Mitch Smith

A day after the first public testimony in the House impeachment inquiry, Americans had plenty to say. But whether the hearing in Washington was seen as a partisan charade or a damning blow to President Donald Trump depended largely on a person’s preexisting political sympathies.

To better understand how the hearings are playing across the nation, reporters for The New York Times are listening to callers and hosts on talk radio shows on both ends of the political spectrum. Some shows are national, some local. They are playing in markets across the country. This is what is being said:

— WCPT 820 AM Chicago: ‘The evidence is already there’

The evidence? Compelling, listeners agreed. The witnesses? Impressive. The president’s conduct? Impeachable without a doubt.

But would it — could it? — end in Trump’s removal from office?

“Some are saying that there are some Republican senators that are, believe it or not, ready to throw him under the bus to protect their own,” said Cliff Kelley, a former Chicago alderman who was filling in as the morning host.

Roosevelt, the first caller, was not as sure. He predicted that there would not be enough senators to remove Trump from office. But perhaps there would be “enough to raise eyebrows” and doom the president politically.

“His reelection, to me, is over,” Roosevelt said. “That middle is going to get shifted over to the Democratic side.”

All through the morning drive, callers on Chicago’s liberal talk station voiced outrage about the president but offered mixed views of what impeachment would mean.

Brad from Elk Grove Village said he was “doing good — and better every day now that we’ve finally got this in front of the public.” Ronald said Democrats should stay focused on other priorities, too. Louis said the Democratic presidential candidate platforms had been overshadowed by the impeachment hearings.

In addition to disgust for Trump, many callers shared one nagging concern: that the other side was unlikely to be persuaded.

“Impeach Trump: the evidence is already there,” a caller named Pam said. “It’s just a matter of exposing it to the public. We won’t change Republicans, Cliff. Maybe independents, perhaps.”

— The Mark Levin Show: ‘You’re a liar, Schiff’

Mark Levin had a message for listeners of his nationally syndicated show Wednesday evening. There was no quid pro quo, he told them. No bribery. Nothing at all worthy of impeachment.

“The Republicans did a fantastic job,” Levin said. “Ignore the phony media. Ignore the phony legal analysts.”

Levin, whose program airs on hundreds of stations nationally, dismissed both the style and substance of the impeachment inquiry. He said the accounts of the witnesses were unreliable. And he claimed the real corruption was being perpetrated by Democrats.

“You’re a liar, Schiff,” he said, referring to Rep. Adam Schiff, the Democrat presiding over the hearing. “Take a lie-detector test. Or step down from the chairmanship.”

Levin, echoing the claims of Trump and other Republicans, said the impeachment was little more than a way to undermine the will of the people. He dismissed the possibility that Trump tried to bribe Ukraine. And he told his listeners to beware of other accounts of the process, to not trust the press, to think for themselves.

“They keep throwing around bribery because their base is stupid, the media is stupid and ideological, and they figure you are,” Levin said. “But you’re not.”

This article originally appeared in

Impeachment Testimony Sends Talk Radio Shows to Familiar Sides

CHICAGO — They all watched the same hearing. They just saw it differently. Very differently.

CHICAGO — Eddie Johnson, who took over Chicago’s police department at a time of cratering public confidence and a spike in homicides, will announce his retirement Thursday. Johnson, a native of Chicago who spent his entire career in the department, stabilized a city and a department that were in crisis after the murder of Laquan McDonald, a black teenager who was shot 16 times by a white officer.

Johnson was scheduled to hold a news conference with Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Thursday morning. His decision to retire was confirmed by Anthony Guglielmi, a Police Department spokesman.

Chicago becomes the latest in a series of large cities this year to see turnover at the top of its Police Department. The Philadelphia police commissioner abruptly resigned in August, the chief in Charlotte, North Carolina, announced plans to step down and a new commissioner was appointed this week in New York City.

During more than three years in charge of the country’s second-largest municipal police force, Johnson led an overhaul in training, introduced more restrictive rules for when officers could use force and guided the department into a court-enforced consent decree. After a dramatic rise in homicides early in his tenure, the murder rate had steadily dropped.

But the superintendent faced mounting problems, especially in recent weeks. He requested an investigation of himself last month after being found asleep in a parked SUV late at night. Johnson blamed the episode on medication, but Chicago’s mayor later said he had been drinking that evening. Days later, the superintendent lost a vote of no-confidence by leaders of the city’s main police union.

The superintendent’s departure leaves the city and its new mayor, Lightfoot, facing difficult choices on what type of leader to select for a department that has faced intense criticism over crime levels but also distrust from residents.

After video of the shooting of McDonald was released in late 2015, protesters marched for weeks, the city’s top police official was fired and a national search for a new superintendent ended with a political stalemate. Johnson had not applied for the top job, but eventually was tapped.

Chicago Police Superintendent to Announce Retirement

“The unions are how we have a voice,” said Warren, one of several Democrats running for president who have expressed support for the strike, which showed no sign of ending. “The unions are how we have power. The unions are how we make sure that the needs of every one of our children are heard loud and clear.”

The rush by Warren and other Democratic candidates to defend the striking teachers — Sen. Bernie Sanders attended a rally before the strike, Sen. Cory Booker met with union members, former Vice President Joe Biden and others have expressed encouragement on Twitter — conveyed the national resonance of the Chicago union’s demands for more support staff and smaller class sizes.

It also reflected a broader shift in their party, as candidates respond to a recent revival of teacher activism across the country and seek to solidify union support ahead of next year’s election.

“What it’s saying is that the Democratic Party is actually finding its Rooseveltian roots again,” Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, said in an interview.

A decade ago, Weingarten said such an outpouring of support from so many candidates would have been unlikely.

Back then, some Democrats joined conservatives in criticizing the power of teachers’ unions. President Barack Obama sometimes criticized the unions as not focused enough on student achievement, and his administration supported nonprofit charter schools, which are generally not unionized.

“It is a real shift,” Weingarten said. “It is a change.”

David Axelrod, a longtime Chicago political consultant and former adviser to Obama, said he was not surprised that Democratic candidates were stepping in with support for the Chicago teachers.

“There’s a great deal of competition within the field for support on the left, and there’s a great deal of competition for support from teachers nationally,” he said, adding, “The other advantage of being a presidential candidate from out of town is that you don’t have to pay for it. Who cannot be in favor of smaller class sizes and more support staff?”

Warren, who often speaks of her own stint as a teacher, and who this week released a plan calling for a quadrupling of federal funds for schools that serve low-income students, arrived on Chicago’s West Side as negotiations between the union and Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration appeared to grow more tense. One union member, who addressed the crowd before Warren spoke, called the mayor “Petty Lori.”

Lightfoot, a Democrat who was elected earlier this year, has talked repeatedly about the school district’s fiscal challenges and has urged teachers to return to work while negotiations continued. Union leaders took offense at the suggestion and said a resolution was not imminent, meaning that more than 300,000 students would remain out of class.

“We’re not going back to work without a legally binding agreement,” said Jesse Sharkey, the union president, on Monday night. “The mayor today has dashed our hopes for a quick settlement.”

In addition to the teachers, a separate union representing thousands of school support workers in Chicago, including classroom aides and security guards, remained on strike Tuesday.

Chicago is a heavily Democratic city with a long history of backing labor unions. As teachers have marched through downtown and picketed outside schools in recent days, they have often been greeted by supportive car honks and parents offering apple cider and doughnuts. But Lightfoot and her predecessor, Rahm Emanuel, whose tenure included an especially bitter teachers’ strike in 2012, have struggled to reconcile demands from the union with the bleak finances of the city and the school system.

“Beyond what we put on the table, there is simply no more money,” Lightfoot said, taking a noticeably harsher tone this week than in the first days of the strike. She added: “Enough is enough. There is no further excuse to keep our kids out of school.”

Lightfoot suggested that she was unsurprised by Warren’s arrival, but did not expect it to change much for the city.

“She has her right to come in,” Lightfoot said. “I would expect all Democratic candidates for the presidency to support workers. That’s who we are as a party. But at the end of the day, what’s going to get it done is what happens at the bargaining table.”

Republicans were also skeptical of the visit.

“Teachers should be wary of any advice Elizabeth Warren may be relaying today in Chicago,” said Kevin Knoth, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee, in a statement that questioned the wisdom of Warren’s plan for spending billions of dollars more on education.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson, who has attended some of the negotiating sessions to try to help reach a deal, said that the candidates weighing in on Chicago’s strike are recognizing a broader problem in paying for what is needed in schools in communities across the country.

“These are not just Chicago’s problems,” Jackson said. “They really need to talk about a national plan.”

In recent years, teachers have protested their pay or work conditions in liberal cities like Los Angeles and Denver, as well as in conservative states like Oklahoma and West Virginia. Amid that wave of activism, Democrats at all levels of politics have rushed to ingratiate themselves. Leading presidential contenders, including Sanders, Warren, Biden and Sen. Kamala Harris of California, have all vied for endorsements from teachers’ unions.

The Chicago strike, in particular, has been a favorite topic. Harris posted earlier this month that she was “in solidarity with Chicago’s teachers.” Julián Castro, the former secretary of Housing and Urban Development, posted a video before the strike calling attention to the demands of Chicago teachers. And on Tuesday morning, as hundreds of red-clad teachers gathered outside an elementary school, Warren told the cheering crowd that “I’m here to stand for America’s public schools.”

“To have someone like Senator Warren come out,” said Brett Murphy, a high school teacher who attended the speech, “and say, ‘You know what, I understand why you’re standing here, keep standing here, and don’t give in till it’s over,’ that gives us the boost” to keep fighting.

National Democrats Signal Support as Chicago Teachers' Strike Stretches On

CHICAGO — Sen. Elizabeth Warren waded into the crowd outside a Chicago elementary school on Tuesday morning, offering hugs and handshakes and words of support for more than 20,000 teachers whose strike had canceled classes for four days in the country’s third-largest school district.

Warren, who often speaks of her own stint as a teacher, was one of several Democratic presidential hopefuls to weigh in on the Chicago strike, stating support for the 25,000 members of the Chicago Teachers Union, who began their walkout last Thursday. Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont attended a rally for teachers before the strike, and left a voicemail message last week for the union’s president. Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey met on Friday with union members. Others, including former Vice President Joe Biden, have expressed encouragement on Twitter.

“The unions are how we have a voice,” Warren said, standing outside an elementary school where hundreds of teachers and their supporters cheered loudly on a blustery day. “The unions are how we have power. The unions are how we make sure that the needs of every one of our children are heard loud and clear.”

Warren’s trip on Tuesday to the school, on Chicago’s West Side, and the rush by other Democrats to announce support for the teachers, came as negotiations between the union and Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration appeared to grow more tense. Lightfoot, a Democrat who was elected earlier this year, has spoken repeatedly about the school district’s fiscal challenges and has urged teachers to return to work while negotiations continue. Union leaders took offense at the suggestion and said a resolution was not imminent, meaning that more than 300,000 students would remain out of class.

Of Warren’s arrival, Lightfoot suggested that she was unsurprised by it, but that it would not change much for Chicago.

Warren’s visit on Tuesday conveyed the national resonance of the teachers’ demands for more support staff and smaller class sizes — some of the same issues Lightfoot had pledged during her campaign to work on as mayor. The visit also reflected a shift in the Democratic Party, amid a recent revival of labor activism among teachers around the country. During his presidency, Barack Obama sometimes critiqued teachers’ unions as not focused enough on student achievement, and his administration supported nonprofit charter schools, which are generally not unionized.

More recently, Democrats at all levels of politics have rushed to associate themselves with teachers striking around the nation — in liberal cities like Los Angeles and Denver as well as conservative states like Oklahoma and West Virginia. Leading presidential contenders, including Sanders, Warren, Biden and Sen. Kamala Harris of California, have all vied for endorsements from teachers’ unions.

The Chicago strike, in particular, has been a favorite topic. Harris posted earlier this month that she was “in solidarity with Chicago’s teachers.” Biden wrote on Twitter last week that it was “time we support all workers with the pay and dignity they deserve.”

Another candidate, Julián Castro, the former secretary of Housing and Urban Development, posted a video before the strike calling attention to the demands of Chicago teachers.

“They’re fighting to make sure that the resources are there for students in their community so that those students can reach their own dreams,” Castro said.

Elizabeth Warren Joins Chicago Teachers as Strike Continues

CHICAGO — Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, one of the leading candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination, joined picketing teachers in Chicago on Tuesday, as classes in the city school system, the country’s third-largest, were canceled for a fourth day.

Simon served as Michigan State’s president during the years that Nassar, a university employee, sexually abused hundreds of girls and young women, including some of the world’s best gymnasts.

“Our campus community is continuing its healing, and the Board of Trustees feel the retirement of Dr. Simon is best for the university,” Dianne Byrum, the chairwoman of the university trustees, said in a statement.

Fallout from Nassar’s abuse continues to haunt Michigan State. The university has approved a $500 million settlement for his victims, seen turnover among top administrators and faced persistent questions about how Nassar was allowed to continue his crimes for so long.

Nassar, a faculty member at Michigan State, worked as a doctor for the university and national gymnastics teams. For about 20 years, he abused patients under a false premise of medical care. At emotional sentencing hearings, many of those patients described the abuse and the impact it had had on their lives.

Nassar is now serving what is effectively a life sentence in prison.

As the scope of Nassar’s crimes was described at those hearings, scrutiny spread to others at Michigan State, one of the country’s largest public universities.

Simon, a fixture on Michigan State’s campus since 1974, tried and failed to weather the crisis, and she left her post as president last year under pressure from protesters. At that point, she became a “distinguished professor” and remained a university employee.

Prosecutors later charged Simon with two felonies and accused her of lying to the police about what she knew of Nassar’s abuse. Simon, who appeared in court as recently as last week, has denied any criminal wrongdoing.

Under the terms of Tuesday’s retirement deal, which takes effect at the end of August, she will receive $2.45 million paid over three years. She will also receive medical and dental coverage, the title of “president emeritus” and continued access to football and basketball tickets. In return, Simon agreed not to sue the university.

University officials declined Tuesday night to make Satish Udpa, the acting president, or any other administrator available for an interview. Attempts to reach Simon were not immediately successful.

But even in retirement, Simon may not totally disappear from campus.

The deal announced Tuesday specifies that Michigan State would commission a portrait of Simon, as is customary with former presidents. But if she is convicted of a felony, the deal says, the college does not have to display the painting.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/30/us/michigan-state-president-retirement-deal.html" id="281ff259-7909-358e-ad35-4db705591cce">The New York Times</a>.

MACKINAW CITY, Mich. — Lou Anna K. Simon, the former Michigan State University president charged with lying about her knowledge of Larry Nassar’s sexual abuse, will be paid more than $2.4 million as part of a retirement deal announced Tuesday evening by the university.

Ex-Michigan State President to Get $2.4 Million in Retirement Deal

But suddenly, across more than 100,000 acres of Nebraska and Wyoming, there is no water to be found. The dirt is cracking. The beans are turning a sickly yellow. And the corn, which looked so promising just two weeks ago, is straining for fluid through long, scorching days.

The countryside is suddenly parched because a century-old tunnel that carries irrigation water across more than 100 miles, from Wyoming to Nebraska, collapsed this month. The cause of the collapse was not yet clear, but the effect has been immediate:

A large expanse of farmland is parched. And hundreds of farmers, already reeling from years of low grain prices, are without water at the most critical point of the growing cycle.

“Could you survive working with no salary for a year?” said Kendall Busch, who grows sugar beets, beans and corn near Mitchell, Nebraska. “That’s what we’re doing.”

Across much of the Great Plains, this growing season seemed cursed even before the irrigation crisis.

First came trade wars that threw the grain markets into chaos.

Then floods covered cornfields with ice chunks the size of golf carts.

An abnormally wet spring delayed planting by weeks or months.

Finally, just when conditions were looking more stable, the irrigation canal split open, and water stopped flowing.

Not every problem hit every farmer, but few in Midwestern agriculture will make it to harvest unscathed.

“It’s just been event after event after event,” said Dave Kaufman, who canceled the purchase of a new Ford F-150 truck to save money after much of his farmland outside Gering, Nebraska, went dry. “And you would think that the last shoe had dropped, but it hasn’t.”

In the semiarid hills of the Nebraska Panhandle and eastern Wyoming, where summer rains are rare, farmers depend on irrigation water diverted from rivers through a network of canals and tunnels. A portion of that canal system had for generations nourished corn, sugar beets, pinto beans and other crops with water siphoned from the North Platte River.

Buz Oliver, who grows corn and hay outside Fort Laramie, Wyoming, was out checking his crops early that morning when he noticed that a nearby cornfield had turned into a lake. “I can see all that water out across my neighbor’s field, and I’m like, ‘What the heck’s going on?’ ” Oliver said.

A climb to the top of a hill revealed a worst-case scenario: Not far from his property, a roughly half-mile tunnel that carried water through a large hill had collapsed in the night, leaving a swift-moving current no room to advance. Within hours, as pressure built, the earthen banks of the canal had been overwhelmed. Water busted through with such force that old-growth trees were snapped into pieces, fence posts were ripped from the ground and cows, with no time to retreat, became stranded on small islands in their former pasture.

Farmers specialize in contingency planning, but this was a disaster no one saw coming.

The tunnels and canals, though old, were maintained regularly and had performed for generations with few major problems. Elected irrigation officials in both states oversee management of the canal system, which was built by the federal government. Though the cause of the breach was not yet identified, it was raising new questions about the reliance of U.S. commerce on decaying infrastructure. In Nebraska alone, around $50 million in crops is at stake.

“The biggest advantage the United States farmers and ranchers have has been our transportation and infrastructure system,” said Steve Wellman, director of the Nebraska Department of Agriculture, who said broad investment was needed to improve the disaster-prone roads, canals and dams that help farmers grow their crops and get them to buyers.

The breach was another blow for Nebraska, where some $840 million in crops, livestock and land were damaged by floods and blizzards this spring and where the governor has issued emergency declarations this year in 81 of 93 counties. Even as fields in western Nebraska were at risk of shriveling without hydration, some farmland in eastern Nebraska remained underwater, and other flood-damaged fields may not be usable for planting for years.

Out in the state’s far west, the canal failure came at an especially cruel moment. After soggy fields delayed planting, farmers spent heavily this spring on seed and fertilizer and labor to get their crops in the ground. By mid-July, the fields looked promising. Crops were approaching the point when irrigation becomes most important.

“All the major crops, they are at peak water use, at a stage we shouldn’t stress them at all,” said Xin Qiao, a professor who studies irrigation at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Because of the canal failure, he predicted that farmers could harvest up to 90% less corn, 70% less edible beans and about half as many sugar beets.

Times were already hard. Corn prices had been low in recent years, leaving many farmers with barely enough income to cover their costs, let alone make payments on a new tractor or a new field. Farms filing for bankruptcy protection rose by 19% last year across the Midwest, the highest level in a decade, according to data compiled by the American Farm Bureau.

But farmers in the Nebraska Panhandle and eastern Wyoming avoided the worst of the spring flooding, and with corn prices ticking upward, this felt like the year when they might finally start to get ahead. Now they face uncertainty about whether crop insurance will cover their losses and the possibility of a monstrous tax bill to cover a permanent fix for the canal, which could cost up to $18 million.

“There will be several of these producers who won’t be able to make it through this,” said Steve Erdman, a Nebraska state senator and longtime farmer whose district includes some of the newly dry land. “They’re going to lose their farms.”

Most immediately, farmers face the challenge of salvaging whatever they can from this year’s crop. A temporary repair may get water moving through the canal again by mid-August, which would help. But what they really need — and what Erdman has asked his constituents to pray for — is rain, and lots of it.

On Saturday afternoon, at his farm outside Gering, Nebraska, Preston Stricker monitored a live view of the weather radar on the wall of his office. Nearby, a dry-erase calendar noted July 17 — “Collapse” — and July 19 — “Water Off” — when the last bit of irrigation reached his farm. All the while, dry heat and a blazing July sun pounded his corn and beans.

“The beans take one or two timely rains, and that crop could turn out pretty good,” Stricker said. “With no rain, it could fail worse.”

A few hours later, the sun retreated, and a thunderstorm blew through, dropping about a half inch of rain on his fields. He was hoping, he said, for more.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/29/us/nebraska-wyoming-farmers-water.html" id="f9aa2a62-9215-33aa-a102-e1ef753de987">The New York Times</a>.

America's Farmers, Reeling from Floods, Face a New Problem: No Water

MITCHELL, Neb. — For farmers battered by floods and blizzards and one of the rainiest springs on record, this has been a year tainted by too much water.

The tunnels and canals, though old, were maintained regularly and had performed for generations with few major problems. Though the cause of the breach was not yet identified, it was raising new questions about the reliance of U.S. commerce on decaying infrastructure. In Nebraska alone, around $50 million in crops is at stake.

The process, which could extend further if the officers choose to challenge their firings in court, was a reminder of how long it often takes to reach resolutions in cases where people die in encounters involving the police. Earlier this week, in New York City, federal prosecutors said they would not seek civil rights charges against Officer Daniel Pantaleo, who placed Eric Garner in a chokehold that led to Garner’s death five years ago.

In Chicago, Laquan McDonald’s death touched off years of political upheaval and led to promises to overhaul the Police Department. Yet even with intense public interest, the legal and disciplinary processes played out slowly.

Last October, almost four years after the shooting, Jason Van Dyke was convicted of murder for firing 16 shots into Laquan. In January, three other officers were acquitted on criminal charges that they had covered up the shooting. And finally, on Thursday, the Chicago Police Board voted to fire four other officers for their actions after the shooting: Sgt. Stephen Franko and Officers Ricardo Viramontes, Janet Mondragon and Daphne Sebastian.

The Police Board found that Franko signed off on false reports about what happened and that Officers Viramontes, Mondragon and Sebastian provided accounts of the shooting that were contradicted by video.

“Each of the three officers failed in their duty — either by outright lying or by shading the truth,” the Police Board said.

The cases in Chicago and New York are among dozens of fatal encounters with the police in recent years that have led to national headlines, expressions of outrage and questions about when and how officers use force. Here is a look at what happened to the officers involved in some of those other cases.

The vast majority of officers who kill a civilian are never charged.

Protesters marched for months in 2014 when Darren Wilson, a white Ferguson, Missouri, police officer, shot and killed Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager. Wilson resigned. County grand jurors declined to indict him, and federal prosecutors decided not to file civil rights charges.

In 2014, Timothy Loehmann, a rookie patrolman in Cleveland, shot and killed Tamir Rice, a black 12-year-old, within seconds of arriving outside a recreation center where Tamir was carrying a replica gun. Loehmann, who is white, was not criminally charged, but was fired from the Cleveland police for lying about a past job on his employment application. Years later, Loehmann accepted another policing job in rural Ohio, but resigned under pressure from activists. He has appealed his firing from the Cleveland police force.

Protesters in Minneapolis occupied the area outside a police station for days in 2015 after Jamar Clark, a black man, was shot during a struggle with Officers Mark Ringgenberg and Dustin Schwarze. Both officers, who are white, returned to work after the county prosecutor and the police chief cleared them of wrongdoing. In 2017, Ringgenberg was among the first officers on the scene after another Minneapolis officer shot and killed an unarmed woman.

Of those officers who are charged, most are not convicted.

In Tulsa, Oklahoma, prosecutors swiftly charged Officer Betty Jo Shelby with manslaughter after she shot and killed Terence Crutcher, an unarmed black man, in 2016. But jurors acquitted her, and Shelby, who is white, returned to work. She later resigned from the Tulsa police after being assigned a desk job, and she joined a sheriff’s department in a nearby county.

Twice, prosecutors tried to convince jurors that Ray Tensing, a white University of Cincinnati police officer, was guilty of murder in the death of Samuel DuBose, an unarmed black driver. Twice, jurors deadlocked and failed to reach a verdict. Prosecutors declined to seek a third trial. Tensing, who had been fired shortly after the shooting, was later reported to have reached a settlement with the university that included legal fees and nearly $250,000 in back pay.

Baltimore erupted in large, sometimes violent, protests in 2015 when Freddie Gray, a black man, died after suffering a spinal cord injury while in police custody. The local prosecutor charged six officers in connection with his death, but none were convicted. Federal prosecutors declined to file charges.

In the last year, three officers have been convicted of murder.

Last year, Van Dyke became the first Chicago police officer in decades to be convicted of murder for an on-duty shooting. Prosecutors emphasized a dash camera video that showed Van Dyke, who is white, firing 16 shots into Laquan, who had been holding a knife but veering away from the police. Van Dyke was sentenced in January to nearly seven years in prison. Laquan’s family and the Illinois attorney general called the sentence inadequate.

Roy D. Oliver II, a white police officer in Balch Springs, Texas, shot and killed Jordan Edwards with a high-powered rifle as Jordan, who was black and 15, and other teenagers drove away from a house party in 2017. Oliver was convicted of murder last summer and sentenced to 15 years in prison, a sentence Jordan’s family called too lenient.

Mohamed Noor, a Minneapolis police officer, said he feared for his life when Justine Ruszczyk, a white woman wearing pajamas and holding a glittery cellphone, approached his squad car on a summer night in 2017. Noor, who is black, shot and killed her. Jurors did not accept his account, and convicted him of murder this year. He was sentenced to 12.5 years in prison.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/19/us/chicago-police-fired-laquan-mcdonald.html" id="90e4f106-580c-3c2c-ad5c-40451dd889f1">The New York Times</a>.

Four Chicago Police Officers Fired for Cover-Up of Laquan McDonald Shooting

CHICAGO — On an autumn night in 2014, a black teenager named Laquan McDonald was shot dead by a Chicago police officer. Nearly five years later, on Thursday, a city oversight board voted to fire four other officers accused of covering up the circumstances of Laquan’s death.

The cases in Chicago and New York are among dozens of fatal encounters with the police in recent years that have led to national headlines, expressions of outrage and questions about when and how officers use force.

The vast majority of officers who kill a civilian are never charged. Of those officers who are charged, most are not convicted.

In the last year, three officers have been convicted of murder.

“It’s life on the river,” Sue Eller said Monday as people fished from her back porch, though only one scrawny catfish was biting. “You take the bad with the good.”

As record-breaking floods have torn through the Midwest this spring, towns have looked nervously toward levees and flood walls that protect them from inundation. When some levees were breached, destroying farms and homes in Nebraska, Iowa and Missouri, politicians pledged to build them back taller, stronger, bigger.

Other places, including Grafton, where the Mississippi crested Monday, have taken a different approach to riverfront living. There are no levees here, no protection from the river’s natural sprawl, so residents have grown all too accustomed to cleaning up behind devastating floods. But as the high water seems to come more often and at ever higher levels, they say they are frustrated by a sense that levees elsewhere have left Grafton even more exposed. In an arms race of barriers along the Mississippi, they say, places like Grafton are losing.

“Every time they build a levee or raise one, it hurts everybody without a levee,” said Peter Allen, an owner of The Loading Dock restaurant in Grafton, which has been closed for much of this spring because of the floods. “Flooding, it’s natural, and the river used to be able to handle it a lot better.”

For generations, Grafton residents made a bargain with nature. The river gave the town a reason for being, drawing tourists who spend money in the bars and nights in the inns, where they have unimpeded river views. In return, Grafton’s 650 or so residents either moved up onto a reliably dry bluff or sacrificed the lower floors of their homes to the Mississippi.

Floods were always a risk, but in the last decade they have become an annual or twice-annual plight. They damage property, force long detours on trips to the grocery store and drive away tourists. The 32.1-foot crest Monday — flood stage starts at 18 feet — was the fourth-highest mark recorded in Grafton going back to the 1800s. It was high enough to cover parking lots and fill some riverfront buildings and nearly submerge street signs. Nine of Grafton’s 20 highest crests have occurred since 2008.

“It’s frightening,” said the mayor, Rick Eberlin, who said he hoped that the water would recede in time for Memorial Day, when peak tourism season starts and when a new gondola-style attraction is scheduled to open.

Scientists have attributed the uptick in flooding to increased rainfall in the Midwest, an effect of climate change, and the continuing efforts to constrict the river. In an ever changing patchwork of protection, cities and towns have long sought new ways to keep the water away. Burlington, Iowa, has worked in recent years to install a floodwall. In Illinois, some rural levee districts have been accused of building beyond their authorized height, a point of bitterness for those downstream.

“There’s always going to be winners and losers when it comes to levees,” said Jonathan Remo, an associate professor of geography at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. “When you create big levees, you’re pushing water onto somebody else.”

Heavy rains expected this week could worsen problems along the Mississippi River, which has already been above flood stage for well over a month in some areas. Some people who live along the river said they believed they were at a tipping point — a moment when the entire region needed to rethink the wisdom of having so many levees, especially in rural areas with few people.

“You’ve got hundreds of miles of waterway leveed off that probably can’t stay like that,” said Colin Wellenkamp, the executive director of the Mississippi River Cities and Towns Initiative, which represents municipal governments on the river.

Grafton’s laissez-faire approach to flood control is part fiscal necessity and part business strategy. Spending tens of millions of dollars on a floodwall is not practical, Eberlin said, and doing so would jeopardize Grafton’s main appeal to tourists, many of whom come from St. Louis, about 40 miles to the south, to be near the water. The town’s strategy also has environmental benefits, according to experts who warned that the competition to build bigger levees elsewhere is dangerous and expensive.

“This is an arms race against Mother Nature,” said David Stokes, the executive director of the Great Rivers Habitat Alliance, which opposes expanding levees and building in floodplains. “Mother Nature will win.”

Grafton’s strategy is distinct. Even many agrarian sections of the river are protected by levees, including the Sny Island Levee Drainage District, upstream from Grafton, which shields farmland along a fertile stretch of Illinois riverfront and has been accused of building its levees too high. The mayor and others in Grafton blame Sny Island and other rural levee districts for some of their flooding woes. The Sny Island district’s superintendent, Mike Reed, did not respond to an interview request.

“While the Sny and the entire region are in the middle of a flood fight to protect our communities, any political discussion about levee heights is counterproductive and does nothing to help the people impacted by the rising waters,” said Christian G. Morgan, a spokesman for the district, in an emailed statement.

For decades, Grafton has sought balance between respecting the river’s power and embracing its proximity. After record-setting floods devastated the Midwest in 1993, many on Grafton’s waterfront accepted federal buyouts for their homes. Some moved onto the bluff. A few hundred people left town. Businesses continued to operate along the river.

Davenport, Iowa, the largest city on the river without permanent flood protection, has faced a similar dilemma. Over decades, Davenport residents have repeatedly decided against building a floodwall, dissuaded both by the cost and a fear of losing their connection to the river.

But last week, as the Mississippi River reached record levels in Iowa, a temporary flood barrier installed in downtown Davenport was breached, swamping businesses and forcing firefighters to rescue people. Much of the area remained underwater this week, said Mayor Frank Klipsch, who said it was too soon to say whether his city now would reconsider building a floodwall.

“We understand that if we do not stop or absorb some of the water, it’s got to go somewhere,” Klipsch said.

In waterlogged Grafton, where river levels were expected to fall in the coming days, residents looked forward to a reprieve.

The Ellers, who had gone without laundry and warm showers, spoke excitedly about moving their water heater and washing machine back downstairs when the floods receded. Joe and Jan DeSherlia, who were commuting to their office by pontoon boat Monday, were eager to reopen their gift shop and winery. And Allen, the restaurant owner and a Grafton alderman, said it would take about a week after the water fell to clean up The Loading Dock and get the approval of health inspectors to resume serving catfish fritters.

“It’s brutal, it’s tough,” Allen said. “The risk is still worth it.”

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/07/us/flood-midwest-levees.html" id="7be4b89a-e35f-37c1-afd7-273bca679b9a">The New York Times</a>.

Midwestern Floods Pit Communities Against One Another as Levees Rise Ever Higher

GRAFTON, Ill. — The Mississippi River annexed Jerry and Sue Eller’s backyard, invaded their basement and converted Main Street, where they live, into a boat ramp. Once again, Grafton was flooded — an event that has become more routine than surprise, more nuisance than calamity.

But Tuesday, after a monthlong trial in downtown Minneapolis, a jury handed down a verdict that is exceedingly rare in police shooting cases: Noor was guilty of murder.

The shooting of Ruszczyk, 40, set off outrage as far away as Australia, where she had lived for most of her life, and forced changes in the policies and leadership of the Minneapolis Police Department. The trial drew intense attention among Minnesota’s Somali-American residents, many of whom wondered whether Noor, who was born in Somalia, would be treated fairly.

No other Minnesota officer has been convicted in recent decades in a fatal on-duty shooting.

Jurors convicted Noor of third-degree murder, which carries a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison, and second-degree manslaughter, which can lead to as many as 10 years in prison. Under Minnesota sentencing guidelines, he will likely face several years in prison, but far fewer than the maximum.

Noor was acquitted of second-degree murder, which carries a stiffer penalty.

“This is a tragic shooting that did not have to happen and should not have happened,” said Mike Freeman, Hennepin County’s elected prosecutor, after the verdict was announced.

From the start, the case had been a mystery. Noor, who was later fired by the Police Department, declined to speak with investigators about why he opened fire a few minutes before midnight on July 15, 2017. At trial, Noor, speaking publicly about the shooting for the first time, said he feared for his life when he saw Ruszczyk approaching his cruiser and made a split-second decision to shoot.

“I fired one shot,” Noor said in court, according to The Star Tribune newspaper. “The threat was gone. She could have had a weapon.”

Prosecutors said Noor, 33, acted unreasonably — firing at a shadowy figure without a verbal warning — and that he should be convicted of murder.

“That night there was a tragic lapse of care and complete disregard for the sanctity of life,” Ruszczyk’s fiancé, Don Damond, told reporters after the verdict.

Ruszczyk had called 911 twice that night to report what she thought was a sexual assault in the alley behind her home. Peter Wold, a lawyer for Noor, acknowledged that Ruszczyk, who was about to get married and sometimes used her fiancé’s surname, had in fact posed no threat. She had been holding a glittery cellphone and standing outside a rolled-down window of the squad car when she was shot.

Wold said it was a tragedy, but not a crime.

“Sometimes your job has negative and unintended consequences,” Wold told jurors. “That’s exactly what happened in that narrow and dark alley in those split seconds.”

U.S. police officers have wide discretion to use lethal force, and few are ever charged in on-duty shootings. Of those who stand trial, many are acquitted, though there have been recent exceptions in Illinois, Florida and Texas.

In Minnesota, Ruszczyk’s death stoked outrage and reinvigorated debate about how officers use force — a familiar topic following protests over the deadly police shootings of Jamar Clark and Philando Castile. In Ruszczyk’s neighborhood, a safe, affluent area near the southwest corner of Minneapolis, the shooting has harmed relations with the police.

“People’s willingness to interact with police officers has taken a decline,” said Todd Schuman, who lives near the shooting scene and is part of group that called for Noor to be convicted. “I have two children here, and how I talk to them about their interactions with police officers is going to change as a result of this.”

After Ruszczyk’s death, the Minneapolis police chief was forced out, and the mayor was voted out of office. The Police Department also revamped its body camera policy: Noor and his partner, Officer Matthew Harrity, had been wearing cameras that night, but neither officer had them turned on at the time of the shooting.

Freeman, the prosecutor, said there were errors by the Minneapolis police and a state law enforcement agency in the early stages of the investigation. John Ruszczyk, Justine’s father, said Tuesday that he felt the conviction came “despite the active resistance” of some in law enforcement.

Medaria Arradondo, who became the Minneapolis police chief after the shooting, offered “sincere apologies” to the Ruszcyzk family in a statement issued after the verdict. “As chief, I will ensure that the MPD learns from this case and we will be in spaces to listen, learn and do all we can to help our communities in healing,” he said.

In some ways, the case was an outlier. While much of the national debate about police shootings had focused on young, African-American men being killed by white officers, Ruszczyk was a white woman, and Noor is Somali-American. During the trial, Noor’s lawyers detailed his journey from a farm in Somalia to a refugee camp in Kenya to a new home in Minneapolis.

Since the shooting, some activists and members of Minnesota’s large Somali community have questioned whether Noor was treated differently by prosecutors than a white officer would have been.

“Everybody’s very nervous and following this case very closely,” said Omar Jamal, a Somali-American activist and consultant, before the verdict. “They feel a sense of him being targeted.”

Ruszczyk, a meditation coach and a dual citizen of Australia and the United States, had made her own journey to Minneapolis. She moved to the city a couple of years before the shooting to live with her fiancé and had been building a small business. When she called 911 that night, her wedding was just weeks away.

After the verdict, Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis released a statement that praised Ruszcyzk and said “we will stand with our Somali community.”

“While today’s verdict may bring closure to some, it will also serve as a reminder of how far we must go to foster trust where it’s been broken,” Frey said. “We must acknowledge that historical and ongoing racialized trauma continues to impact our society.”

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/30/us/minneapolis-police-noor-verdict.html" id="927f9fdb-31dc-36c6-a35a-2b4103e97d5c">The New York Times</a>.

For nearly two years, Minneapolis waited for answers about the fatal police shooting of Justine Ruszczyk, an unarmed woman who had called 911 seeking help. There was no video of the shooting. There was no audio. And the officer involved, Mohamed Noor, would not answer investigators’ questions.

Minneapolis Police Officer Convicted of Murder in Shooting of Australian Woman

The shooting of Ruszczyk, 40, set off outrage as far away as Australia, where she had lived for most of her life, and forced changes in the policies and leadership of the Minneapolis Police Department.

Ruszczyk had called 911 twice that night to report what she thought was a sexual assault in the alley behind her home. Peter Wold, a lawyer for Noor, acknowledged that Ruszczyk, who was about to get married and sometimes used her fiancé’s surname, had in fact posed no threat.

The shooting of Justine Ruszczyk, 40, set off outrage as far away as Australia, where Ruszczyk had lived for most of her life, and forced changes in the policies and leadership of the Minneapolis Police Department. The trial drew intense attention among Minnesota’s Somali-American residents, many of whom wondered whether the former officer involved, Mohamed Noor, who was born in Somalia, would be treated fairly.

“Justine was approaching the car unarmed. They couldn’t even tell whether it was a male or a female, an adult or a child,” said Mike Freeman, Hennepin County’s elected prosecutor, when charges were filed last year. “What is the threat that requires the use of deadly force? What was the serious crime that was going on?”

Ruszczyk had called 911 twice that night to report what she thought was a sexual assault in the alley behind her home. Peter Wold, a lawyer for Noor, acknowledged that Ruszczyk, who was about to get married and sometimes used her fiancé’s surname, Damond, had in fact posed no threat. She had been holding a glittery cellphone and standing outside a rolled-down window of the squad car when she was shot.

Jurors in Minneapolis convicted a former police officer of murder Tuesday in the 2017 shooting death of an unarmed woman, The Associated Press reported. Rarely do police shootings result in such convictions.

“Sometimes your job has negative and unintended consequences,” Wold told jurors, who heard arguments throughout April at a downtown Minneapolis courthouse. “That’s exactly what happened in that narrow and dark alley in those split seconds.”

“People’s willingness to interact with police officers has taken a decline,” said Todd Schuman, who lives near the shooting scene and is part of group calling for Noor to be convicted. “I have two children here, and how I talk to them about their interactions with police officers is going to change as a result of this.”

The brothers, Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo, said in the lawsuit that Smollett, an actor on “Empire,” orchestrated the fake attack against himself earlier this year and that two of the actor’s lawyers, Mark Geragos and Tina Glandian, then lied repeatedly about what happened.

“He wanted his employer and the public to notice and appreciate him as a successful black, openly gay actor,” the lawsuit said. “So, Mr. Smollett directed every aspect of the attack, including the location and the noose.”

CHICAGO — Two brothers who were said to have assaulted the actor Jussie Smollett in what the police called a staged hate crime filed a federal defamation lawsuit Tuesday against the entertainer’s legal team.

Mitch Smith

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