Newly released video shows Chicago cop firing at SUV with heavily tinted windows that was wanted in shooting of off-duty officer

The officer and his partner stopped the SUV near the 5000 block of West Lawrence Avenue on Sept. 20, but it sped off as the two approached.

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The Civilian Office of Police Accountability has released video footage of an officer shooting into an SUV Nov. 9, 2022, in Irving Park.

The Civilian Office of Police Accountability has released video footage of an officer shooting into an SUV Nov. 9, 2022, in Irving Park.

The Civilian Office of Police Accountability

Newly released video shows a Chicago police officer firing at an SUV with heavily tinted windows that was wanted in the shooting of an off-duty officer in Irving Park in September.

In the video, the officer and his partner stop the SUV near the 5000 block of West Lawrence Avenue on Sept. 20, but it speeds off as the two approach it.

One of the officers fires at the passenger side of the SUV, which just misses the other officer as it squeezes between two police cars and escapes onto the Kennedy Expressway.

No one in the SUV was apparently hit, according to the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, which released the videos and reports on the shooting.

Chicago Police Department policy generally prohibits officers from firing at and into moving cars “unless such force is a last resort and necessary ... to protect against an imminent threat.”

A police report on the shooting uses almost that exact language in describing the officer’s actions. It states that the officer “discharged his firearm at the offending vehicle as a last resort to protect against an imminent threat” to his partner.

COPA said it was continuing to investigate the incident.

The SUV allegedly had been involved in the shooting of an off-duty probationary officer minutes earlier at Elston Avenue and Addison Street, according to police.

The off-duty officer, 27, had been headed north on Elston Avenue when she was “involved in an incident” with another driver, according to Chicago police and COPA.

The other driver had allegedly stopped the black SUV abruptly in front of her at Addison Street, then pulled a firearm and began shooting, according to police.

She was struck in her face and taken to Illinois Masonic Medical Center for injuries that were described as not life-threatening.

Officers later spotted the SUV near the 5000 block of West Lawrence Avenue. Video shows the two officers leaving their unmarked car and approaching the it from both sides.

The SUV lurches forward, and the officer on the passenger side raises his gun and fires at the vehicle. The SUV then drives between the unmarked car and a marked squad car and flees.

The two officers jump back into their car and chase the SUV, but tell dispatchers minutes later that they lost it. The SUV was later found, unoccupied, in the 5800 block of North Drake Avenue. No arrests have been reported.

Days after the shooting, the wounded off-duty officer was fired. The woman, “was a probationary police officer at the time, and we do not disclose personnel matters,” spokesman Tom Ahern said at the time.

Law enforcement sources said she had failed a drug test Sept. 17 and was stripped of her police powers that day.

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