Chicago police have released a social media post they say may have encouraged hundreds of individuals to descend on the city’s “Magnificent Mile” shopping district to loot and riot.
The post purports to outline a response to a “police-involved shooting” on the city’s south side. Initially, a fabricated story about an unarmed black teenager, shot dead as he was fleeing from police in the city’s Englewood neighborhood, circulated on Twitter and other social media platforms. Although the story turned out to be false — police were instead called to the scene to confront an armed man who engaged them in an exchange of gunfire — the narrative quickly went viral, shared by many of the city’s anti-racism and anti-police brutality activists.
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