The Washington Post published a story Wednesday about a 26-year-old black man in Chicago killed following a shootout with police last month. Readers have to scan eight paragraphs under the headline, “Police fire 96 shots in 41 seconds, killing Black man during traffic stop,” before learning bodycam footage indicates Dexter Reed fired first, wounding an officer.
“Dexter Reed’s mother remembers the last time she saw her son alive. ‘Mom, I’m going for a ride,’ he told her, before heading out in the car that he had purchased just three days earlier,” the Post’s story began. “Reed, 26, was killed that same day, when tactical-unit police officers fired 96 bullets at him within 41 seconds, according to Chicago’s Civilian Office of Police Accountability, or COPA, which investigates allegations of police misconduct and police shootings.”
Readers had to keep scrolling to find “COPA said its review of the footage and initial reports ‘appear to confirm that Mr. Reed fired first,’ hitting one officer while four others returned fire.”
It wasn’t just the Washington Post that ran with the hysterical headline highlighting 96 shots before presenting any evidence Reed shot at police first. CBS, CNN, and USA Today each framed the shooting as another episode of police misconduct. USA Today omitted Reed’s provocation for the first three paragraphs.
“It ended with Reed, 26, being gunned down on a residential corner by Chicago police officers who fired nearly 100 rounds in less than a minute,” the Gannett paper reported in its article’s
