*The white Chicago police officer accused of murder in the shooting death of a black teenager Laquan McDonald was charged on Thursday with 16 new counts of aggravated battery.
Jason Van Dyke pleaded not guilty through his attorney in a Chicago courtroom to 16 counts of aggravated battery with a firearm that were issued by a grand jury on March 16 and unsealed on Thursday by a special prosecutor, local media reported.
Video footage of 17-year-old McDonald being shot 16 times by Van Dyke in October 2014 was released more than a year later, sparking protests and pushing the city into a national debate over police use of force on unarmed African Americans. The release of the video also led to the removal of Chicago’s police chief.
Van Dyke pleaded not guilty to murder in 2015 and is awaiting trial.
Special prosecutor Joseph McMahon did not give an explanation for the new charges on Thursday.
Four Chicago police officers were suspended for not having properly functioning dashboard cameras during the shooting, officials said in January. Chicago’s Office of the Inspector General recommended 11 of the 15 officers involved in the incident be discharged.
The U.S. Justice Department began a civil rights investigation in December 2015 after the video was released by court order.
The department said in a report in January that Chicago police routinely violated the civil rights of people, citing excessive force, racially discriminatory conduct and a “code of silence” to thwart investigations into police misconduct.
The report said excessive force falls “heaviest on black and Latino communities,” with police using force almost 10 times more often against blacks than whites.
