Protesters Decry Video Of Oak Lawn Police Beating Arab American Teen

OAK LAWN, IL — Throngs of angry protesters gathered in front of Oak Lawn Village Hall Thursday afternoon, after a citizen’s video surfaced showing three officers repeatedly punching an Arab American teen. Oak Lawn police said he fled a traffic stop and was later found to be carrying a loaded gun.

The protesters — many from the Arab American community — demanded an end to police “racial profiling” of Arab Americans, and the immediate firing of the three officers shown on the citizen’s video striking blows to the teen’s head and body. The arrested 17-year-old boy remains hospitalized under police guard at Advocate Christ Medical Center.

Oak Lawn police haven’t released the teen’s name, who is a juvenile, but people gathered in front of village hall identified him as “Hadi.”

Related: Oak Lawn Police Defend Use Of Force In Video Showing Cops Punching Kid

A woman of Arab descent, who did not want her name to be used, told Patch that Oak Lawn police have been “extremely aggressive” with Arab American residents. She said she’s had numerous encounters with the Oak Lawn Police Department where she was pulled over for “unnecessary reasons.”

“I had a cop pull me over for not fully stopping at a stop sign,” she said. “The next thing you know, I see four cop cars show up. They did a 360 of my car.”

She called the Oak Lawn Police Department’s initial statement Thursday morning “disgusting.”

“If he were standing and holding something against them, hey, blue lives matter,” she said. “When I see inhumane things happening, that’s not okay.”

“It doesn’t give anyone the right to beat a minor. He was restrained and begging them to stop,” she continued. “Now we have a minor in the hospital in critical condition.

Husan Marajda, of the Arab American Action Network, which organized the protest, said he spoke to the injured teen’s family earlier in the day. Marajda said the teen is in critical condition with internal injuries at Advocate Christ. Oak Lawn police have not released information on the boy’s condition.

“[The parents] are horrified and disgusted by what the police have done to their kid,” Marajda said, spokesman for the Arab American Action Network, which organized the protest. “Nobody should have been beaten the way this kid has been. No one should be beaten by police officers. That’s not their job.”

Oak Lawn police maintain that the teen had an accessory bag containing a loaded gun and would not comply with orders to relinquish the bag. The citizen video, that surfaced Wednesday evening, showed the teen lying on his stomach as two officers punched his body and head. They are then joined by a third officer to finish handcuffing the teen after he was tased.

Marajda said the facts of the 17-year-old boy’s arrest and whether he was a threat still aren’t known. He said the only threat in the video was three police officers “beating the [boy] on the ground and smashing his face in the pavement.”

“We see mass shooters like the [white] Highland Park shooter killing multiple people and wounding others,” Marajda added. “He was apprehended without a scratch. It tells us a lot about the racial prejudice and systemic racism in law enforcement.”

During the demonstration, Oak Lawn police could be seen walking a man wearing a red MAGA hat across the village green and away from the protesters. When the gathering started to disperse, a woman carrying a sign supporting the Oak Lawn police drew an angry outcry from the protesters, who screamed, “racist.” Marajda and the other organizers told the crowd to go home.

The Chicago chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Chicago) said in a statement that the 17-year-old, who lives in Bridgeview, is in a neck brace at the hospital and suffers from a broken nose, bruising to his face, right arm, and back, and internal bleeding near his brain and forehead.

CAIR-Chicago decried the police brutality it said is shown in the video, and called for a complete internal departmental investigation, along with the discipline of the officers.

“Regardless of the alleged infraction that led to the arrest, the video clearly shows a restrained teenager in submission, not resisting, being brutally beaten by three officers without justification,” CAIR-Chicago Executive Director Ahmed Rehab said. “As a result, he has sustained internal bleeding to the head, a broken nose, and other bodily injuries, all fully avoidable. The issue here is excessive force and police brutality. Something we are seeing again and again and again.”

Facebook Live video of protest