I've posted many times about police brutality, beginning when I found out about the Kelly Thomas murder by 6 Fullerton cops, in 2011. Everybody finds it abhorrent. The focus is on the racial aspects but black, white or purple no one wants to be the next innocent, unarmed child, old person, or whoever to be murdered and the have that murderer claim that he/she was in fear for his/her life, or that murdered reached for his/her waistband and the murderer feared a gun. Those seem to be the most popular excuses. They always seem to be accepted by the administration, and in the rare, very rare, cases that the murderers are brought to trial, are also it seems accepted by the juries.
CreditCreditZbigniew Bzdak/Chicago Tribune, via Associated Press
Black Security Guard Responding to Shooting Is Killed by Police
A black security guard at a bar in the Chicago suburbs was killed by the police as he apparently tried to detain a man he believed to be involved in a shooting, the authorities said Monday.
Officers from several police departments had responded to reports of a shooting early Sunday morning at Manny’s Luxury Lounge in Robbins, Ill., said Sophia Ansari, a spokeswoman for the Cook County Sheriff’s Office.
Witnesses told the police that a fight had broken out and someone had started shooting. After the authorities responded, a police officer shot the guard, Jemel Roberson, 26, who had a gun, Ms. Ansari said. Mr. Roberson died at the hospital.
Witnesses said that people in the crowd had yelled to arriving police officers that Mr. Roberson, who was wearing gear that read “Security,” was a guard. Ms. Ansari confirmed that Mr. Roberson worked for the bar.
This episode happened as many Republican politicians, including President Trump, have responded to mass shootings across the United States by calling for more people to protectively carry guns. After a shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue left 11 people dead, Mr. Trump suggested that people carrying firearms during services would have helped.
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Ms. Ansari said that five people were shot during the episode at the bar. The injuries sustained by four of those people, including the man believed to have initially opened fire, were not life threatening, she said.
An officer with the Midlothian Police Department shot Mr. Roberson, Ms. Ansari said. The Midlothian police chief, Dan Delaney, confirmed in a statement that one of his officers had shot a “subject with a gun.” He did not name the officer.
Ms. Ansari said the man who initially opened fire at the bar had not yet been charged. She said he was still at a hospital.
The shooting of Mr. Roberson is being investigated by the Illinois State Police, who did not return a call for comment.
Family friends of Mr. Roberson’s said he had worked as an organist at several local churches and had once dreamed of becoming a police officer himself, according to local news reports. Mr. Roberson had a state firearm owner’s identification card, Ms. Ansari said, which authorized his possession of firearms.
Mr. Roberson had planned to play later that day at New Spiritual Light Baptist Church, the pastor, Walter Turner, told the local ABC affiliate.
“How in the world does the security guard get shot by the police?” Pastor Turner said. “A young man that was literally just doing his job, and now he’s gone.”
A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A19 of the New York edition with the headline: Arriving at Site of Shooting, Officer Kills Security Guard. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe
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