The Civilian Office of Police Accountability has opened an investigation into an alleged battery that occurred last weekend in Wicker Park involving the Chicago police officer who fatally shot Officer Krystal Rivera earlier this year.
Officer who shot Krystal Rivera stripped of police powers days after Wicker Park bar incident
A COPA spokesperson told the Tribune that the agency opened an investigation after Officer Carlos Baker was accused of injuring another female CPD officer Sunday at a bar in the neighborhood.
Baker remained assigned to administrative duty in the Gresham (6th) District as of Thursday, according to a department spokesperson. The incident in Wicker Park was first reported by the Chicago Sun-Times and Illinois Answers.
The alleged incident came about two months after Baker and Rivera, both part of the district tactical team, were trying to make a traffic stop on a suspect and chased him into an apartment at 8210 S. Drexel Ave., authorities previously said. Inside the apartment, they met a man later identified as 25-year-old Adrian Rucker, of Freeport, who allegedly pointed a rifle at them.
Baker fired a single shot, striking Rivera in the back. She was pronounced dead a short time later at the University of Chicago Medical Center. Rivera was the first CPD officer to die in a friendly fire incident in nearly 40 years.
Two men were charged with various felonies in connection with the June 5 shooting, but neither faces a murder charge. Both cases remain pending.
The slain officer’s family has since retained attorneys to conduct a civil investigation of the shooting.
At a news conference last month, attorney Antonio Romanucci noted six complaints were lodged against Baker in his relatively short career with the Police Department, including an allegation that he flashed a gun at a woman he had been talking to while she was on a date with another man inside a restaurant. Other allegations included excessive force and neglect of duty, according to records from the city’s Office of Inspector General.
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