Eight Chicago police officers were sent to hospitals with injuries ranging from a broken hand to cuts on the face after false social media rumors of a fatal officer-involved shooting sparked a near riot.
Eleven people, including three 14-year-olds and a 15-year-old, were arrested and charged with counts ranging from aggravated battery to a police officer to resisting arrest and reckless conduct, according to police.
“It just shows you the mentality of folks in some of our neighborhoods,” police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said Wednesday as he once again denied police shot anyone.
The confrontation started just after 8:50 p.m. when officers answered a call about gunfire in the 2600 block of South Albany Avenue, an area claimed by the Satan Disciples, according to police.
Someone heard gunfire and then saw a car speeding away near 24th Street and Washtenaw Avenue, police said. The corner has seen dozens of shootings in a decades-long conflict between the Disciples and the Latin Kings to the west.
Responding officers chased a car along 26th to Albany, near the Discount Mega Mall, where a crowd had gathered after a funeral for a Latin King. Police have not provided details about the chase, except to say officers at some point fired at the car as it sped toward them and they feared “they would be pinned between vehicles.”
The department said no one was hit by the shots.
“Nobody got hurt here tonight, except some police by morons who threw beer bottles,” a sergeant told one woman in the crowd asking about the rumored shooting, the Chicago Tribune reports.
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