

They show the tactical unit driving up to the scene with multiple officers screaming commands for Reed to first lower the window and then open the door.

After he refuses, gunshots erupt. A man calling 911 to report the shooting described it as ‘shooting like they´re having a Vietnam War.’

Reed exits the vehicle and slumps to the ground, ending up facedown with his head near the rear passenger wheel and wearing only one shoe.

‘Don´t move! Don´t move!’ the officers scream at Reed who lies motionless on the ground as they try and search his body for a gun while slapping him in cuffs.

‘I don´t know where the gun is,’ an officer says. They later use a flashlight to look into the vehicle and locate the weapon on the passenger seat.

‘He started shooting at us,’ another officer says.

Afterward more officers and ambulance arrive on scene.

‘All of us were shooting,’ one officer says repeatedly.

Mayor Johnson vowed a full investigation, adding Tuesday´s release was part of an effort to be more transparent.

‘Attempts to withhold or delay information are mistakes of the past,’ he said at a news conference with COPA and the Cook County state’s attorney’s office.

‘As mayor and as a father, raising a family, including two black boys on the West Side of Chicago, I´m personally devastated to see yet another young black man lose his life during an interaction with police.

Of the officer he added: ‘If that bullet had hit him a few inches in a different direction, I would be here today talking about the loss of another young black man.

‘It weighs heavily on me that this event took place just blocks from my own community. And it is not lost on me that both Dexter Reed and this officer could have been my students.’

The officers were placed on 30 days of administrative leave amid the investigations from COPA and the Cook County state’s attorney’s office.

Andrew Stroth, an attorney for Reed’s family has branded the police stop ‘unconstitutional’ claiming the plainclothes cops did not announce they were police.

‘Nothing is going to bring Dexter back, but certainly efforts should be taken to make sure this doesn´t happen to another family,’ he said.

On Tuesday, police spokesperson Thomas Ahern said the department was cooperating with the investigation.

‘We cannot make a determination on this shooting until all the facts are known and this investigation has concluded,’ he said.

State’s Attorney Kim Foxx said her office will determine whether the officers´ use of force was warranted or necessitated criminal charges.

‘Let me assure you that our pursuit of justice will be relentless, guided by the facts, grounded in evidence and the law,’ she said.

The Cook County medical examiner’s office classified Reed’s death as a homicide and reported that he died of ‘multiple’ gunshot wounds.

Prior to his death, Reed was awaiting trial in a firearms case, county records show.

He was first charged with a misdemeanor count of retail theft in April 2023 for allegedly stealing a $950 shirt before the charge was tossed.

He was arrested again on July 13, 2023 when police allegedly discovered him carrying a loaded handgun at a music festival despite having no concealed carry license and after his firearm owners identification card had been revoked.

COPA was created in 2016 after the city was forced to release dashcam video of then-officer Jason Van Dyke shooting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, contradicting officers’ account that the teen had lunged at police with a knife. Its responsibilities include investigations of shootings by police.

The police department has been under a consent decree since 2019, handed down after the U.S. Justice Department found a long history of racial bias and excessive use of force following McDonald’s death.

The independent monitoring team overseeing the department’s compliance has repeatedly found it falling behind on deadlines and specific goals and last year called on Snelling as the incoming superintendent to ‘address challenges that have disproportionately delayed progress.’