Failed Oversight Follows Suburban Police Shootings

Brandon Harper’s memorial. Jared Rutecki/BGA

In the second part of our “Taking Cover” series, we examined the oversight that followed police shootings. As we wrote, the officers who have shot people in the suburbs under questionable circumstances have done so with impunity.

In one particularly questionable case, a police officer fatally shot an unarmed 23-year-old man in his car outside his mothers house in broad daylight with two teens present. Before the officer fired one round into the man’s chest, he told the occupants of the car to cover their eyes with their hands. This is how one of the witnesses described the shooting:

It happened so fast it really is not even a story. We pulled up, he jumped out, there he was, bang! It just happened so fast.

Last year, the same police officer was promoted to sergeant.