New York Daily News: MANHATTAN, NY – A 13-year-old boy had his hands up when he was shot dead by a Chicago cop last month, according to stunning body-camera video released Thursday afternoon.

Adam Toledo did not appear to be holding a gun when he was shot, contrary to what authorities said after the March 29 incident.

The release of the gruesome video left the city bracing for chaos. The shooting in an alley on the city’s West Side had generated protests even before the clip was made public.

In the footage, which was published by the city’s Civilian Office of Police Accountability, Toledo races away from cops down an alley. An officer, identified in a police report as Eric Stillman, demands that the teen stop, then shouts at him to “show me your f—ing hands”.

Toledo stops, turns and raises his hands. Then a gunshot rings out, and Toledo crumples to the ground. Blood coats his face and sweatshirt.

Prior to the release of the video, Mayor Lori Lightfoot addressed reporters and the city on Thursday, describing it as “incredibly difficult to watch.”

Early on March 29, Stillman, 34, and his partner responded to a gunshot alert in the Little Village neighborhood. They encountered Toledo and a man, 21-year-old Ruben Roman.

Once there, Stillman shoved Roman to the ground, body-cam video showed. His partner then detained Roman, while Stillman chased and shot Toledo.

The night of the shooting, a Chicago police spokesperson tweeted a photo of a gun on the scene. In video released Thursday, from a building security camera on the other side of a parking lot near where Toledo was shot, the teen makes an underhand toss motion in the direction of where the gun was found.

Several days after the shooting, Roman was charged with carrying and firing the weapon. Those suspected shots were detected by Chicago’s ShotSpotter alert system, which sent cops to scene.

The Civilian Office of Police Accountability said Thursday that its probe of the police shooting was ongoing.

And Lightfoot asked Chicagoans to remain calm and peaceful in the aftershocks of the tragedy. She said it remained a “complicated and nuanced story.”

But she acknowledged the city had failed Toledo and expressed sympathy for his parents, who watched the video before its release.

“No parent should ever have video broadcast widely of their child’s last moments,” Lightfoot said. “Much less be placed in the terrible position of losing their child in the first place.”

  • Top Feature Photo: Police work at the scene of a fatal shooting of 13-year-old Adam Toledo by a Chicago Police officer on March 29, 2021 – Antonio Perez/AP