OAK LAWN (WBBM NEWSRADIO) - Oak Lawn police say they're still investigating, as a video has gone viral of officers punching a suspect after he was down during an arrest Wednesday evening.
Oak Lawn police said it started as a traffic stop at Southwest Highway and Austin and that a suspect ran and was caught a short distance away on McVicker, just off 95th Street, between a McDonald’s and a Speedway gas station. Police said the suspect had a semi-automatic handgun.
Myriah Deal was at the gas station and began videoing the incident.
CAUTION: VIDEO CONTAINS GRAPHIC MATERIAL
“They (police) grabbed him. He slowed down. And, from there, it should have been that. Once you grabbed him and y’all put him on the ground, then go on and put the cuffs on, but, y’all literally started beating on him. And then, it was multiple you guys beating on him," Deal said
On the video, the suspect is belly-down on the ground, as one officer punches him in his upper back, followed by a second officer punching the young man in his face six times, including after grabbing the suspect’s hair to turn his face towards the officer.
Oak Lawn police said the suspect would not listen to verbal commands and had a “physical confrontation” with officers.
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Myriah Deal believes what police did was overkill.
“Once they have you under control, what do you need to do extra for? I feel like they just want to get extra rage out, extra anger out. I don’t know. They probably had a bad day. That was, I feel like it was more so extra rage that they had and they was taking it out on the little boy,” she told WBBM Newsradio.
Deal thinks the officers should be fired from their jobs and criminally charged.
She said she was surprised to see that kind of thing happen in Oak Lawn.
“He was screaming. The young man was like screaming for his life. He was saying like, 'Stop,' like all kinds of stuff. He was definitely screaming and it was heartbreaking.”
According to a news release from Oak Lawn Police Division Chief Gerald Vetter, the suspect and an officer were taken to Christ Hospital and that the investigation is still going on.
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