In October 2014, when Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke shot and killed 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, the case received limited media attention and quickly disappeared from view. In February 2015, Invisible Institute’s Jamie Kalven published “Sixteen Shots” in Slate, detailing the medical examiner’s report which revealed both the number of shots – 16, front and back – as well as the existence of a dashcam video that captured the incident. After a protracted legal battle , the video was released in November 2015.
The persistence of journalists, activists and lawyers ultimately led to a cascade of events: : a Department of Justice investigation, the firing of police superintendent Garry McCarthy’s, State's Attorney Anita Alvarez being voted out of office, Mayor Rahm Emanuel declining to run again – and years later, a court-ordered consent decree that commits the Chicago Police Department to reforms. Van Dyke was convicted of 2nd degree murder in 2019.
Drawing on Kalven’s Polk Award-winning “Sixteen Shots,” filmmaker Rick Rowley created the documentary “16 Shots” (SHOWTIME). The film, produced by Kalven and co-produced by the Invisible Institute’s Alison Flowers, won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Investigative Documentary and a Television Academy Honor and was nominated for a Peabody Award.
“Almost immediately, it immerses the viewer in a tale of two cities: one ridden with an angst stemming from injustice and the other refusing to relinquish control and accept responsibility, offering a candid look into the thoughts of activists, prosecutors, former police officers and even eyewitnesses of the murder.”
–The Guardian
“...you can feel anger coursing through this film, and it says far more than loud words could.”
– The New York Times