High Speed Chase Victim Remembered By Family: 'I Want My Mom Back'
CHICAGO (CBS) -- The family of a 37-year-old mother of six is calling for answers, after Lupe Franco was killed in a crash with a Chicago police car involved in a high-speed chase.
CBS 2 Investigator Megan Hickey said the family saw our exclusive video of the crash itself.
While it was difficult for them to watch, they said it was important because it shed some light on exactly what happened. But now they need answers from CPD.
"Now seeing the video of how it all happened, I have questions for that cop," said Bibi Alvarez, Lupe Franco's sister-in-law.
"It's so hard to believe it. I know she's going to be awake soon, but it's not going to happen," Jaritzi Escobar, Lupe Franco's daughter.
Lupe Franco's daughter and her sister-in-law would rather remember Lupe like this: Dancing. The loud, funny, loving mom.
They'd rather remember the good times than think about the way she died, in a shocking, high-speed crash with a cop who was pursing a homicide suspect in the midst of an hour-long, high speed pursuit across the city Wednesday night.
Franco had been out of work because of COVID-19, and was coming home from her first day on the job as a dishwasher at a local restaurant.
"I want my mom back," Escobar said.
When her SUV was hit...
"She had emergency surgery. I knew she was strong. She was going to go through this, but she didn't," Escobar said.
"We would have still had her. She doesn't deserve this. She just wanted to go home," Alvarez said.
Her family said the dangerous speeds of this chase weren't worth endangering innocent human lives. And they wish the chase had been called off.
The incident is currently under investigation by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability (COPA) and now Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot is calling for an update to the chase policy.
Franco's family is also demanding that changes be made.
"It's not worth it at all. Now we cannot have her back. They took something that we cannot have back," Alvarez said. "They took a beautiful human being and now we can't be like 'hey, give her back to us.'"
A spokesperson for the mayor's office said that the update to the pursuit policy was already underway before this incident. CPD did not comment on any plans to change it.
The suspect in the chase is still in custody and as of Friday, no charges have been filed.