Local Activists Storm CPD Headquarters to Demand Firing of Police Officer
Civil rights groups including the Black Youth Project 100 and the Southside Organization for Unity and Liberation (SOUL) have been protesting at Chicago Police Board hearings, calling for the city to fire officer Dante Servin. Last week, those groups, along with many others, protested in front of the Chicago Police Department (CPD) headquarters to renew their demands for Servin to be fired for killing Rekia Boyd.
The Independent Police Review Authority (IPRA) notified Chicago Police Supt. Garry McCarthy of the recommendation last week. According to officials, McCarthy has 90 days to accept or refute IPRA’s recommendation to terminate Servin’s employment with the police department.
Kohmee Parrett, who is the chairman of SOUL’s mass incarceration task force, says the facts are clear at this point.
“Tonight is about justice for Rekia Boyd,” Parrett says. “Dante Servin is still in that building with a job and she’s dead. I don’t want to wait until the next Black person dies to have us out here.”
Several residents also spoke at the hearing inside CPD headquarters to slam the police department for not acting fast enough to fire Servin.
Frank Burr spoke at the hearing. He claims to live four blocks from Servin in Douglas Park. He told the police board to “protect us from the officer next door.” Burr made reference to the U.S. Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) program called “Good Neighbor Next Door,” a program that offers financial incentives to police officers and other public servants, to live in certain neighborhoods.
Mark Clements, also spoke at the police board meeting. Clements, who spent 28 years in prison for a crime he did not commit, was only 16 years old when he was tortured in police custody.
“What compelled me to speak was that there are still 100 men languishing inside our prisons and the damaged has yet to be fixed,” Clements said. “We must take an honest examination of the fact that the men are still locked up in our prisons.”
Earlier this year, Servin was acquitted of criminal charges in the 2012 killing of a Rekia Boyd, a 22-year-old woman. In March of that year, Servin argued with a group of people in the Douglas Park neighborhood. According to police, Servin said a man pulled a gun and approached his car. Servin later said he was in fear for his life and fired over his shoulder at the group. Boyd was struck in the head and died the next day.
The Cook County state’s attorney charged Servin with involuntary manslaughter, but he was acquitted.
The city later settled a wrongful-death lawsuit with Boyd’s family for $4.5 million but admitted no wrong doing.
Last week’s police board hearing was attended by protesters and concerned citizens, along with Boyd’s family, including her brother Martinez Sutton, who was with Boyd on the night of the shooting.
After the hearing, the groups marched from police headquarters on 35th street, to Dyett High School located at 555 E. 51st St.
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