Protesters, Mount Greenwood Residents Make "Wonderful Progress" At Meeting
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Blacks and whites spoke of unity, not name-calling, coming out of a three-hour closed-door meeting Wednesday night in the far southwest side Mt. Greenwood neighborhood.
The meeting stemmed from the protests and counter-protests that followed the fatal police-involved shooting of Joshua Beal, an Indianapolis man visiting the neighborhood for a funeral on Nov. 5.
Kathleen Walsh poked her head out midway through the meeting, at the Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences, to say the 50 who met for a second consecutive night were making "wonderful progress." Afterward, she said a solidarity dinner would take place at Saint Christina's Church, on 111th Street, at 2 p.m. Sunday to continue the conversation.
"We're going to break bread," she said. "This is going to be the first of many meals that we're going to continuously share, continue our progress and continue our unity."
Protesters and Mount Greenwood residents hope to reverse the ugliness heightened by Beal's death. Police said Beal drew a gun during an argument with off-duty police and fire personnel outside a fire station near 111th Street and Troy Avenue after leaving a funeral. Police said Beal refused to drop the gun, despite orders by two off-duty officers, one of whom was in uniform, who then opened fire.
Independent Police Review Authority chief administrator Sharon Fairley was among those at the meeting, and discussed how IPRA conducts its investigations of police-involved shootings. Fairley called the meeting "constructive" and "tremendously important."
