It was a routine call to remove a drunk man off the bus who had refused to pay his fare, but a video recording of the incident demonstrated that Chicago police need to retrain some of their officers in basic people skills.
The officer stepped onto the bus and demanded the drunk man to step off. The man refused to budge so the officer gets agitated and continues his demands, laden with profanity.
The drunk man pulls change out of his pocket and offers to pay the fare but by then it’s too late, the cop insists he must step off.
Then the man stands up, apparently to step off the bus, and the officer grabs him by the shirt and asks, “do you want to fight me, do you want to fight me, do you want to fight me, do you want to fight me?”
From the angle of the video, it doesn’t appear that the drunk man is making any attempt to fight the officer because his right hand can be clearly seen holding onto the railing.
The cop ends up pushing the man back down onto his seat and punching him at least one while continuing to say “do you want to fight me?”
At this point, he finally calls for back-up. Two other cops arrive and lead the man off the bus to take him to jail.
The passenger recording the video, a member of Chicago Cop Watch, then asks the officer for his badge number.
“Officer, can I have your badge number, please,” the videographer asks.
“What’s that,” said the cop, whose badge number turned out to be 10677.
“Can I have your badge number?”
“Why, why do you want it … (unintelligible) … why, you got a problem?” barks the cop, obviously still agitated.
“No, I monitor the police, I just want to report it, thank you,” said the videographer.
“Good,” said the cop before the video cuts out.
Now the incident is being reviewed by the Chicago Independent Police Review Authority, according to the Chicago Tribune.
