Watchdog agency rules CPD officers acted reasonably in fatal 2024 shooting of Tracey Watson
The Civilian Office of Police Accountability has ruled that Chicago police officers acted properly when they shot a man wielding a knife in the South Austin neighborhood in May of 2024.
Just after 11 p.m. on May 27, 2024, officers responded to a 911 report of a man wielding a knife on near Cicero and Gladys avenues.
They found two men fighting, and ordered the man with the knife to drop the weapon several times.
He ignored them, and officers shot him. That man, 35-year-old Tracey Watson, later died at Stroger Hospital.
The person he was attacking when officers opened fire also was shot and critically wounded.
COPA ruled the officers who opened fire acted reasonably and that "other options were unlikely to be effective."
