Lake County Gazette

Chris Bos hopes to see cooler heads prevail in the wake of a deadly Waukegan police shooting involving a 19-year-old Black man that has much of the community simmering with emotion.

“I think anytime there’s a tragedy like this, the community needs to stop and mourn,” Bos, a Republican candidate for state representative in the 51st District, told the Lake County Gazette. “In time, we’ll learn more of what happened, but right now things are so emotionally charged we have to be careful.”

Marcellis Stinnette died in a hail of bullets earlier this month and his girlfriend was seriously injured after a Hispanic officer opened fire on their vehicle soon after it was approached by a White officer who thought it looked suspicious.

GOP candidate Chris Bos | File photo

Authorities have since terminated the still-unnamed officer who fired the fatal shots over “multiple policy and procedures violations.” Though the city has released footage from the incident, the ex-officer only activated his body camera after the bullets had finally ceased, leaving many unanswered questions.

“We need to make sure all the evidence is gathered and we can make rational decisions based on that,” Bos said. “We have to let the system work and not just jump to conclusions. I don’t want to see happen in Waukegan what we’ve seen happen in some other places when we’ve let our emotions run wild in moments like these. If there was any wrongdoing, it needs to be dealt with.”

Stinnette’s girlfriend and the mother of his 7-month-old child, Tafara Williams, has told authorities that after recognizing him from an earlier arrest, the first officer harassed the couple before the second ultimately started shooting without warning or provocation when she began to drive away.

“I didn’t do nothing wrong,” she said during a recent hospital bed interview. “I have a license. You didn't tell me I was under arrest.”

Williams also alleges that police covered Stinnette up with a blanket while he was still breathing and ignored her repeated pleas for them to help him as he lay badly injured and in need of assistance.

Meanwhile, authorities continue to insist the officer opened fire “in fear for his life” after Williams attempted to flee the scene and reversed her vehicle in the direction of the officer.

Before challenging longtime U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin in next month’s general election, Mark Curran served 12 years as Lake County sheriff, a time when he came to know Lake County State's Attorney Michael Nerheim quite well. Nerheim’s office is investigating the deadly incident and will determine if any charges against the officers are warranted.

Curran insists he has complete faith that Nerheim is the right man for the job of getting to the bottom of what happened.

“I believe state officials need to be transparent about their investigation and work with the community, but I know D.A. Nerheim and I know he will do the right thing and act accordingly,” he said.

Others in the Chicago suburb of roughly 86,000 residents aren’t so sure that stands as a given. Already, the families of Williams and Stinnette are loudly disputing the police version of the incident and calling on the U.S. Justice Department to take over the lead role in the ongoing investigation.

State Sen. Craig Wilcox is among those closely following the case and admits that he, too, has plenty of concerns.

“My first reaction to the incident was the officer couldn’t get out of the way of a vehicle going in reverse without shooting first,” he said. “And did the vehicle’s lights come on? I really need to see the video. I see the officer’s been fired, so that tells me there’s already some second-guessing going on among supervisors. I’m just glad to see Waukegan hasn’t blown up and authorities are trying to get to the bottom of this and keep the community calm.”

Waukegan is not far from Kenosha, Wisconsin, where tensions are still running high following the police shooting of Jacob Blake earlier this summer, which left the 29-year-old victim partially paralyzed.

In the aftermath, 17-year Kyle Rittenhouse was charged with two counts of murder after shooting three people while patrolling the streets with an AR-15 shotgun during the protest and emotionally charged scene that followed.

The shooting came just months after the Memorial Day weekend police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis sparked protest and demands for racial justice across much of the country. Former officer Derrick Chauvin is facing second-degree murder charges after he was seen on video kneeling on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes. Three other officers also face charges of aiding and abetting murder.

All four have now been terminated from the force. Chauvin is free on $1 million bail with his next court date set for March 8, 2021.