It started with a ticket for jaywalking, but by the time Don Pennington Jr. left the Calumet City police station, he had a swollen right eye, head contusions and blood on his hands from being beaten, the 15-year-old alleges.
Now, one week later, his family and community leaders are demanding answers, city officials have pledged two investigations–by the Police Department and by the city’s Office of Professional Standards–and are pleading for patience.
The day after a protest by about 100 people at the police station, Calumet City officials called a news conference Thursday at City Hall, flanked by a few local clergy and state Sen. James Meeks (D-Chicago), to say they would take action against anyone who violated policy or broke the law. So far, no officers have been removed from active duty, officials said.
“Appropriate action will be taken,” said Mayor Michelle Markiewicz Qualkinbush. “Everyone should remain calm and let the investigation proceed.”
Meeks and other clergy members said they welcome Calumet City’s probe and would help city leaders convey information to their congregations about the incident, which has increased emotions in a town where the police force is overwhelmingly white but more than half of the residents are black. But Meeks and others made it clear their support was conditional and required quick and appropriate action.
“This can’t be swept under the rug,” Meeks said.
Pennington’s mother, who filed a complaint alleging misconduct by the police, said she did not believe the department could adequately investigate itself.
“And why is this officer not off-duty?” Vicki Pennington said Thursday. “Why is he still able to earn a living, go home and sit down and have dinner with his family, and work as usual?”
Police Chief Pat O’Meara could not say how long the probe would last, but said it could take longer than a month. Qualkinbush and Meeks said they would push for information much sooner.
Earlier this week, Don Pennington, a sophomore at Thornton Fractional North High School, showed the media pictures of the beating he says he received from a detective while he waited in the police station for the jaywalking citation to be written.
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Pennington, sporting a black eye, said: “A detective walked by and asked me to stop tapping my fingers on the wall. I put my head down and shook it, and he came and started hitting me, and he didn’t stop.”
O’Meara refused to comment on the complaint or to identify the officer involved.
He also declined to list the charges against the teen, but Vicki Pennington said her son was charged with jaywalking and two counts of aggravated assault. (Tribune policy is to not identify juveniles charged with crimes, but Pennington’s name is being used because he appeared at a news conference with his parents to publicize their complaint.)
Members of the African-American community have rallied around Pennington, who plays for his school basketball team and participates in a youth ministry program at his church.
“This is not the type of person with a criminal record,” said Bishop Lance Davis, president of Voices of Morality, the “civic arm” of the New Zion Christian Fellowship Church in Dolton.
Davis said he would continue to organize protests until corrective action has been taken. He accused Calumet City police of using the jaywalking ordinance to harass African-Americans, an accusation the mayor denied.
O’Meara said the ordinance is used in response to many complaints of teenagers walking down the middle of the road, not moving out of the way of cars, and intimidating drivers.
Pennington said his brush with the police began about 3:45 p.m. Aug. 26 as he and some friends walked across Pulaski Road after school. An off-duty officer pulled Pennington over for jaywalking, the youth said.
After another officer took him to the station and the detective confronted him about tapping the wall, Pennington alleged the detective punched him in the face and beat him for about five minutes, grabbed his neck and threw him in a corner while other officers watched.
His mother received a call from her son’s friend about the arrest and went to the police station where she heard him scream, she said.
“I heard my son yell, `Mama,'” Vicki Pennington said in tears. “I yelled, `That’s my son screaming for me. He’s only 15 years old.'”
Her son’s eye was closed shut and “the size of a golf ball,” she said. When she asked who had assaulted her son, a police officer twisted her hand behind her back and twice asked her if she wanted to go to jail, she said.