CAPTION: Cousin of Walter Armstrong speaks outside of Police Headquarters at rally last Saturday.

Chicago, IL – Following a march of a few hundred on Police Headquarters last Saturday, family members of Walter Armstrong, the tenth person shot dead by Chicago police this year, will testify at a meeting of the Police Board, 7:30 pm, Thursday, October 27 at Chicago Police Headquarters, 3510 S. Michigan Avenue, 1st floor Multi-Purpose Room.

The Police Board is charged with meting out employment-related punishments to officers who violate the rights of civilians. The historical reality is that they only rarely punish police accused of injuring and killing civilians, and generally they do this only after sustained pressure from community organizations and activists. It is for this reason that supporters of Armstrong's family have pledged to "turn up the heat" on the Daley administration until there is a truly impartial investigation of the killing.

Armstrong family members and supporters angrily note glaring inconsistencies in the police account of the killing, such as police spokesperson Pat Camden's claim that Armstrong was wounded in the chest as he charged towards police, a "fact" contradicted by both the coroner and family members who viewed the body. Armstrong was shot in the side of his body, underneath his arm, a wound which suggests that he probably had his arms raised in a gesture of surrender.

After the 1999 police killings of LaTanya Haggerty and Robert Russ, the police department rushed out false reports about the killings, using the false "news" to cast the police in a better light. Following widespread denunciations of this practice of spinning the news with incorrect information, police spokesmen promised to only issue reports after thorough investigations. Today, Armstrong family members charge that false reports, such as Camden's story about Armstrong's wound, represent a reneging on this promise of reform.

Police still refuse to release the name of the officer who killed Armstrong, but have made an issue of Armstrong's criminal record in an attempt to tacitly suggest that he deserved to die. Meanwhile, the record of Armstrong's killer remains unexamined by the media thanks to the Department's selective release of information about the case.

Armstrong is survived his mother, Sharon Weekly, his fiance, Tiffany Dameron, his grandmother, and by a 7-year-old child and an 8-month-old infant.

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