"A good guy with a gun" saves the day, only to be shot dead himself

[Angrboda]

A new statement from the state agency tasked with investigating a white police officer's fatal shooting of a black security guard in suburban Chicago suggests the officer could not have known the man wasn't a threat.

Jemel Roberson, 26, was armed and working security at Manny's Blue Room in the village of Robbins around 4 a.m. Sunday when a shooting occurred, according to the Cook County Sheriff's office. Witnesses said Roberson subdued one of the people involved.

In a statement released late Tuesday night, the Illinois State Police said that according to witness statements, an officer from the nearby village of Midlothian gave Roberson "multiple verbal commands to drop the gun and get on the ground before ultimately discharging his weapon and striking the subject."

The agency said Roberson was in "plain black clothing with no markings readily identifying him as a Security Guard."

That contradicts what people who said they witnessed the shooting told the media.

Jakia Woods lives in a house adjacent to Manny's parking lot. She said officers already on the scene had asked Roberson to release the suspect, and Roberson was complying, when another officer came through the bar's back door.

"Before [Roberson] could get up off of him, the officer comes flying out this door gun up," Woods said Tuesday afternoon while standing on her porch. "He says, 'Get on the ground,' and before he says 'ground,' he fires the first shot."

(MPR News)